Comics are Awesome II

[BWprowl]

Yeah, that's the thing. If 'Superior Spider-Man' were just some dumb event name, I wouldn't expect this to last past a few issues. But #700 is apparently the END of the Amazing Spider-Man title, and then they're launching a whole new book named after and starring this Ock-brain-Spider-whatever. Which makes me think they probably plan on keeping this around for a little while, anyway.

It's just...such a fabulously stupid idea. Who at the board meeting thought saying "Let's make Doctor Octopus be Spider-Man!" would be a good idea? And how did all the people there *agree* with him? And doing it via brainswitch? Doc Ock hooking up with Mary Jane? It's just...It's like the writer (his name's Slott, I think?) took a dare that he couldn't come up with a stupider idea than One More Day.

[andersonh1]

There's a thread with the ASM 700 spoilers stickied on 4chan's /co/ board, along with a whole bunch of awesomely angry replies. For those wondering...

Spoiler

So I guess Doctor Octopus and Peter Parker switched brains, and this issue has Peter-in-Ock's-body having a bunch of supervillains help him try to take down Ock-in-Peter's-body-as-Spider-Man so he can get switched back. But it doesn't work because Spider-Ock-Man is just TOO POWERFUL and beats them all up and beats Ock-Peter within an inch of his life. So Ock-Peter apparently somehow transfers his memories over to Otto-Spider-Octo-Man, and goes "Think of Uncle Ben, dude! Do the right thing!" and Octo-Spiderpus is all "Yeah, I will, I'll be a better super-hero as Spider-Man than you ever were! I will be the SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN!" and Doctor-Peterpus is like "lol, okay. HRRK-Bleaaah" and dies.

Doctor Octopus is going to be the new Spider-Man for the relaunch. Also he's apparently going to be trying to get into a relationship with Mary-Jane. I'm likely buying this issue on Wednesday just to watch this trainwreck unfold.

Aaaaaaaand cue O6...

They are really scraping the bottom of the barrel with this idea. In fact, they may have gone through the barrel and are actually scraping the dirt underneath. Comic book writers really have run out of ideas.

[BWprowl]

So leaked complete scans of ASM 700, along with the follow-up issue of Avenging Spider-Man 15.1 (Marvel does .1 issues now? That's silly.), and I read 'em both last night because my morbid curiosity for this ridiculous bad-idea pile-up cannot be sated.

ASM 700 is just okay as far as stupid comics based on really really bad ideas go. There're some gems like Otto-as-Peter talking all supervillainy "Silence, woman!" to Mary Jane, and her just shrugging it off all "Oh, Peter!". It's like, with all the time's Peter's been mind-controlled/brainwashed/whatever, you'd think she'd have some alarm bells when her Satan-enforced-ex-husband-but-still-love-interest starts acting off. The rest of it, like I said, is pretty standard fare, with lots of Peter-as-Ock being DETERMINED and touching, poignant dialogue about how he CAN'T GIVE UP until it turns out, he can, because Doc's plot armor is as strong as the METAL SPIDER HELMET he's wearing to protect himself from GOLDEN OCTOBOT BRAINSWITCH, so right before Pete dies he asks Doc to please be a good guy, and Doc does "Yeah, whatever" and thus Pete can die content to let his arch-nemesis take over his legacy and screw his love interest. Happy 700 issues and 50th anniversary, true believers!

But oh man, that follow-up issue of Avenging Spider-Man is gold. Immediately after telling Peter he'd be a hero, Spider-Doc wakes up the next morning and starts gloating about how cool he is for killing Peter and what an awesomer evil Spider-Man he's going to be. The rest of the book is Doc not being suspicious in Peter's body AT ALL as he goes around talking like an asshole supervillain to everyone Pete knows, sneaking around to one of his evil lairs, having elipse-filled inner monologues about how much he sucked as Doctor Octopus and how much cooler and more badass he wants to be as Spider-Man, set to a piecemeal montage of him playing pretty princess dress-up culminating in a first shot of his AWESOME EDGY new SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN costume! With CLAWS and LENS EYES and BLACK PARTS WHERE THE BLUE USED TO BE WHICH IS TOTALLY EDGY AND DARK EVEN THOUGH SPIDER-MAN HAD COLORS LIKE THAT IN THE 50's!! Oh god, I couldn't stop laughing the whole time I was reading this, and for some time after I was still giggling about it.

I read these via downloading scans, but I think I'll be buying these issues when I swing by my local shop after work. Marvel has my money. If I can count on Spider-Asshole comics this hilariously stupid regularly, I'll keep buying them as long as they keep me laughing like an idiot. An idea this bad needs to be supported, nurtured.

[Sparky Prime]

(Marvel does .1 issues now? That's silly.)

They started that early 2011. Supposed to be a jumping on point for readers at the start of a new story arc with a self contained issue.

Happy 700 issues and 50th anniversary, true believers!

Yeah, what a nice way to celebrate. I think you're right, someone at Marvel must have dared Slott to come up with a stupider idea than OMD. I can't imagine why else they would have seriously even considered this story, let alone actually approved it to publish.

[Sparky Prime]

Green Lantern Corps #15
Guy doesn't take being forced to resign from the GL Corps very well. He decides to go vigilante and gets in over his head when he stops a smuggling ring which was about to be busted by the police and is arrested by his own sister. Meanwhile, John explains to Fatality he's on a mission to find out what's going on with the Mogo pieces. She explains she can feel Mogo's core was part male and part female, so in effect it feels like two lost lovers trying to reunite... Not sure how a sentient planet can have a gender in the first place, but whatever. She can sense something is preventing the core from reforming and the two decide to work together. Best part of this issue I felt was Salaak spying on the Guardians and finding out what they're up to, as he finally realizes why the "free thinkers" of the Corps so often clash with the Guardians. Unfortunately for Salaak, they discover the camera and imprison him in a cell under their chamber. Bit surprised they don't just kill him right then and there, but they do suspect that he has told someone else of his suspicions so perhaps they plan on finding out who that is first until until they're ready to use the Third Army to attack the Lanterns on Oa.

Green Lantern #15
Simon confronts the man who owned the truck he'd stolen and finds out he was the real terrorist. And Simon's ring conveniently runs out of power at that moment. Don't they usually give more warning before that happens? But he's saved when Agent Fed shows up, suspecting Simon would go there to clear his name. And then they're attacked by the Third Army. They blow up the house to escape and Simon and Fed are saved by B'dg, who is looking for Hal.
Hal and Sinestro find out whoever they are following was Sinestro's enemy and Hal's friend and they're in a place called the Dead Zone. Wish they'd give us more details on this... It's soooo slow.
Meanwhile, the Guardians feel they need more power from the First Lantern as their new Army grows weaker the more spread out it is. His prison begins to crack, unnoticed by the Guardians, as "Volthoom" vows revenge.

Green Lantern New Guardians #15
Kyle, Carol and Arkillo arrive back at Okaara where Sayd is expecting them for Kyle's training. Carol doesn't understand why Sayd doesn't trust her and Sayd explains Love has cause her a lot of pain. We get a flashback from 2 years ago when Ganthet recruited Kyle and brought him to Oa for Kilowog to train, and Sayd expressed her first interest in embracing emotion to Ganthet. Wait.. what!? The first issue showed Kyle's origin as a Green Lantern hadn't changed, so how is Oa not decimated here? Anyway, Carol convinces Larfleeze she will help him find his family if he trains Kyle. Larfleeze agrees and then fights him, saying he will have to want his Lantern to learn to use its power. The Third Army then attacks, but Sayd, Carol and Arkillo hold them off so Kyle can learn Avarice. The power is almost too much for Kyle however, and Carol has to snap him out of it. Sayd allows time for them to escape but is killed by the Third Army herself. Ganthet then decides to deal with Kyle personally.
Retcon that makes no sense aside, this was a good issue. Nice to see Kyle having more of a struggle to learn one of the powers. Bit disappointed they killed off Sayd though. I'd hoped they would have her play more of a role after this story arc. And now Kyle only needs to learn to control Love.

[Onslaught Six]

Incidentally, this reminds me of at least one draft of the 1994 James Cameron Spiderman script, which had Doc Ock going around claiming he was Spiderman and saying "Okey-dokey" 12 times a page like it was his catchphrase.

I much preferred the draft with Electro and Sandman as the bad guys. (Some of that actually made it to the Sam Raimi movie!)

[Dominic]

Happy 700 issues and 50th anniversary, true believers!

Yeah.

Having bought and read the issue last week, I will say one thing for "Amazing Spider-Man" #700.

It was bad.

But, that has been more or less standard for "Spider-Man" comics for the last 20 years or so. I have tried, and failed, to come up with any *good* "Spider-Man stories since the early 90s. The most notable and defining runs of "Spider-Man", ("Amazing" or otherwise), over the last two decades are noted for being controversial at best.

This is consistent with that trend. The core concept is not bad. But, its handling in the course of two issues has been lack-luster. The 30th anniversary was marked with foil and acetate covers. The 40th was marked with JMS' less than stellar run. And, the 50th anniversary is marked with a stupid event that will not last more than a year. Its most significant impact is likely to be the return of MJ to the book, setting it back to early 80s spec. So, yeah, a bad comic that will add little of value to the franchise. That sounds like Spider-Man to me.


Dom
-EXCELSIOR!

[Onslaught Six]

It's so sad, too, because Venom and Scarlet Spider are doing great things with it. (Okay, they were doing great things six months ago. I can't speak for right now. Hopefully it's still good.)

[BWprowl]

Hey, speaking of Scarlet Spider, I actually checked that one out this week!

Scarlet Spider #13:
So I had seen this thing on the shelves a few months ago, but passed it over in a “Oh hey Scarlet Spider oh wait this is some other guy wait it’s Kaine this seems stupid” moment, and I wasn’t exactly engrossed in Marvel at the time, so. Well anyway, the other day someone on /toy/ of all places posted a few pages that made the series seem like it would be worth checking out, and if I’ve already committed to the other bad-boy Spider-Man book, why not, eh? This series is written by Chris Yost, who really impressed me with those first couple arcs of ‘Red Robin’ a while back, and he’s doing pretty well here. A new story arc kicks off in this issue (the other reason I bought it was that this seemed a decent-enough jumping-on point), and while it feels a bit short and thin in places, there’s some really solid thematic work holding it all together. The plot really just concerns Kaine trying to track down and shut down this human trafficking operation that his latest rescue alerted him to the existence of, and fighting some werewolf gang who are after said rescued girl because she’s a telepath, apparently (though she also seems to have some level of psychosympathetic powers). It ends on a rather abrupt cliffhanger, but what we get works. This book very clearly exercises the idea of Kaine being a guy not naturally inclined towards heroism who nonetheless really wants to do the right thing. It’s interesting how his natural cynicism conflicts with his efforts to find the human trafficking operation, him fretting the whole way about how pointless taking them down will be since more will just spring up to take its place, and complaining about how hard it is to fight bad guys the ‘heroic’ way, without killing them or anything. This conflict with Kaine is purportedly the driving theme of the whole book, and props to Yost for making its integration into the story look so effortless. The art’s okay, there’s a dream sequence partway through that I think was supposed to look otherworldly and so forth, but really just looks like ass, and I’m having trouble adjusting to seeing Kaine’s very non-Spider-Man-ish body type in a decidedly Spider-Man-ish costume, but it gets the job done. I’ll keep following this series for a bit.

Speaking of bad-boy Spider-dudes…

The Superior Spider-Man #1:
Okay, this series is pretty much everything I wanted and expected it to be: the most gloriously over-the-top execution of the worst idea I’ve seen in a long time. Otto’s utter refusal to act like anything *other* than a gloating supervillain while he’s supposed to be masquerading as Parker, with no one really questioning at all, makes for a comic that had me giggling all the way. I love how he’s in full mad scientist getup while he’s working at Horizon, ranting about SCIENCE to his boss, and then he just hands him some ideas for theoretically-good SCIENCE products, and his boss is all ‘keep up the good work, Pete!’. Then we see him at dinner with Mary-Jane, where he spends half a page narrating how much he wants to bone her while staring at her rack, all the while swirling his wine villainous-brandy style and gesticulating EVILLY! And Mary-Jane doesn’t question any of this, she’s more interested in why Peter isn’t stopping the Sinister Six RIGHT NOW! Well, that gives way to the one actually interesting part of the story: watching Otto take down super-villains, and doing it only as another super-villain would do. It’s pretty interesting, Otto’s use of spying, as well as deducing what components the Sinister Six would go for based on what stock evil gizmo he knew they were building was clever, and seeing him rely on traps and specific-character-tuned technology to take the bad guys down really drives home the point that this is still a comic-book-villain himself piloting the Spider-Body, and it’ll be interesting to see if his heroing style evolves from this over time, especially since the last page reveals that Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Ghost is still floating around Otto’s noggin, influencing him when he can and formulating a way to take his body back! Dun dun DUUUUUUN!!!

Seriously, this book is the best kind of stupid and still manages to work some interesting ideas in out of its retarded, retarded concept.

So someone please tell me there’s a Marvel Universe figure of Superior Spider-Douche in the pipeline.

[Onslaught Six]

and I’m having trouble adjusting to seeing Kaine’s very non-Spider-Man-ish body type in a decidedly Spider-Man-ish costume, but it gets the job done.

Are you comparing it to Kaine's old body? Because now he's just A Peter Parker Clone. I guess. (I dunno. I didn't read the thing that preceeded this. The first issue really brushes it off and kind of goes, "Okay, Kaine's here, he looks like this, and he's a Spiderman now. You're reading this book; you're clearly already in.")