It’s been almost one year later — so what do the True Believers think?
Next week, we’ll (hopefully) know the answer, as Stuart Green over on the Comic Book Resources forums has put up a survey asking readers what they think about Spider-Man’s status quo following the events of One More Day and its follow-up story arc, Brand New Day.
In the series by J. Michael Strazcynski and Marvel EiC Joe Quesada, Peter Parker “erases” all traces of his marriage to Mary Jane Watson in a deal with the demon Mephisto to save the life of Aunt May. According to a Newsarama survey from last year, more than two-thirds of the responses to the story were negative.
In this storyline, Marvel revamped the Spider-Man franchise, collapsing the three running titles into one thrice-a-month title helmed by Dan Slott, Marc Guggenheim, and Zeb Wells. In the all-new, all-different Amazing Spider-Man, Peter Parker has been living with his Aunt May — reeling after an as-yet-unexplained break-up with Mary Jane — as he hangs with a mysteriously-resurrected Harry Osborn and flees the police as an unregistered superhuman. To make matters worse, someone has been leaving spider tracers at murder scenes, and a new red-headed superheroine known as Jackpot has been crossing Peter’s path!
One way many people have voted, however, is not with paper, but with their wallets. According to a post by our own Vaneta Rogers, sales have increased with the character’s new direction, but retailers fear that these numbers are on the road to slipping. Meanwhile, reviewing sales estimates from ICv2 over the past 12 months have shown that while the title has dwindled in sales in recent months (dropping from around the 100,000 range in January to around the 70-80,000 range in September and October), the thrice-a-month status of the book still yields more than double the amount of the Spider-Man franchise’s pre-BND sales.
December 1st, 2008 at 10:04 am
The thing is that this cop-out invalidates any future evolution for the character. Aunt May won’t die, because if she does, what was the point? Personally, I prefer the characters that evolve, and that is the major flaw of the Johns’ penned Superman, too. Perry White smoking? He had lung cancer. Clark a mumbling idiot? Come on. All of you superheroes start having children, so I don’t have to.
December 1st, 2008 at 10:35 am
What is there to say at this point? What’s done is done. Many of us hated it (including me), and others liked it. Or, at least, they liked the end resulted even if they didn’t like the means of arriving there.
Those of who hated OMD and have no interest in picking up a Spider-Man comic ever again have had our say, and it’s clear that nothing’s gonna change Joephisto’s mind. Except for maybe falling sales, and even then I don’t know that it’ll help. Even though ASM’s numbers per issue have fallen significantly, the last I saw the sales per months still out sell the combined numbers of the three core Spidey books that preceded BND.
The new Spidey seems directionless and stuck in a state of arrested development now… Two decades (or more) of stories are invalidated (for better or worse) and the characters will not be allowed to develop and change, even as the rest of the 616 apparently does. It’s disappointing, especially after being lied to about the “years” of story ideas Marvel had for an unmasked Spidey (I was skeptical, but honestly intrigued), but it hasn’t affected my life in any way. I just ignore it.
Nothing I’ve read about the “new” Spidey sounds interesting to me, and the new villains sound really lame. Oh, and if anyone was still buying this stuff and finding themselves disappointed by the laughable non-reveal of “Jackpot,” they’ve only got themselves to blame. Wake me when everything from OMN and BND is undone or retconned. I really don’t see the point of rehashing all the animosity of OMD over and over again.
December 1st, 2008 at 1:00 pm
I’m still firmly in the, “Spider-Man is awesome again!” category. Of course, I grew up in the 90’s, so to some this might be my first exposure to a good Spider-Man, while it might explain to others why I even like this Brand New Day stuff.
One More Day was bad. The execution was ridiculous, the explanation was this close to being one of the failed retcon ideas for the clone saga, and the throwing in of “Yeah, sure I’ll make it so everybody forgets your identity!” was lazy storytelling.
Doesn’t mean Brand New Day can’t be good. Dan Slott is knocking it out of the park, Guggenheim has been consistent, Casey is a welcome addition, Waid is Waid, Wells is quirky and fun, and Gale is the weakest link yet still somewhat strong. And the voice of Peter Parker has been consistent even with the shifts in artists and writers. I’m having fun reading Spider-Man; it no longer feels like a chore to follow a story like it did for the last year or so of JMS’ run.
So yeah, I’m enjoying the ride. Still…could this still be done with a married Spider-Man? Of course. Good writers will bring good Spider-Man. They would have found a way to make it work no matter what directions the cards were falling. But we got an un-married Spidey and the stories are still good. So let’s go with that for a while.
Everyone is entitled to their opinions, but I’m happy with the book right now.
December 1st, 2008 at 6:52 pm
First, sorry for all my typos above… I was writing at work, trying to not be caught! Hopefully, I my comments made enough sense in spite of it all.
Second, growing up in the 90’s meant not not having any “good Spider-Man”? Oh sonny… Let me recommend you check out DeMatteis’ run. Specifically, get yourself a copy of Kraven’s Last Hunt. That was some great stuff, and he was married the whole while.
If you’re enjoying Spidey now, more power to you. I just don’t care for it anymore.
December 3rd, 2008 at 11:52 am
Not counting New Ways to Die issues, the sales numbers are more around the mid-60,000s.