Why Did The Spider-Man Reboot Fail?

[remoteman]

The second part is now up on my blog - I review the first issue of the reboot, Amazing Spider-Man #1.

On the whole, not an abysmal first issue but a fairly uninspired one in pretty much every respect. The most striking thing for me about the issue was Aunt May's characterisation - it was utterly dreadful, with the last 20 years or so of the character's history completely ignored. The fact that Mackie seems to be setting her up as a mainstay of the title makes this development particularly grating.

[oldschool]

Josh, I checked out your blog last nite and I must commend you: very, very well done! I thoroughly enjoyed your take on not just the ASM reboot of a decade ago but other more recent reviews as well. Congrats again on a job well done!

[NickFury90]

Oh, let me count the ways

-They killed Mary-Jane. One of the laziest, dumbest, creatively-bankrupt ideas Marvel has done in the past decade or so. First of all, its not like Spidey needed anymore shaking up. So many people from his life have been killed, and then he was a clone, and then he wasn't, then Aunt May was dead, then she wasn't. We don't need anymore characters killed off for shock drama.

She wasn't like Gwen Stacy, who was dramatically spent had stopped being an interesting character 50 issues ago, and its not like you could duplicate the Death of Gwen Stacy due to the context of the time.

But that didn't stop Bob Harras and co. So she goes up in a plane, BOOM, dead. The death of Mary Jane cast a pall over the series and turned it into a sheer act of masochism to read every month. And then having Peter lose all his money, lose his home, sleep on the streets, get a job as a dishwasher in order to have money to eat, all of these indignities heaped upon Peter were for the sole purpose of heaping indignities upon him. And not even in the good drama sense kind of way; all his friends pretty much deserted him, even Jonah and Aunt May didn't help him out. Mary-Jane left a big hole in the series, and the book was lesser for it each and every month.

-Aunt May comes back in stupidly far-fetched reason, contributes NOTHING to the book. You retroactively rob much of the power from ASM #400 for this retcon, and what does she do? The same ol' bullshit that was already parody-status in the Lee/Romita run: worrying about Peter, worrying about her age/heatlh, talking about "that awful Spider-Man", and getting threatened by a badguy. JMS fixed some of these complaints and made her a lot more enganging, but at the time, he was nowhere in sight. We just had this plot device masquerading as a character, in a poor attempt to recapture the feel of the glory days.

-Spider-Woman sucked: Mattie Franklin was such a stupidly contrived character, and I'm glad her book got cancelled shortly after it began. Her being killed off unglamorously in Grim Hunt was maybe the best part about that story.

-Tri-Corp amounted to nothing: Peter Parker never shows up to work! All those politically correct characters at Tri-Corp, introduced for nothing! Say what you will about how Dan Slott's writing the Horizon Labs scenes and how Peter's fellow scientists are basically set dressing, but at least we see Peter interact with them, at his job, in visually interesting ways and is built into the plot of the Spider-Man adventures. Tri-Corp was a ok idea with terrible execution.

-Randy Robertson is hip fresh cool roommate, always laughing about Peter Parker's relationship problems and telling him to sell her shit on eBay. Dude, his wife JUST DIED LAST WEEK, holy shit, man.

-Senator Ward: Some of the most BORING Spider-Man stuff I've ever read, and it just went on for MONTHS.

-Amazing Spider-Man Volume 2 #18
Peter Parker Volume 2 #18: OMG, this story, you guys...I'm angry just thinking about it. Simply the worst Spider-Man story I've ever read. Yes, worst then the one you're thinking about. Wow.

[remoteman]

Josh, I checked out your blog last nite and I must commend you: very, very well done! I thoroughly enjoyed your take on not just the ASM reboot of a decade ago but other more recent reviews as well. Congrats again on a job well done!

I'm really glad you enjoyed it and I can't tell you how much I appreciate the compliment. Be sure to keep reading

[The Superior Michael Deery]

I remember the issue after MJ's "death" featured Matti Franklin telling Peter that MJ died so that they could be together and then the teenager kissed the man in his mid twenties. That issue was also part one fo a story that concluded in Spider-Woman.

The issue after MJ died, what should have been a monumental issue in comic book issue was a setup to push a new series.

It was stupid.

[Venomous Mask]

Remember this timeless villain?

[AstonishingXMan]

For one, the art was hideous and some of the villains/new allies were super lame.

John Byrne lost his touch in the early 80's, basically.

The stink of "Chapter 1" did no favors for the books.

[Cody1982]

Just read the blog, nice reviews. I've only read a few issues in the reboot era myself. I'd be interested to at least give them a once-over.

[Venomous Mask]

For one, the art was hideous and some of the villains/new allies were super lame.

John Byrne lost his touch in the early 80's, basically.

The stink of "Chapter 1" did no favors for the books.

The Chapter 1 stories that I read weren't horrible, just horribly unnecessary.


This was the best comic cover of the reboot:

[Venomous Mask]

For one, the art was hideous and some of the villains/new allies were super lame.

John Byrne lost his touch in the early 80's, basically.

The stink of "Chapter 1" did no favors for the books.

The Chapter 1 stories that I read weren't horrible, just horribly unnecessary.


This was the best comic cover of the reboot:

[remoteman]

Part three is up, dealing with Peter Parker: Spider-Man #1.

Again, not an awful issue but I have been really taken aback by how dull the two #1s were. Both were fairly basic stories, and although Mackie has done his best to introduce a few mysteries there is nothing immediately compelling about them. Literally nothing has been done to make the new Spider-Man interesting, and at this stage he is actually a very unlikable character. The choice of villains has been poor too. The Scorpion is a classic foe but most of what makes his character unique was absent, and the Ranger is just pretty dull based on his first appearance.

[davidjack]

The reboot failed in the sense of not creating an interesting new scenario. The reboot was bad. Not as bas as Ben Reilly becoming spider-man but almost as bad. The clone saga was cool but became weird and uninteresting, not defined. Then the Byrne reboot was sad, unimportant. Only one cool idea, who was the new spider-man but not enough... JMS was so much better, Bendis was so much better. Millard was so much better. Slott too. every time that I hear some one complaining about OMD and BND i wonder if they don't remember how BAD was used to be from 1996 to 1999... Bussiek was amazing

[remoteman]

The reboot was bad. Not as bas as Ben Reilly becoming spider-man but almost as bad.

The Ben Reilly era was pretty good, I thought. Not amazing but certainly better than the reboot.

[davidjack]

I'm a Ben Reilly fan BUT some of the stuff, some of the inner dialogues were soooooo bad. Lady Octopus, interesting, the Reilly girlfriends were bad. some cool ideas every here and there like Johny 5 or Spider Carnage why not. But from a 2011 perspective were some very bad stories, like the virtual reality Scarlet Spider stuff. Uggggggggh.

[remoteman]

I'm a Ben Reilly fan BUT some of the stuff, some of the inner dialogues were soooooo bad. Lady Octopus, interesting, the Reilly girlfriends were bad. some cool ideas every here and there like Johny 5 or Spider Carnage why not. But from a 2011 perspective were some very bad stories, like the virtual reality Scarlet Spider stuff. Uggggggggh.

The short lived Scarlet Spider series' were indeed very bad. I'm purely counting the stories after Ben became Spider-Man though, they were generally solid.