When Words Collide - Mar 26, 2012

[CBR News]

Tim reflects on a rarely-discussed pulp revamp from two decades ago, when writer and artist Tim Truman relaunched the Spider for Eclipse and changed the 1930s version of 1991, forever.


Full article here.

[CSPDX]

This article has an excessive usage of the word "pirate". I approve.

[emb021]

And forgotten is the much better and on-going series of Spider comics from Moonstone.

"The Spider is a ferocious-looking wastelander type of character in this version, barely recognizable as the same guy who once looked like a mix between the Shadow and Zatara." BZZZZT!!!! Try again.

The Spider cover you gave is NOT an accurate depiction of how the Spider REALLY looked. Most weren't. Moonstone is actually doing a pretty good job of accurately portraying him, UNLIKE Dynamite. Try doing a little research. Girasol is reprinting the original Spider in double volumes, and Moonstone has done one volume of new Spider prose stories.

In the pulps, the Spider actually went around with a fright wig, hunchback, fake vampire fangs, along with the fedora and a mean pair of 45's. And unlike the Shadow, was not afraid to use them, then stamping his victims with his spider stamp so everyone would know who did the deed.

[emb021]

And "Reign of the Vampire King" is an original Spider novel from 1935: "Death Reign of the Vampire King".

Here are some of the others:

City of Flaming Shadows
Satan's Death Blast
The Corpse Cargo
The Red Death Rain
Slaves of the Crime Master
Reign of the Death Fiddler
Master of the Death-Madness
The Cholera King
Laboratory of the Damned
The Devil's Death Dwarfs
The City That Dared Not Eat
The Gray Horde Creeps
The City That Paid to Die
King of the Fleshless Legion
The Benevolent Order of Death
Volunteer Corpse Brigade


The Spider was a weird combination of hero pulp and weird menace pulp, a specialty of Popular Publications who produced The Spider.

[batlash]

I always thought Tim Truman's "Spider" was oddly true to its origins. It was set in a retro-future and re-imagined The Spider's world, but the characters seemed to me at the time to be the same characters I enjoyed in the pulp novels. Truman knows how to bring a new twist to something without trashing it. Okay, he trashed The Spider's costume, but hey, he kept the fright wig and the fangs! In fact, I think Truman's visual representation of The Spider is much better than the upcoming Dynamite version of a guy in a suite draped with a spider-web motif cape and cowl. With a fedora on top! It looks sort of like The Spider from the Warren Hull serials, and just as hokey. Truman's story was pure "Spider," wild and crazed. Good stuff

[Jon Vinson]

Great article, Tim. I've just been enjoying Hawkworld, starting with the limited series and through the regular series (which Truman co-wrote with John Ostrander for the first nine issues before Ostrander took it over solo. The final three issues, Truman comes back to do the art!) I think Hawkworld, the limited series, is about as good as super-hero comics can get. The regular series is fun stuf but not nearly as bold or consistant. Truman's covers for some of those final issues, though, are amazing!!
I also enjoyed Volume 1 of Scout recently, so you might say I'm on a bit of a Truman kick. I have Scout Volume 2 and that JLA limited series sitting in my "must read soon" stack.

[emb021]

I always thought Tim Truman's "Spider" was oddly true to its origins. It was set in a retro-future and re-imagined The Spider's world, but the characters seemed to me at the time to be the same characters I enjoyed in the pulp novels. Truman knows how to bring a new twist to something without trashing it. Okay, he trashed The Spider's costume, but hey, he kept the fright wig and the fangs! In fact, I think Truman's visual representation of The Spider is much better than the upcoming Dynamite version of a guy in a suite draped with a spider-web motif cape and cowl. With a fedora on top! It looks sort of like The Spider from the Warren Hull serials, and just as hokey. Truman's story was pure "Spider," wild and crazed. Good stuff

Am not sure I'd say that Truman "trashed" the Spiders outfit. He made changes to it that fit/worked in the world he created. And I had no problem with that.

Uh, its pretty clear that Dynamite took the look of the serials rather then the pulps, which is what Moonstone is doing.

[Blade X]

I read this mini series when it first came out and I loved it. I highly recommend this mini series.

[KurtW95]

I can't believe this article didn't mention that The Spider partially inspired Stan Lee to create Spider-Man.

[Leocomix]

Definitely worth reprinting.