My last issue of "friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man," it's the Spidey/JJJ confrontation that's literally years in the making. Whad'ja think?
PAD
Posted by Peter David at August 22, 2007 03:39 PM | TrackBack | Other blogs commentingBeen looking forward to this for years.
Years.
Looking forward to seeing consequences to this little meeting over the years to come.
Great issue! How long have you been waiting to use the "I hate that F.N. Spider-Man" joke?
Loved it. Any Spidey title in which Peter Parker acts more like a guy smart enough to have invented his own webshooters and less like a hormonal underwear model is welcome indeed.
> Looking forward to seeing consequences to this little meeting over the years to come.
I believe the phrase is "Don't Bet On It". You didn't see the FCBD issue, did you?
PAD, your best FNSM issue ever and one of my all-time favorites, right up there with The Commuter and the Death of Jean DeWolff. The psychological motivation you gave for Peter's actions in this issue was so perfect for the character that I had one of those weird comic book moments where I felt like I was reading about a real person.
Loved the fact that JJJ really DID walk into the door!
"Somebody": Yeah, my hopes are likely for naught. For now, anyway. Anything that's retconned once, after all...
Very solid issue. But to be perfectly honest, I thought the "walked into a door" gag was a terrible cheat. You used JJJ's black eye to ratchet up the danger and the tension in the confrontation and then when it's all over and we're trying to process this big exchange...
Boinnngggg! Wah-way-wahhh! (cue laugh track)
It didn't feel like a punchline...it just felt like a cheap copout. Like you purchased that early tension, that sense of high stakes, with a check that you knew for a fact was going to bounce.
Otherwise, good issue.
Thoroughly enjoyed it -- it's about time the two of them had a real tete-a-tete.
TWL
Along with the just released Sensational #40, this will have been the last new Spider-Man comic I ever buy (Ultimate excepted) if the rumours about 'One More Day' being a grand insult to the readers intelligence and to all the people who've created S-M stories over the past 20 years turn out to be true.
And to be honest, as well as being a great story it made a fine jumping-off point too.
The door gag worked for me. But, more importantly, this, along with how Peter cleaned Kingpin's clock with ridiculous ease (as he SHOULD HAVE years ago!) make for two fine closing points. JMS and you picked fine tales to go out on. Now, about SHE-HULK ... ;-)
That was a good story and probably one of my favorite Spider-mans in a long while.
You are probably one of the better JJJ writers out there. Many go for the cliche Jameson lines.
Peter, I've always enjoyed how you're one of the few writers to treat Jameson as a character as opposed to a caricature. (I still remember the story that ended years ago with Jameson's monologue about how the Bugle didn't HAVE to run all those retractions.) I especially liked the brief scene of Jonah calling out "Peter?"
Awesome. That meeting was DECADES in the making, and I'm surprised that it wasn't done before. I particularly liked the fact that it was grounded in Peter and Jonah's psychology, and not just a gratuitous slugfest (though we shouldn't be surprised, since it was you handling it, Peter). I also liked the genuine tension as I was reading it, because I didn't know whether Jonah would or would not hit Peter.
The one thing that did not make sense to me was the walking-in-the-door thing. Walking into a door would cause one's nose to be injured. I don't understand how it would give you black eyes.
It was a great send-off, Peter, and I eagerly look forward to your first ish of She-Hulk.
Ever get hit really hard in the nose? You can get black eyes from it. Most often, when someone breaks their nose, they get black eyes.
Great issue, PAD, I'm gonna miss your writing, and I'll consider this the last good Spidey comic written.
Kim Metzger wrote:
Peter, I've always enjoyed how you're one of the few writers to treat Jameson as a character as opposed to a caricature. (I still remember the story that ended years ago with Jameson's monologue about how the Bugle didn't HAVE to run all those retractions.) I especially liked the brief scene of Jonah calling out "Peter?"
Agreed:
I remember two "PAD" scenes with Jonah, (Both from Web of.." (I think)
-- One was ere Spidey confronts JJ, reminding JJ of all the times that he has saved Jonah and fam, and yet Jonah still felt the need to keep pushing and pushing, and that he (spidey) was gonna push back -- grabbing his collar. Jonah responded that he didn' think he was that good of a writer -- making Spidey replied, "You Stink" and hen leave.
The other was pure newsman Jonah. During the inferno summer crossover. Jonah comes stroming out of his office with a newspaper yelling about the headline "Poltergeists!" He pulls out a red marker a scratches out hte "!" replacing it with a "?" gives the coorected copy to Joy Mercado leaves.
Loved it. Great ending. I also liked the door gag
However..How did you, Peter like the ending. You mentioned earlier that the book was cancelled somewhat unexpectedly and you had to wrap up your story sooner than you originally planned. How much different would the story have been if you had the time you thought?
It pulled no punches. Truly awesome. JJ breaking his fists on Petes face....and then walking into a door.
Though the wine grab at the end was a little gratuitous.
I loved this issue. One of my all-time favorite Spider-Man issues of... um... all time.
The door gag worked. JJ saying, "Peter?" worked. Everything worked.
Sorry to see you leave the "regular" Spider-verse.
Brad Milyo
Very solid issue. But to be perfectly honest, I thought the "walked into a door" gag was a terrible cheat. You used JJJ's black eye to ratchet up the danger and the tension in the confrontation and then when it's all over and we're trying to process this big exchange...
Boinnngggg! Wah-way-wahhh! (cue laugh track)
It didn't feel like a punchline...it just felt like a cheap copout. Like you purchased that early tension, that sense of high stakes, with a check that you knew for a fact was going to bounce.
You had the option of taking Jonah's word he walked into a door. If anything, you seem to be complaining because it literally wasn't a cheat.
Ratcheting up suspense to a knowing audience is not a casual accomplishment in presenting a story. Homer had to keep the attention of an audience who already knew the histories of Achilles and the Trojan War, and Vonnegut gave away his endings at the beginning of most of his books.
Jonah was presented after his confrontation with Peter, but the effects on Jonah of Peter's reaction had to be taken as far away from what actually happened in the story without violating what actually happened. Coupling this with Chaplin's paradigm of stepping over the banana peel to fall into a manhole cover, the gag seems worth speaking in favor of.
Also, I liked how Jonah was maneuvered into interacting with an attitude much like his own in Randy after confronting Peter. There is a double-bind that can be inferred from Peter validating the offense Jonah takes from him by allowing Jonah to vent on him, then Jonah confronting someone taking a similar offense from him that I think is worth revisiting if Jonah's maturation becomes an ongoing theme.
"Jonah comes stroming out of his office with a newspaper yelling about the headline "Poltergeists!" He pulls out a red marker a scratches out hte "!" replacing it with a "?" gives the coorected copy to Joy Mercado leaves."
Credit where credit is due - Gerry Conway did that scene. (And it was Kate, if anyone cares. :-) )
Anyway, if you're going to have Peter reveal his id to the world, a Jonah/Peter confrontation issue is a must. I'm glad PAD was the one to do it. And I also hope that someday he gets to write Spider-Man when the poor character isn't being tossed around from event to event. Even so, this run of issues was the most I've enjoyed Spider-Man comics in a really long time. I'm sad to see it end.
Sigh!. An issue like this reminds me why I am a comic fan. Sorry to see you leave this title, Peter, as you have told some great stories during the all too brief time you were on this title. Still, you are still writing Spider-Man for Marvel Adventures.
A great send-off for your run and a satisfying place for me to stop reading Spider-man books. Although I agree whole-heartedly with one of the above posters about the Peter/MJ rumors (For my money, Peter and MJ getting married was the best thing that ever happened to either character and this notion that you can't tell good Spidey stories while they are still married is just lazy. And since we ARE talking about "my money" here, I'm reluctanct to continue spending it on Spider-books when the books are going in a direction that I'm sure that I won't enjoy. Thank God for Spider-girl.) the main reason I'm quitting the Spider-man books is that I've heard that the three books are going to have one continuous story-line throughout ala the Super-man books in the "Death of Superman" era. I simply am not going to buy the same book three times a month. I almost skipped the first four FNSM issues for that very reason, and frankly, in a lot of ways I wish that I had.
>>1Thank God for Spider-girl.) the main reason I'm quitting the Spider-man books is that I've heard that the three books are going to have one continuous story-line throughout ala the Super-man books in the "Death of Superman" era. I simply am not going to buy the same book three times a month. I almost skipped the first four FNSM issues for that very reason, and frankly, in a lot of ways I wish that I had.
--it's not 3 books. Sensational and FNSM are being cancelled and Amazing will be produced 3 times a month with a rotating staff of creators.
^Well, that seems like a better way to do it. It also means the the guy who works at the comic store didn't explain it very well. He said it would be "just like" how DC handled Super-Man. Oh well. In any case, there is still the cost issue. The reason I only bought one Spider-book a month was becauser I could only *afford* one Spider-book a month.
For my money, I thought it was the best issue in the brief run of FNSM. Peter, I'm glad you dealt with one dangling plot thread (the lawsuit) while dealing with some of the emotional baggage that has been simmering for decades. You also managed to bring out two very important points about JJJ, which are that A) he's actually quite an intelligent, if misguided person, and B) he does actually have a sense of ethics, although that too is often misguided. I've long felt that the two most critically under-used characters in the SPider-Man universe were Jonah and Aunt May, and while Joe Straczynski did quite a bit of work in developing Aunt May as a character, Jonah rarely comes across as more than a caricature in any of the Spidey books, at least in my opinion.
I think I'll be echoing the feelings of a lot of previous posters who will most likely be dropping the Spidey books. I stopped reading them some years back after selling off most of my collection, but I came back for JMS's stint on Amazing and later, for Peter's tennure on FNSM. My biggest worry is that are far too many recent developments that will most likely be swept under the rug with new writers coming aboard; after The Other storyline, there was a huge amount of material to be mined with Peter/Spidey literally being reborn, and JMS also laid some groundwork that Peter had maybe developed new and/or stronger powers, but that was swept aside by the Iron Spider costume and the Civil War storyline, which in turn introduced the biggest event in the character's history when Peter decided to unmask. As far as I'm concerned, even a mediocre writer could spend half a decade dealing with the fallout of that event, but as I say, I suspect most of this stuff will be back-burnered in favor of another BOLD NEW DIRECTION FOR THE CHARACTER!, which will most likely involve whichever non-event event that Marvel is pushing next and the resultant crossovers that make it all but impossible for a new writer to develop a strong storyline. I hope I'm proved wrong, but as I say, I suspect I won't be around to see it. Thank you Peter, for trying to provide at least a tiny measure of closure.
I loved your last issue, too. The door gag was very funny but I mainly enjoyed that you found a good balance for JJJ: He is certainly not a boss I would enjoy working with but he has his limits. That is at least something.
If I will continue to get Spider-Man in future will very much depend on how the next chapter will end. If Mary Jane will leave Peter - again - or if she even dies, I am 99 % sure that I will drop all Spider-Man books I am subscribing at the moment.
Great issue! I'm bummed to see your run end, as I was really jazzed to see that you were back on Spider-Man when the new title started up. This run, just like the last one, was far too short. Still, you went out on what was arguably one of your best issues.
In one of the coming next time ads we see Peter raising a sheet from a body on some sort of medical table. IF it's May, then I'm betting one of the other inmates will have taken care of Fisk by the time Spidey arrives, thus keeping him from becoming a murderer.
If it's MJ, all bets are off as to what happens to the character, but I probably won't care then. Count me in as one of those who feels MJ is a big part of what makes the Spidey titles worth reading these days so I wouldn't care to do without her. Never mind the fact that Peter already has enough grief.
I thought this was one of the very best Spider-Man stories I've ever read, and quite possibly one of the best Spider-Man stories ever written, period.
I've slept only 4 hours in the last 24, so rather than embarrassing myself by saying more, I'll leave it at that.
All this talk about the upcoming story arc has, frankly, scared the hell out of me. If I, like evryone else, gives up on Spidey, then I will have to be content with Fallen Angel, etc. But I am grateful that I can go back anytime I want and read all The Great PAD SM stories that I have saved. THANK-YOU PAD for the many years of enjoyment. See you later in She-Hulk.
Way way way back, in the Stan-and-Steve days, Jonah was more than once shown to be, if nothing else, a damned good newspaperman. And, while Pete was often genuinely just short of murederous in his attitude toward JJJ, he never actually carried through, and when Cannonball put Jonah in the hospital, he was lucky to survive his confrontation with Spidey.
Ya know, i miss those days...
It was a good issue Peter. Christopher Priest was right when he said you were the best Spider-Man writer.
As for the final fate of MJ? To be honest I would like to see her gone. It's time for a new love interest. It worked for the Hulk.
But where's the wine? He's not holding it in his hands in that last frame. No backpack straps showing. Doubtful he had time to drink it before swinging away. Webbed to his back, maybe?
I thought it was a great send-off issue, and I will sorely miss PAD on any of the Spider books. One thing that I've loved about Peter's run was that there were more characters in it other than just Peter, MJ, and Aunt May. Spidey's supporting cast is one of the richest in comics, so it was great to see PAD's swan song be a story about Peter and Jonah's relationship. It's been a really long time (too long, really) since we've seen a story like this in the Spider-Man books.
I enjoyed it quite a lot. Best Spidey-Jonah business since Ron Zimmerman's "Sweet Charity" one-shot, which I really loved.
Thank you Peter.
I would love to see the Web of Spiderman issue with the JJJ conversation (which I remember vividly because it was that well written) and this one together. I'd say add other great Spidey/JJJ Conversations but I don't think there have been any.
I'm glad you had the chance to put some spin on Betty and Flash during this Spidey era.
You were writing stories that I always thought would be perfect for a Web of Spider Man book - how Peter's life affects the people around him while Amazing would be the more straight forward Peter focused.
Two Spider Books a month - you on Web and Kurt Busiek on Amazing would have made me happy and got my 6 bucks.
As a further aside, I've enjoyed JMS run and will continue to follow him to Thor (which I've done) but Back and Black bothers me.. it has put the character in a position that only can be fixed by deus ex machina (i.e. Doctor Strange) and I wouldn't write a character into a corner unless I knew how he got out of the corner in a way that didnt feel cheap.
Until later
John
I enjoyed it. To repeat what's been said a dozen times already, it's been a long time coming. You really made me feel for Spidey, Jonah and Robbie. JJJ angry at for Peter using him and Peter throwing it back in his face about how JJJ used him and Robbie playing the moral compass through all of it.
Others above have said it better than I have. This was a great issue and I really appreciate the work you put into it while it lasted.
Thank you sir.
I can think of one perfectly legitimate way to have Peter's current problems (May's health excepted) vanish. Presidential pardon. Given the good he's known to have done over the years, and the untenable circumstances he's in, it might just happen. It isn't, after all, as though he can pull off a Bruce Banner. Nobody knew who he was for the longest time. They were looking for the Hulk. But now everybody knows who Parker is, so hiding in the population wouldn't be as easy for him.
If Peter wanted a presidential pardon, he should have confessed to Robert Novak as an anonymous source then run interference for Karl Rove in the subsequent investigation.
Mr. David,
A nice close to the series. I think if you take this issue and set it alongside the final issue of Spectacular, the Spectacular annual from a few months back, and issue 111 of Ultimate Spider-Man, you kind of have the essence of Spider-Man, right there in those four issues.
Well, maybe toss in the Parker-Wieringo Spidey-FF mini for the bouncin' round, team-up fun aspect of Spidey as well. It'll never happen, I know, but all 8 of the above issues combined would make a sweet trade (one that would really be "Essential.")
Also, Mr. David, I'd like to echo some of the fond memories of Web of Spider-Man, from back in the day.
Thanks and here's to a good, healthy run on She-Hulk.
Cheers.
It isn't, after all, as though he can pull off a Bruce Banner. Nobody knew who he was for the longest time. They were looking for the Hulk. But now everybody knows who Parker is, so hiding in the population wouldn't be as easy for him.
Well, the military and government knew who Banner was since the mid-60s, although I don't know if the general populace did. Peter does have the advantage that he's totally average-looking, though--average height, unremarkable hair and eyes--and until he unmasked, he wasn't really anything more than a minor local personality in New York.
While he's certainly had more exposure since then, that's not so much an insurmountable obstacle as a story element for the writer to work with. If he cut his hair and did something else to disguise his face (mustache, fake glasses), he could probably avoid casual recognition outside of NYC. The real issue is that, unlike Banner, who wanted to avoid the Hulk, he couldn't/wouldn't avoid acting as Spider-Man (or Marvel isn't going to not have him as Spider-Man, anyway) for any length of time. Parker on the lam could be made to work; getting Spider-Man stories out of it would be another matter.
In my above comments, where I say "Spectacular," make that "Sensational."
I was sad to read that FNSM was ending to make room for more monthly installments of ASM. Just how many editions of ASM do we need? Overexposure much!
At least FNSM provided a balance which usually more light toned stories in comparison to the other monthly Spider-Man comics on the stands, especially since ASM has been so grim for so long.
Hulk... YJ... and now FNSM.
Peter, you really know how to end a run (when given a half-decent chance by TPTB).
Thanks for a great ride.
I almost walked into a door today, and immediately thought of this F.N. Spider-Man issue.
The StarWolf said, re giving Peter Parker a presidential pardon:
"It isn't, after all, as though he can pull off a Bruce Banner. Nobody knew who he was for the longest time. They were looking for the Hulk. But now everybody knows who Parker is, so hiding in the population wouldn't be as easy for him."
That raises an interesting question. If either the comics' Bruce Banner or the TV show's David Banner first appeared today-- with the plethora of digital cameras and camera phones, and the existence of the Internet in general and YouTube in particular-- how long could either have remained anonymous? Even if no one got a shot of Banner's face, sooner or later, someone would have filmed the transformation, and then the Gen. Ross (or Jack McGee, as the case may be) would at least know how the Hulk kept under cover most of the time.
As to Spidey (or any masked adventurer), how long until he'd be exposed by an in the right place at the right time camera phone as he's changing into or out of costume? As discussed in one of the threads about Spider-Man 3, it was incredibly stupid of Spidey to have his mask off when near the scene of the ceremony honoring him, because thousands of people were there, with cameras.
A presidential pardon for Peter Parker sounds good to me, given the point the StarWolf makes above, though I'm not clear what crime he committed to require one. However, I suspect that unless Marvel (and DC and everyone else that publishes superheroes, for that matter) essentially pulls out a magic wand by having its characters use, well... magic or some advanced super science to foul up cameras at just the right time, someone's going to snap a picture of a costume change.
That's assuming, of course, they want to keep comics somewhat grounded in the real world. Now, superhero comics aren't fully in the real world, but real world issues and situations do play a role.
Now I didn't read Civil War, but I read about it and I read some of the reactions to Peter's decision to unmask (and all that came afterward). I wonder... if the object, with regard to Peter Parker, was to have his identity become public knowledge, perhaps there was a better way. It might've made for a better story-- and been more in keeping with Peter's often bad luck-- to have had someone catch him on camera changing costume. He's exposed to the world in circumstances out of his control. Can he bluff his way out of it, somehow? What steps will other heroes (and villains for that matter) take to ensure they won't be "outed"?
Or, for that matter, would influential heroes, like the Avengers or the JLA, have forseen the dangers to themselves that camera phones could bring and tried to encourage the government to discourage their development and use?
And if that were the case, would the government have demanded that it, at least, know their identities? Which might've led right back to the two factions of Civil War.
Of course, the best solution to keeping your secret identity secret-- even in this age of camera phones and YouTube-- is:
A) don't wear a mask.
B) Don't even hint that you have another identity.
C) Let everyone think you live in the arctic (or antarctic, as the case may be) and commute to work.
D) wear glasses when you're in your other identity.
and finally,
E) Don't hang out with the same people in both identities, even if everyone believes you don't have a secret ID. Glasses as disguise isn't a fool-proof disquise. Don't push your luck. Life-like robots that can substitute for you aren't really that easy to come by.
And the batteries always run down at the most inopportune moments.
Rick
I'm late in my response, but I loved this issue. And that last line had me laughing my butt off.