PeterDavid.net

While I didn't care at all for One More Day, I am excited for the new run, because I think that it's going to tell good stories. I don't like how we got here, but the return to the serialized "sop-operay" adventures and the supporting cast is something that Spidey has been missing lately...well, every place but FNSM. You did a real good job on it, and I thank you.

Bravo, Peter. I do have to say that I didn't like OMD, for the simple fact that I don't think it was well done. And it does call several things into question in the broader continuity, such as Peter unmasking in Civil War. But it happened. Over the years comics have done a hell of a lot of things I'm not happy about. Couples have gotten together that I hated, my favorite characters have been killed or gone in directions I didn't like. But those stories I did love are still there to be enjoyed.

For better or for worse the Spider-Man status quo has changed (for now anyway) I get why people are angry, and I do wish that Marvel hadn't gone in this direction, and it'll probably end up getting reversed at some point, but I do think there are some good stories that could come out of it in the meantime.

Yeah, this whole "debate" shows the tendency for fans to get overly whiny. I don't like the overall idea of this reset, but I certainly can see why the Powers that be may have wanted to do it...

Peter David -

While I haven't read One More Day, I applaud you for this statement. Isn't it what we all say when we (as fans) are unhappy? "I would have gone in a different direction." For the same people to herald that and have bashed you in the past because they're unhappy with how their characters are being treated, with little or no trust with the people behind that character.

Rant over.

Great post.

HA! You tell 'em PAD!

Word. Thank you for this post, Peter. I hate the tendency I and so many others have of rallying to the one particular statement someone makes that I agree with; it's a manipulative thing to do, taking what you said and using it for other purposes. So I try not to do it. Sorry it happened, but huzzah to you for clarifying.

I have your whole run of F'N Spider-Man and, yeah, those issues didn't erupt into sparkly sparkles like Golden Compass daemons when Quesada made that decision. (Though that actually would've looked neat.)

A few quick points of rebuttal:

1. I was one of those who didn't like a majority of the stories in your run. I didn't like the Other. I didn't like the Chameleon/Ben Parker bit, mostly because the notion of someone with Ben Parker's face killing people just made me sick to my stomach. I liked the Mexican wrestling stuff, and I actually really liked your contributions to the Back in Black crossover. Your Sandman story was really good.

When FNSM was pitched, we were told that it would be a return to "old-school" Spider-Man stories. Heck, 'Ringo was drawing Spidey with a Ross Andru touch. But for the most part, we didn't get any of this. We got The Other, and The Unmasking, and Chameleon 21whatever.

Now, we're told that Brand New Day will REALLY give us the old-school Spidey that we're craving. But it can't, because One More Day taints everything badly for reasons that would take too long to go into here.

2. "Can you still pull them out and re-read them? Yes."

No, not with the same enjoyment as before.

Think of this- if MJ and Pete weren't married, how did the first Venom story play out? After all, MJ was a big part of that.

How did Kraven's Last Hunt play out? His love for MJ is what brought Peter back to the surface.

It's curious that Marvel chose the path they did to end the Spider-Marriage, because it invalidates a great deal of the stories that have been published as trades over the last few years. Building the trade paperback program was a big initiative of Jemas-Quesada when they first took over Marvel. How would you like to be a retailer now, staring at unreturnable Spider-Man trades that have diminished readability?

I want to like Brand New Day. I'm with you, Peter, that there's a lot of great talent on the book. But that talent could have still been on the book without this ridiculous storyline.

PAD, if I was you, I would've avoided all discussion about this, pro or con. OMD has so many fan's P.O.ed at Joe Q. and Marvel EVERYWHERE, I wouldn't discuss it at all if I was in your shoes.

Personally, I think it was more about one guys opinion in a seat at Marvel than what was better for the character. Let Joe try to rest on that bed of Nails he made from Spider-man fans.

I apologize for making any assumptions on your view of the OMD storyline.

"Think of this- if MJ and Pete weren't married, how did the first Venom story play out? After all, MJ was a big part of that."

Um. THE STORY STILL EXISTS. What does it matter if it is 'in continuity' or not anymore?

Your obsession with continuity is what is ruining the story, not what OMD did. THE STORY IS STILL THE STORY. It's your insistence that all the stories connect that makes it hard for you to re-read it.

That has NOTHING to do with Joe Q.

It's YOUR problem, not his.

Peter, I understood your "not how I would've handled it" for what it was. Nonetheless, it was welcome in both the context you intended and the context it was inevitably received. It made for a good "therapy session"(still ongoing by the looks of it) for a lot of readers.

Wait a minute, wait a minute--you don't get comp copies? That's ridiculous.

It's funny, every time I see OMD, I read it as OMG. Which does seem to be appropriate based on the majority of the reactions....

I just want to know one thing, PAD, seriously: Based on your comments, you're OK with a hero "making a deal with the Devil" then? Yes, it's his wife who does the deal, but the hero allows it to happen. It doesn't matter if you've actually read the issues yet, you know what occurred.

Personally speaking, any hero who makes such a deal is no longer a hero, IMO.

Kevin: so not a Spawn fan, then? :)

The theory that great new stories will come about because of OMD doesn't stand, in my opinion, because any future stories will now be burdened by "Pre-Crisis, Post-Crisis" syndrome, meaning the question of what happened and what didn't happen will distract from the stories the BND writers want to tell. Never mind the use of MJ as Jackpot, which will right away have OMD following this supposed Brand New Day like toilet paper on a shoe.

I was looking forward to BND until I heard the vaguely defined parameters of Mephisto's retcon. I'm certainly not outraged or insulted, just sadly confused. But I will still pick up Slott's arc to see just what is going on. Or maybe if Joe Q puts up a clearer explanation somewhere?

In less than two years Pre-Brand-New-Day-Spiderman will join the New Exiles cast or something like that. Or there will be a Marvel UK story in the Pre BND Universe.

After a long time away I started reading Spiderman comics again with Millar's MK Spiderman and started collecting all SM comics (including PAD's run). I though the Peter-MJ relationship worked. I really liked them together, but what do I know, I am just a "stupid comic book reader". Now the Clark-Lois marriage... that one I would like to see end. ;)

The word 'fan' is derived from the word 'fanatic'.

How much calm and rational deliberation were you expecting? :)

Cheers.

Um. THE STORY STILL EXISTS. What does it matter if it is 'in continuity' or not anymore?

Because if it's not in continuity, then what is it? Professional fanfic? Several years worth of comics (all that backstory and history) gets thrown into the DisContinuity bin next to ST Voyager's "Threshold" and that's fine because they're "just comics"?. I don't blame Spidey fans if feel like they've been kicked in the teeth.

I'm thinking that I'm the only reader out there who enjoyed OMD. It's going to create a bit of confusion as to how it impacts the rest of Marvel continuity, and ultimately it might wind up causing more harm than good. However, I thought that it was a well-told story, and by this point in my life (after 22 years of reading comics) that's all that I really care about.

Personally, I sort of understand the whole idea that the older Spider-Man stories "don't count," but it doesn't bother me enough to get upset about it, nor will it take away from my enjoyment when I reread all those comics. After all, I really like Ultimate spider-Man - does he "count" or not?

Anyway, I'm looking forward to the stories that are coming up. So far, it sounds like good stuff. (Oh, and I liked your run on FNSM quite a bit, PAD.)

Hmm. Personally, I think it would have been better to end the marriage by having MaryJane turn out to be a Skrull.

By the way, if Spider-Man has been de-aged, could he have gone back in time? I wonder how it will affect New Avengers and the like. Is it possible that JQ is going to have two separate continuities: one set in the past and one set in the present? Is it possible that in the New Avengers continuity, Peter did not take the deal with the devil?

I don't understand why anyone who works for Marvel--and especially someone who is exclusive to the company and is entrusted with some of the most important characters--doesn't get a free issue of EVERYTHING the company makes. Isn't that just common sense? If they're trying to cut corners this seems a dopey place to do it.

Now I hope this doesn't somehow get turned into "Peter David Rants Against Marvel's Pennypinching" or something. Just my opinion.

as for your post, it's right on...but...to a lot of fans continuity, or at least the illusion of continuity, is important. You can come up with a lot of reasons why this is illogical or how marvel has been ignoring it for years (Wasn't Ben Grimm a WWII vet once? How has peter parker gone through 8+ presidents of the United States and isn't even 30? Etc) but it doesn't matter. THEY think it's important. And THEY are a significant part of a small readership. can marvel afford to really piss them off?

It just seems like both major companies are hotshotting it and it's hurting the creative teams. You read a great story by PAD that has deep ramifications and you think wow, but then you realize that what seems like an "important" issue will be overturned before the year is out. The story is still good, the dialogue is no less great, it's still entertaining...but something is lost, that sense that you are a witness to something significant. (Yes, I know, these are not real people.)

When Jean Grey died I actually felt it. When Captain America died it had as much reality to me as when Vince McMahon's car blew up at the end of WWE Raw. The only question is when will it be reversed and will any effort be made to have the reversal make sense.

PAD, you've always been honest about your feeling toward Marvel's direction but I think you should be careful--it's too easy for people to interpret your words any way they want, either through honest opinion or a malicious desire to cause you trouble.

PAD, you've always been honest about your feeling toward Marvel's direction but I think you should be careful--it's too easy for people to interpret your words any way they want, either through honest opinion or a malicious desire to cause you trouble.

Yeah, but it's impossible to avoid. If I say "No comment" then it becomes "Peter David finds OMD so terrible he won't even talk about it" or "Peter David is clearly so outraged he can't find the words." Besides, when I go to conventions, I'll be asked about it. At which point, if I respond, that will be subject to reinterpretation as people swear I said one thing when, in fact, I said something else entirely. This way I can just refer anyone who asks to my website.

PAD

Peter, I feel for you guy.

It’s times like these that have to make one miss the days of pre-internet fandom when the worst that could happen is someone would have to sit down and write a letter to the editor.

I’m sure the one thing you don’t need is to have a boss (or bosses) come down on you or take issue with what for all intents and purposes was an innocuous remark. I imagine just the mere statement you would have approached the plot points differently is enough validation for all the people who were incensed over the storyline to go running to and fro holding up your comment and screaming, “SEE! SEE! EVEN PAD AGREES WITH ME!” (LOL)

Well, I like the citing of the Groucho line in any event, I thought you might have gotten the wording wrong but, it looks like you were spot on.

It’s just the industry’s current crisis - there’s one every couple of months so, just remember this too shall pass.

What’s next, going down to the local theater and shouting fire? (just joking of course. If you weren’t involved in it you’d find it funny yourself)

Haven't read OMD, and now that I know the broad outlines of the ending, don't intend to. In fact, reading about it actually caused me to pull out some of my old back issues and TPBs, to read about the Peter Parker I had so come to enjoy (yes, even with the totemistic stuff - the various writers somehow made that work).

However, I also know that when TPTB make a decision, sometimes the writers just have to suck it up and write it as well as they can - perhaps out of a fear that if they walk, it might be given to a lesser writer, who'd make things even worse. (Remember what happened to the Hulk after Peter left...)

PAD has stated, plainly, that it's not the story he would have chosen. That's not saying "This sucks!", any more than a plot twist that catches you by surprise in a New Frontiers novel (because it's not where you would have gone with it) is bad.

In a similar vein, JMS stated in another forum that he wrote his part of OMD under protest, and "everyone within earshot knew what I thought of this." Somehow, since he didn't walk, this has been interpreted by some fans as JMS' [i]approval[/i] of the storyline, rather than his fulfillment of a contracted obligation (and, incidentally, the collecting of a paycheck - not everyone is a bestselling novelist on the side...).

Murphy's Rule of Internet Posting: Anything that can be misinterpreted, will be misinterpreted.

Let me preface this by saying that I am a fan of Peter David and love this blog. But I do have a difference of opinion.

You are right. You should have seen this coming--and should have known better.

You have been a writer for a long time and you know the power of words. You also worked in the comic industry and know the fanatical nature of its readership.

From the context, your statement did seem somewhat negative. Said out loud, "Let us just say that it is not the direction I would have taken things," can have a negative tinge.

The statement was vague enough to be open for interpretation. I took it to mean that you were not a fan of the "direction" of Peter and Mary Jane's marriage being dissolved. But it could be interpreted that you were not a fan of Mephisto being involved or a number of any other variations.

Granted, it is a leap to go from "I would have gone in a different direction" to "I hate the story and/or writing". I'm not a fan of killing off Captain America but that book features some of the best writing in comics. But people who hate this story look for confirmation that they are right. Therefore, they chose to interpret your statement as a complete and total condemnation, which obviously was not what you were saying.

But, however, unfortunately, the burden of not being misconstrued lies with you. A simple explanation of what you meant by "direction" or illustrating what direction you would have gone in would have made it harder for the rabid fans to twist your words around.

Should you have done this? Ideally, you shouldn't have to. Realistically, being the way fandom is, you proabably should have.

LOL
Wow sounds like a bad day at the office Peter.
I will not pretend to be deeply entrenched in comic book stuff at this stage of my life. I am not. I simply can not afford them.

Way back when I was you where the author that stood out. I just had a blast reading your stories. I also read every Asimov fiction book,Louis L'Amour,Stephen King,Robert Pirsig,Jon Bach,Edgar Rice Burroughs,Piers Anthony ,Michael Chrihton. The list goes on. You are the only living author I have ever read that actually interacts with there fan base on an almost day to day basis. That fricking rocks. I am not trying to be Super Fan Boi or anything. You just gotta expect the kindve crap your posting about after this amount of time. I think its funny that you even get worked up about it. On the other hand words are your medium *shrug

Thanks for the blog man you are always an interesting read with my coffee in the morning.

I've decided to, TRY, and pretend like OMD didn't happen. I've also decided that I want to go back and read those great Peter/MJ married stories. Heck, I even want to re-read Clone Saga stuff and the horrible Clone Saga ending that I didn't like.

I can not, however, read the new "Brand New Day". Why? Well first and formost, I don't have a job at the moment, but second of all and most important: I believe that buying Brand New Day tells Joe Quesada that what he did with OMD was a GREAT thing. It just encourages them to keep this status quo around.

So even if I had the money, I wouldn't buy this.

The whole idea of Peter making a deal with the devil is STUPID (just the worst idea ever with Spiderman, imo), but also losing the marriage and also bringing back Harry...

I'm sorry. It could have the best and greatest creative team in the world with BND..and it just doesn't matter to me....

I'm a huge Spiderman fan. I love Spiderman. It would have been great to pick up BND (I even briefly thought about it before hearing about all this junk). It seems like it might be good. Who knows. But I dislike the setup for it. And I'm sick and tired of 'events' with Spiderman. I just want good stories for Spiderman again....

BND is just another event. It'll prob blow over. IF it does and the marriage comes back, I might come back. But then again, maybe not. It just depends if Marvel will FINALLY focus on great stories again for Spidey and stop with all these 'events'...

DF2506
" I think Marvel as a whole needs to go back to what made Marvel different from DC: great stories that focus on normal people who get superpowers (especially Spidey). Hey where do you think Heroes got the idea? Marvel comics! Despite the spandex, Marvel use to always be about people...."

Well, I for one find it interesting to hear the opinions of people who really KNOW something about comics. It's a shame that other people try to twist that, and I hope that doesn't make creators like PAD more reluctant to interact with fandom.

When I really enjoy a movie, a series, a book or a comic book series I get emotionally involved. I establish strong emotional bonds with certain characters which also means, it matters to me a lot what happens to them. A series I really enjoy is much more than “just” entertainment to me and arguments like, “It doesn`t really matter because things can change again” or “You can enjoy the stories before” do not apply to me. Yes, of course I will still enjoy JMS Spider-Man – except how it ended. But my enjoyment will be tainted because I know what happened at the end and so far I have no reason for optimism that the new direction will be to my liking.

I started reading Spider-Man after a very long time because I was so excited when I read the message one fan posted elsewhere that JMS brought Peter and Mary Jane together again. I started looking for more information and liked what I read so much that I subscribed his comics and even also bought the trades. Why should I stick with a series that is missing now what I enjoyed most? The unmasking of Spider-Man, the storyline also involving Iron Man – I really enjoyed reading these topics and kept wondering how things will develop in future. Now I will never find out because it never happened. I feel like I was teased with a great story but the end will never come. A nasty voice in the back of my head is wondering if Marvel got cold feet, wondering how to move forward from where Civil War originally left off. Pulling the emergency brake and use one of the “It never happened” tricks is certainly not a satisfying solution, not for this reader.

I make you this promise: Even when I stop reading Spider-Man I will keep reading information about what happens next. And if there will really be a big turnaround and this move is being undone, I will most probably give the series another chance. But I am not willing to stick with something I don`t enjoy in the hope that maybe, just maybe, things will become better. I am a customer after all and read comics for my enjoyment. My to-read pile is constantly growing. I have to make choices.

People can be very passionate about what they enjoy or not. I know, I am one of them. I don`t think there is anything wrong with that. Only, I am not passionate about sports, which is much more common, I am passionate about certain fictional characters and stories. The big outcry over this move is therefore very understandable and again, as I said, I am not happy, too. That some people exaggerate, misread and a few at worst become unpleasant and personal unfortunately comes with the territory. That your remark has been twisted is not unexpected either but I am also sure, most people know the nature of fandom and the Internet well enough to know what I just tried to explain.

My experiences on the Internet are certainly mixed but for the most part, I find it very rewarding. I am hoping you see it the same way.

First I want to say thanks to Peter for hosting this debate and let us rant.
Second, while I agree with PAD that those of us who liked the Peter/ MJ marriage can re-read our old comic books, by that logic can't the haters of the Peter/ MJ marriage re-read the pre-MJ comics? Or better still just read Ultimate Spider-Man, there's a teenage Spidy who is unmarried.
Third, I heard that Joe Q. said something about heroes can't be dad's. Gee, does that mean no doctor ever left his kid's birthday party to preform emergency surgery on someone, known of the guys fight in Iraq or Afganistan right now have any kids, no cop or fireman can be a dad. Sorry, but I take that one a little personally.
Forth, while this idea might have worked on Angel they didn't go out and say the two seasons Conner was on the show didn't happen and truth be told, Angel's motives and reasons were better than Peter's.
Fifth, if they wanted MJ gone why not let the bullet hit her instead of Aunt May.
Last of all, given that a lot of people don't seem to like this course, let's let the market take it's course. Joe Q. does not have to keep Peter and MJ together, that's true; but it's his job to make sure the Spider books sell and if they don't he'll have to change things back and maybe he'll get PAD to do it. We can hope!
Again I want to thank Peter for hosting this. I am very glad that there is a form like this one where our views can be heard.

I really liked Scream ish #2

I honestly don't know why there is wailing and gnashing of teeth for.

It's not going to last.

Trust me.

Either it's going to be like the Marvel Owners in '94 or '95 telling Tom DeFalco that they were going to bring Reed and Doom back from what Tom had intended to be a permanent death (at least that's how I heard it) with or without him. There was TWO YEARS of presuure including one fan whose letter in the lettercol was "Bring Back Reed and Doom." ad nauseum (To which Marvel should have said "Thank You for that Letter, Bart Simpson") and Tom resisted until the Owners that be (annoying) gave him the choice. (And they probably "offered" Tom that under pressure from sales and Marketing who at that time had aggrandized themselves. T'Lana would have loved them)

But what does this have to do with the here and now? Simple. Joe Q is going to have this happen to him where the change is going to be made and his participation will be optional but the actual story will not. Either way, I think Joe Q may have set in motion has policitical downfall, which is sad. Take it from me, the b****ing that the Die-hards and Wizard made with the clone saga (and let me be clear it was Wizard, not the Die-hards, how else do you explain them sticking to their story that sales we down due to the clone saga when they went up UNTIL among many reasons, there was no end in sight.) will be nothing compared to what will happen. At the very least Wizard should no longer be fawning over this.

"Because if it's not in continuity, then what is it?"

Just what every story is: A FRICKIN' STORY!

If I could remove one word from the english language, it would be continuity. It's done more to harm comic books than anything this side of Rob Liefeld's mediocre artwork becoming popular.

1 I think that what you don't quite understand Mr. David is not that there might be great stories in the future, it is that the anger exists now over the way the story was told, the delays and the price increase and JQ's cavalier and (at least to me) smug statements on the comic book resources intereviews. To be fair I should state outright that I haven't really liked any of the big events marvel has put out for the past few years and I'm not buying Spiderman at all. But I think that the anger is genuine and it is very much like the anger I felt with the big events. To quote myself I once said that JQ and marvel were putting a highway through the Enchanted Forrest and using characters I liked as slave labor to do so. I think this anger is now boiling over, anger over Avengers Dissasembled, House of M, Civil War... All of the above featured shredding of characters and history to get the stories to work. In the case of civil war I belive the entire storyline was deliberately designed to get people mad and it worked. I think that anger is far greater and lingered a lot longer than anyone at marvel realized. But I was anti-sra so I may be speaking only for myself.
But I think that when you couple the glee that JQ is showing in his interviews about getting rid of MJ with the way it was done (Peter making a deal with the devil? I mean really, he's not smart enough to realize that Mephisto will turn on him? Peter knows Johny Blaze after all.), you get the anger that appears now. I feel sort of sorry for the next writer, he has the same job Gail Simone had with Wonder Woman after Amazon's Attack. After a character has been really, really shredded and you've lost a lot of fans you'll have to write at least twice as well to get them back. And it'll take a while for the anger to fade so no matter how well you write you might not be able to get them back.
To me at least marvel has worked very hard over the past few years to really alienate fans who have been around more than three years. In this case they might have pushed too far.
Of course I could be wrong, this could be only flash anger caused by a badly constructed and late story and a holiday where everyone had some free time to type. We'll have to wait and see.

Mark

I think that, for whatever reasons people have, many people are upset over this storyline (which I know is stating the obvious.)

The second part of that is then: The people who are upset are looking for allies anywhere they can find them to give them hope that the result they see will be reversed. Just like activists recruit celebrities to their cause to inspire us lowly normal people, I think this is a case where we are looking for higher ups to make our position feel justified.

And unfortunately then yes...it leads people to looks for signs in the littlest thing, that people in the position of power are on the side they want them on.

Its sort of like when a hot girl flirts with you asks you if you studied last night, and you take to mean she thinks you are cute :)

PAD: There are complaints because years worth of continuity has suddenly been rendered moot? Okay, well...did you enjoy the stories when you read them? Yes? Good: You got your money's worth. Can you still pull them out and re-read them? Yes? Good: Then OMD didn't somehow cause the previous comics to magically vanish from existence.

No, it didn't. And you know, if there were a universe-wide reboot a la DC to make the Marvel Universe more accessible to people for whom learning all the history of all the characters would be too complicated, I think I could live with that.

But this doesn't seem to be about making Spider-Man or the Marvel Universe more accessible, despite what JQ might say. Contrary to his belief, you cannot alienate at least 2/3 of your fan base and expect them to support you and boost sales through word of mouth, saying "You should totally check out Spider-Man now!" I'm speaking as a guy who has read Spidey stories from when he was single and when he was married, who has walked away from comics and come back on more than one occasion, and I tell you this: I never found a married Spidey any less exciting to read about than a single one.

As far as promoting the new version of Spidey, Quesada can't count on word of mouth from formerly loyal fans who feels like he's stabbed them in the back, so what's he gonna do? Go on TV to promote this? "Hey, good news everybody! Spider-Man is single now, and that means the books are better, so you should start reading!" Considering that the majority of the people who aren't fans, whom he is hoping to convert, didn't even know Peter was married to Mary Jane in the comics, this isn't going to make any difference to them. This isn't going to make the books more attractive. If people buy a Spider-Man book, they are buying it primarily because they want to see him fight somebody--they couldn't care less about his marital status.

This is about JQ being selfish, saying "I liked Spider-Man better when he was single, so I'm going to break up the marriage. Fuck what my customers want, fuck my loyal readers who buy my product; what do I owe them?"

I don't appreciate that. And he IS being selfish here, PAD, despite how he says us fans are being selfish. Here is what he says about fans like us who wanted the marriage to stay intact:

QUESADA: Sometimes when I look at the way that the lines of opinion have been drawn in comics about the marriage, I see the argument falling into two basic camps. The fans may not perceive it this way on the surface, but it is what's happening when you look at it clearly. When we fall in love with these characters, we claim ownership over them in our own way; so for some fans, Peter belongs to them and no one else. So, the way I see it, there are two sides of the argument, two segments of fans. On one side, there is a contingency of fandom that wants Peter to age along with them and live life as they do. He needs to get married, have kids, then grandkids, and then the inevitable. One the other side, there are fans that realize Spidey needs to be ready for the next wave or generation of readers, that no one can lay claim to these icons, no one generation has ownership and that we need to preserve them and keep them healthy for the next batch of readers to fall in love with.To me, only one side of this argument is correct. If Spidey grows old and dies off with our readership, then that's it -- he'll be done and gone, never to be enjoyed by future comic fans. If we keep Spidey rejuvenated and relatable to fans on the horizon, we can manage to do that and still keep him enjoyable to those that have been following his adventures for years. Will everyone be happy with the decision? No, of course not, but that's what makes it a horserace. At the end of the day, my job is to keep these characters fresh and ready for every fan that walks through the door, while also planning for the future and hopefully an even larger fan base.

Here is what I have to say to that (copied and pasted from a post I made elsewhere):

ME: He says that the camp who is for the marriage wants Peter to age along with them, wants Peter to graduate college when they graduate, get a job when they get a job, get married when they do, have a kid when they do, be middle-aged when they are, etc.

No, we don't, you (censored)! My God, he is making out everybody who disagrees with him to be so selfish it's insulting. He says we're like "I want Peter to be doing everything I am at the same time I am."

What we want, Mr. Quesada, is for Peter to grow. Slowly. You know the rate at which he went from being a teenager to whatever his current age is? That is FINE. Eventually, after maybe another 50 to 100 years, you're right: enough "Marvel Universe" time will have passed that he be too old to be Spider-Man any more. Now if the character's still around by then, what's the solution? Pass the damn mantle on to somebody younger.

There has been more than one Flash (the fast guy, not Thompson). There has been more than one Green Lantern. While I consider Steve Rogers the only true Captain America there has been more than one of him as well, and if the new guy turns out to be Bucky then I would accept him as worthy to have the shield even while wanting Rogers back. There has also been, as one Stanley Lui pointed out, a number of different Iron Men. Somewhere down the line, there can be a Spider-Man who isn't Peter Parker. But at the rate he's aging, choosing a successor won't become a problem for a long, long time.

We're not asking that Peter age along with us, Quesada. We're asking that he continue to age slowly, continue his career as a superhero, and do it with the supporting cast that we've all grown to love over the years. We want the story that began in Amazing Fantasy #15 to continue indefinitely, instead of being rebooted. Sometimes one of the supporting cast is going to die, like Gwen or Harry or either character named May, and that's never pleasant because we liked those characters. But we manage, usually. MJ is an exception. MJ is a character that we want to stay alive almost as much as we want Peter to stay alive, because she has been almost as much the star of these stories as he has.

Now, moving on...

PAD: I mean, jeez, we're dealing with a medium in which death itself is simply a temporary set-back, and fans are treating an updating of "Doctor Faustus" as if it's a crime against humanity. Fandom really needs to get some perspective here...

With all due respect, PAD, you were the one who wrote an open letter to Richard Donner because you were pissed off about what was done to Superman II. Somebody could've told you to get some perspective. They could've said "don't get worked up; it's only a movie." They could've told you that you were treating the alterations to Superman II as a crime against humanity and that you were overreacting. They could've told you that as long as you had your old tape or DVD of Superman II without the changes, you had no reason to complain since it hadn't been erased from existence; you could pull it out and watch it whenever you wanted.

But you know what? You were totally within your rights to be pissed off and upset about it, because you liked it the way it was before. You cared about the movie, you cared about the characters, and you didn't want to see either one butchered. It's the same way with fans like myself, Mr. David. We consider this to be butchering Spider-Man. It's saying that Mary Jane, who by now is pretty much Peter's co-star instead of his supporting cast because she is loved THAT MUCH, is a liability that needs to be discarded.

Also, I don't see what the reception of FNSM has to do with anything. Yeah, some Spidey fans were hard on the book and on you for stupid reasons. I wasn't one of them nor, I suspect, were most of the people who post here. Nor, I suspect, were the majority of people unhappy with OMD.

The only criticism I had of the FNSM stories I read was that Francis Klum seemed like a different character than the guy we saw in Kevin Smith's "The Evil That Men Do", and for some reason he thought that Spider-Man killed his brother when Klum himself killed his brother.

Other than that, I liked it. Overall I liked the teamup with the Sandman, even though you basically had to mash two stories together to save time, as you posted here. I liked the whole arc with Ero and thought she was a great villain. I liked the confrontation with Jonah. Other than that thing with Klum, I liked the Mysterio arc.

If you want to be bitter about how you were treated, that's certainly your right. But please don't judge all of fandom by the actions of some vocal people who have something against the words "friendly" and "neighborhood" or some combination of the two, or against Mexican wrestling. This is different. This is a legitimate grievance.

"This is different. This is a legitimate grievance."

No, that's not what he's talking about. PAD isn't complaining that people don't like OMD. He's complaining that people are misrepresenting his statements as a way of attacking OMD.

His point is that when his recent Spidey stories came out, plenty of people said that he didn't know what he was doing with Spider-Man. But when he said that he wouldn't have done exactly what OMD did, people started saying that his statement is some kind of proof that Joe Q was outright wrong.

The fans disliking OMD is legitimate. The fans presenting PAD as some absolute authority on Spidey, but only when they think he agrees with them, is not.

Okay Jason, that I agree with. I wouldn't want something I said to be taken out of context or twisted around, either.

quote
>There are complaints because years worth of >continuity has suddenly been rendered moot? >Okay, well...did you enjoy the stories when you >read them? Yes? Good: You got your money's >worth. Can you still pull them out and re-read >them? Yes? Good: Then OMD didn't somehow cause >the previous comics to magically vanish from >existence. I mean, I *wrote* a number of those >stories that, in terms of plot and character >development are no longer relevant, and I'm not >cracking up over it. I wrote them, they were >enjoyed for what they were (or disliked for what >they were), and that to my mind is the end of it.

Well, this is the exact contrary of what continuity means.

Coming from an author that has writed tons of stories involving a real care on the character and his evolution in continuity, that's a true nonsense.

In my opinion, obviously.

"Hmm. Personally, I think it would have been better to end the marriage by having MaryJane turn out to be a Skrull."

You know, for years I cursed Tom DeFalco's name for making Alicia a Skrull. Who knew that the day would come that I'd think it was genius?

Sorry, Tom.

If it got perspective, it wouldn't be comics fandom anymore.

Any bets, folks, on how long it'll be before OMD is undone?

Two or three years. For this retcon to be undone will require a major event. This year, we know that the major event is going to be the Secret Invasion. I bet next year's event is already initially plotted.

Peter David: I posted a fairly neutral comment about how OMD wasn't the direction I would have gone in, and suddenly that comment is making the rounds as some sort of proof that I "hate" (exact words) One More Day.
Luigi Novi: Just out of curiosity, what are you referring to as "the rounds"? Where are they saying this?

Peter David: There are complaints because years worth of continuity has suddenly been rendered moot? Okay, well...did you enjoy the stories when you read them? Yes? Good: You got your money's worth. Can you still pull them out and re-read them? Yes? Good: Then OMD didn't somehow cause the previous comics to magically vanish from existence.
Luigi Novi: For me, the issue is not whether those stories cannot be read now. For me, the problem with things like OMD is that it’s yet another reminder that any sense of permanence is a joke with comics from the Big Two. All fiction deals with the major passages in life: birth, youth, growth, the loss of innocence, major change, falling in love, losing loved ones, procreation, and death. Permanence is a fundamental aspect of much of that. Good fiction is simply simulated reality, and can stimulate your emotions in ways that are similar to how real life does. When a character is or story is written so well that you actually feel something after reading it, that’s how you know that that story did it’s job. Things like OMD make it much harder, if not impossible, for me to enjoy any story that requires me to accept any event with a sense of permanence with a suspension of disbelief: Banshees’ death, Captain America’s death, Jason Todd’s death, what we thought we knew about Gwen Stacy, the major events that occurred during Peter and MJ’s marriage, etc. Why should I care, for example, about Peter revealing his identity to the world—an event that was ostensibly a gigantic turning point in the 40+ years of the character’s history, after which nothing would ever be the same—if the people in charge of the character essentially admit, with OMD, that they didn’t realize that they were painting themselves into a corner, and have to weasel their way out of it? Whether you liked the identity reveal or not, it was an editorial decision that required a commitment to it. And like an immature boyfriend who hasn’t really grown yet into a man, the Powers that Be have now told us loud and clear that they can’t commit to this. It’s a colossal narrative cop-out. It’s Aunt May showing up in Peter’s shower, and saying, “I’m okay! It was a dream!”.

Bullshit.

As a reader/viewer, I don’t want to stumble back stage as the magician is stuffing rabbits into his hat, and thereby lose the mystique of his tricks. I don’t want to pay attention to the man behind the curtain. I want writers to show me that they can do things that I, as a non-writer, can’t, and when they pull stunts like this, the stitches and seams on the fabric begin to show, so that the entire thing doesn’t look like one contiguous tapestry, but the loose collection of cobbled-together parts that you see from someone who does not know his craft better than you do. I don’t want to see writers throw up their hands and say, “Oops! We screwed up! Can you cut us some slack?” I’m tired to cutting slack to this hack work, simply because the writers and editors either don’t know how to commit to a given continuity, or are so contemptuous of the readers that they will simply chuck decades of it out the window because they jolly well “didn’t like” something that a writer or editor came before them did. Like it or not, the editors decided years ago that Peter and MJ would marry. Period. They did it, and neither they nor their successors have obviously had any problem telling Spidey stories in which Spidey is married. To ignore all this because of one editor’s personal sense of vanity is egocentric and selfish.

Ray Cornwall also raises a valid point: By establishing that Peter and MJ never married, then how are writers supposed to reference storylines that occurred during that time period? How will editions of Marvel Universe Handbooks, or similar reference materials be written? How am I supposed to understand a story that hinges upon such things?

That said, was the story itself awful? No. Because of these threads, I went out and bought Part 4 of the story. As depressing as it is, the execution, at least, was well-done. The story was powerfully told, and Joe’s artwork (among the first I’ve purchased in years) as evolved to a thing of beauty. His art was always nice, but certain excesses in his stylization have been tempered with a subtlety that fits as a story like this, displaying aspects that reminded me of Adam Hughes.

But it’s s a shame it had to come to this. There’s the Ultimate universe, and Joe could always start another line, perhaps similar to DC’s All Star line. But instead, he had to shove his own personal vanities down the throats of a lot of fans he knew didn’t want it.

What a shame.

El Coyote: Um. THE STORY STILL EXISTS. What does it matter if it is 'in continuity' or not anymore?
Luigi Novi: Let’s say someone does a Venom story that requires a detailed reference to his origin, and his first confrontation with Spidey. How does that work? What about lots of other stories that occurred during their marriage in which MJ played an important part, that some writer might want to reference in the future?

El Coyote: Your obsession with continuity is what is ruining the story, not what OMD did.
Luigi Novi: Acknowledging that some reasonable adherence to continuity is important is not an “obsession”. It is a fundamental aspect of decades-old serial stories. Or, as a wise man once said:

“A shared universe, like any fictional construct, hinges on suspension of disbelief. When continuity is tossed away, it tatters the construct. Undermines it.”

El Coyote: That has NOTHING to do with Joe Q. It's YOUR problem, not his.
Luigi Novi: If it costs the company readers, or otherwise contributes to public opinion turning against Quesada or his future works, it could very well be both. Time will tell.

Gah. I just wish they'd stop all these events....

Marvel, under the rule of Quesada, has become just as bad as it was in the 90's, imo. Event after event after event...

It didn't start out that way. When Quesada started at Marvel, it was good (imo). He seemed to have a fresh prespective and Jemas & him created the Ultimate Universe and really seemed to bring back life to the Marvel Universe.

I wonder...do you guys think Jemas leaving is when things went wrong? I'm not sure. I know there were a lot of people who were happy that Jemas was gone, but which is worse---Jemas or after Jemas??

Personally, I'd have to say after Jemas...

What does this all have to do with Spidey??

Spidey use to be good. When JMS started out, it was JMS telling the stories he wanted to tell---Morlun, the Spider Totem, Peter & MJ back together, of course not all of these storylines were liked, but they were told within Amazing Spiderman. Even Sins Past was. But then, all the sudden, we got these multi-comic crossovers again with Spidey...harkening back to the Clone Saga & other 90s events: the Other, Civil War, Back in the Black....One More Day.......

I think things would have been great if JMS, PAD, etc were left alone to tell the stories that they had been telling....instead we get all this other stuff forced down our throats....

In my dream world, I'd love to see Amazing Spiderman be the only Spidey title (in regular Marvel universe. I want Ultimate to stick around). Peter & MJ are married. There's only one writer (BNDs just got too many writers. It might be ok at first, but I think it'll end up a mess...). And stories only last one or two parts. Maybe three sometimes, but no more then that...

Thats how I'd like to see Spidey done....

DF2506

Wow, someone took something a famous person said on the Internet and misinrerpreted it? Who'da thunk it?

As for the discussions/arguments about continuity, and whether or not OMD negates what came before, I'm on the side of thinking this *does* lessen those stories. As for why...

1) Tell me if this sounds familiar: "Not a dream! Not a hoax! Not an imaginary tale!" These lines were created and used to assure the fans that the promise dbig event was "real" and not just a daydream from one character or a fake-out that never happened in the comic's continuity. Yes, we know there really aren't superheroes getting powers and beating up bad guys; but we do get involved in the stories, we expect (or hope for) some sort of consistency and evolution of events in the characters' lives; and to suddenly say "Oh, it never happened" does remove those past stories from the continuity.

2) Remember when DALLAS had Bobby appear in the shower, back from the dead, and the previous season was a dream? I don't recall any fans saying "Yes, but the past episodes can be re-watched and enjoyed as much now as when you first saw them. The fact that we're told it never happened doesn't lessen your enjoyment any." Instead I heard a *lot* of outrage, a feeling of being ripped off because all those storylines and events were removed from continuity and consigned to someone's dream.

3) If continuity didn't matter, why was there a book (published at different times) called WHAT IF? Marvel didn't have a cover showing General Ross as the Hulk, only to have it turn out to be a nightmare of Betty's at the end; Doctor Doom didn't join the FF and wind up having that history changed by the Watcher. This whole book was dedicated to the idea that there were stories that were interesting but which never happened in the "reality" of the Marvel Universe.

The strangest thing I can rarely understand is why comic fans, who read comics for years and years don't expect anything to change in the comics involving thier favorite characters. Or worse yet; why they would want everything to stagnate. I have my favorite stories, yea, but I'm always open to new ideas. It's the main reason I read comics. Tons of ideas. Some are fleshed out extremely well and others aren't. But what the fans don't realize sometimes(I think), is that the creators of comics are fans of the books(sometimes)they are working on and they want to put thier ideas into the mix. Just the same as that fan would want to write the "best way" Spider-man should be written if he were given a chance. So thinking about it from that perspective, fans might realize that it's all about the ideas and who is employed to tell/create those ideas for thier favorite super hero.

Perhaps the perspective of a fan really is different from that of a creator. What bothers me most about OMD/BND is not the loss of continuity, it is the fact that a story that I cherished and deeply enjoyed is over. . . and in a very unsatisfying way. The Peter-MJ relationship was one that always spoke to me as very real, not perfect, but moving in ways I rarely see in fiction. From the moment Peter lashed out at her post-Gwen and she decided to stay despite his abuse to the doubts and fears of both before his marriage (something the reprint in OMD 4 coveniently left out) to MJ's reactions in "The Other," there was just something special about the portrayal of that relationship. There will be no more stories about it. And, to make it worse, not even a mourning period within the story-- it is as if the whole thing never happened. And that bugs me.

Like it or not, fans invest emotionally in characters and stories. Good stories move people and imprint themselves on us. Sure, people can throw whatever snarky comments they want on boards -- and everyone knows how too many board-dwellers love to kick folks when they are down -- but its that emotional investment, sustained over time, that makes comic books so special and the fans so, well, fanatical.

I guess I'll own that.

Here's a point I've talked about with a friend.

This is the first time we've ever seen Mephisto rewrite reality on a promise. We're told that Mephisto was only interested because of the power of their marriage.

But Mephisto lies.

What if Mephisto has done this before? Who else was interested in a deal with Mephisto, despite the cost? Who else was Mephisto interested in doing a deal with?

See, I'd rather read that than OMD.

The strangest thing I can rarely understand is why comic fans, who read comics for years and years don't expect anything to change in the comics involving thier favorite characters.

I think perhaps you should step back and see what the underlying problem is.

It's not that people don't want their characters to change. In +40 years of stories, the characters damn well better change... but over time.

People appreciate change over time. How long were Parker & MJ dating before they finally got married? It certainly wasn't a shotgun wedding in Vegas after a one night stand, was it?

One of the most serious problems with OMD, beyond the pathetic story, is that it's the equivalent of a f*cking train wreck that's killed half a thousand people. It not only made Spidey & MJ not married, but it completely wiped it out, wiped out probably all of JMS's work, and who knows how much else...

Parts of 20 years of work undone in the span of a few pages. Yeah, people have a right to be pissed about this kind of change.

"Perhaps it will lead to great stories and everyone will hail it as a great move after the fact."

Wow. So if it's a LOUSY STORY, that's OK if after the fact it was a "great move"?

I understand what you're saying, but the entire PROBLEM is that it's a MOVE, and not a STORY. Do you realize that we are talking about the end of the 20 year marraige of Spider-Man and NOBODY seems to have been even slightly MOVED? No "I wept", no "I hated to see the end", no 'it was so tragic"?

Hide behind "perhaps it will lead...", but the story FAILS MISERABLY. When the Emperor is buck-naked we gotta yell we see his pasty white ass, not comtemplate the possible future wisdom of his "MOVE".

I think the Dallas reference is a bit dated and not geek enough. How about a Star Trek Voyager analogy. I remember the episodes like “Year of Hell” (I think that was the name) were there was finally some real action, suspense, character growth, and what looked to be lasting change. I thought to my self “Wow! this show is finally hitting the mark. This is what I want out of a scifi show.” Then at the end, Surprise! It wasn’t the real voyager! Just a bunch of Jell-O people that thought they were the crew of Voyager! They even melt before they can tell their story to the real Voyager. It was an instant letdown. Even thought the rest of what I watched was still on tape. I could still watch the cool parts of the episode. I still felt let down. It had no barring on what was to come next for crew of Voyager. It’s the same thing with OMD only worse. I didn’t just sit through 45 minutes of a show before the bomb was dropped. I read and enjoyed years of JMS run before being told that it didn’t count toward what happens next.

PAD, please call your retail contacts and friends after the next new arrivals day and see if people are really dumping OMD off their pull list. Even if you don't share the info with us, it would be good for you to be prepared with that Knowledge. My self and the people that I know out side of Cyber Space have actually dropped the book. We are not the typical fan boys that complain with every change. We are the people that have been enjoying the comics and changes of the Joe Q era of Marvel. I really don't think that it's just the Internet gang for this one.

There was also an episode of Deep Space Nine like that. Finally, Miles O'Brien was getting to do something dynamic, and by the episodes end, it was two steps forward, two steps back. Sighs.

"Do you realize that we are talking about the end of the 20 year marraige of Spider-Man and NOBODY seems to have been even slightly MOVED? No "I wept", no "I hated to see the end", no 'it was so tragic"?"

I don't think it's possible for anyone to have those feelings no matter how good or bad the story was. Nobody who posts online, anyway. Anyone who is on the net was already posting their opinion of the story before the first page of it was published.

Hey, kids! Lets review some Joe Quesada editorial fiats:

- Smoking is bad.
(Even if the character smoking it has a healing factors which makes health concerns irrelveant.)

- Deals with the devil are good.
(Espically if they retcon bomb a marriage to get a character more play from the field.)

I enjoyed your F'N Spider-Man run. Honestly.

"- Smoking is bad.
(Even if the character smoking it has a healing factors which makes health concerns irrelveant.) "

I find that completely reasonable. Humans aren't logical. They think they are, but they *reeeeeaaaalllly* aren't. Whether Wolverine has a healing factor or not, he makes smoking look cool. You can't argue that Wolverine should be allowed to smoke without saying that he looks cool doing it, and that's an endorsement of smoking.

Now go out and find an actual devil to do a deal with. For every deal you make with an actual devil, I will smoke one billion cigars.

There are complaints because years worth of continuity has suddenly been rendered moot? Okay, well...did you enjoy the stories when you read them? Yes? Good: You got your money's worth. Can you still pull them out and re-read them? Yes? Good: Then OMD didn't somehow cause the previous comics to magically vanish from existence.

The strangest thing I can rarely understand is why comic fans, who read comics for years and years don't expect anything to change in the comics involving thier favorite characters. Or worse yet; why they would want everything to stagnate.

I think it's because the comics industry is a hostage to collector interests. The 2 big publishers drove almost all other interests away by catering to collectors, and for the most part the only audience they have left are readers who have decades'-long runs of their publications who balk at the prospect of collections getting made irrelevant to continuity.

This is why I think the 2 big publishers should dump their existing readership, and concentrate on storylines that stay in print rather than keep the franchises alive to squeeze dry an aging and dwindling audience. No one wastes their time doing the latter in any other medium when they can do the former. What comic publishers do would be back-assward in any other medium.

Whatever was wrong with OMD, it wasn't pissing-off collectors. Comics are choking on the collectors. You aren't going to see a turnaround in the industry without pissing-off most of the current readership of the medium.

Anyone who is on the net was already posting their opinion of the story before the first page of it was published.

Well, Joe Q certainly can't complain about that, because he has has made his own opinions known and thus, we knew this story was coming.

Everybody has also known from the start that this wasn't done in the best interest of the character.

Joe Q has only himself to blame.

"All I said is that it's not the direction I would have gone in"

No, you didn't Peter. You said "Let's just say it's not..." which implies that there is more to it than that. Or that you dilute the emphasis and passion of what you really believe.

"Let's just say there were artistic differences"
"Let's just say we had a difference of opinion"
"Let's just say we won't go to that restaurant again"
"Let's just say we're glad it's a new year now"

You are careful with your words, and what they imply. You can't be surprised if people infer what they did.

...you're OK with a hero "making a deal with the Devil" then? Yes, it's his wife who does the deal, but the hero allows it to happen. It doesn't matter if you've actually read the issues yet, you know what occurred.

Personally speaking, any hero who makes such a deal is no longer a hero, IMO.

Goethe's Faust is often hailed as the literary high-point of an entire language.

As the second movie emphasized, Spider-Man's origin is founded on the biblical Jonah. But that conflict hasn't been present in the storyline since the the publication's first decade. You can't expect to keep selling the franchise on Jonah, then deny readers an internally-conflicted, uncertain character.

The more the readers complain, the more obvious it seems that JQ needed to do something, and that Faust is better than nothing. Hell, JMS's "totem" theme seemed reminiscent of Moore's "anatomy lesson/parliament of trees" revision of Swamp Thing. God bless the non-incestuous comic book revamps.

Brian Osserman: I remember the episodes like “Year of Hell” (I think that was the name) were there was finally some real action, suspense, character growth, and what looked to be lasting change. I thought to my self “Wow! this show is finally hitting the mark. This is what I want out of a scifi show.” Then at the end, Surprise! It wasn’t the real voyager! Just a bunch of Jell-O people that thought they were the crew of Voyager!
Luigi Novi: That was Course: Oblivion. Year of Hell was the two-parter in the fourth season in which everything was reset at the end.

Me, I think the Dallas analogy is pretty much dead-on, and using Star Trek as one is wrong, because in those Trek eps, the entire story was conceived to end the way it did.

In the case of the Dallas season premiere and OMD, it is clear to me that the writers or editors either just wrote themselves into a corner that they couldn't get out of, or which some higher up simply didn't like aesthetically, and took the easy way out.

PAD said:

"There are complaints because years worth of continuity has suddenly been rendered moot? Okay, well...did you enjoy the stories when you read them? Yes? Good: You got your money's worth. Can you still pull them out and re-read them? Yes? Good: Then OMD didn't somehow cause the previous comics to magically vanish from existence."

Except that Marvel, very intentionally, used "continuity" as a selling point when they published those old comics. Fans didn't buy Amazing Spider-Man Annual #21 because they thought, "Gee, this will be an entertaining and enjoyable story", they bought it because they thought, "Wow, this is a major hallmark in the life of my favorite character, and I really shouldn't miss it if I want to understand what's going on in future issues of the title." 'Civil War' made headlines, literally, with the statement, "Peter Parker is being unmasked as Spider-Man." People who ordinarily didn't buy comics went in to buy copies of this "historic" event. Now that their money is in Marvel's pocket, it turns out it's kind of hard to have to deal with that, so they're undoing it. That is what makes fans angry. They might not be able to articulate it, but what angers us is the idea that when continuity sells comics and transfers money from our pockets to Marvel's pockets, it's absolutely vital, important, serious stuff. When it's inconvenient for writers and editors to deal with, we're whining fanboys who care too much about a silly comic book. We recognize that fundamental dishonesty and disrespect to us as an audience, and it makes us mad. It's not about continuity, it's about taking our money on an implicit promise that these stories are important to the future of the character, then reneging on that promise.

PAD also said:

"Fandom really needs to get some perspective here. Perhaps it will lead to great stories and everyone will hail it as a great move after the fact. Perhaps it won't, in which case it can always be reversed."

And this, right here, is the fundamental problem with Marvel as a publisher today, and why it has lost readers with decades of gimmicks, stunts, and other "events" that make its fans cynical and jaded. "Buy 'One More Day'--it's the story that changes Spider-Man's life forever! Unless it turns out that we don't like the way it turns out, in which case we're retconning that sucker out of continuity at the first opportunity. Of course, by then, we've already got your money..."

If Marvel really didn't care about continuity, fans wouldn't be so upset.

I like how no matter what you say, there are 50 comments shouting 'hear hear' irregardless of the fact that the two

I thought the lines implied snarkiness. But thas jus mee. And the net.

It seems like nobody liked 'One More Day', but Marvel is banking on 'Brand New Day' to justify it. Which it very well may, but I'm just kind of suprised that there's apparently, and I didn't notice this, love and marriage are unrelatable.

John, the basis of your criticism, and all the criticism I've seen, seems to be that the continuity has been made independent of your comic book collection. And that criticism isn't wrong, but what has that got to do with the challenge of continuing the storyline on a monthly schedule?

Flagging continuities seem to revamp either by alienating their dwindling readership (a la the Claremont/Cockrum/Byrne X-Men or Alan Moore Swamp Thing) or rebooting to past glory (a la Byrne's FF). If the title isn't selling, what choice do they have other than alternating the revamp-methods until they find a new vein they can tap dry?

I think comic publishing should be like conventional book publishing in that conventional publishers don't resort to arbitrarily dominating store shelves in hopes of an industry turnaround. The comic industry has evolved into something no one would choose to lead comic publishing to if they could snap their fingers and make it into something that resembles a profitable industry. But if you can count on dwindling sales by maintaining the status quo, how does getting rid of the status quo not make more sense?

Maybe the whole OMD storyline was meant as a metaphor for the strip itself. The Spider-Man comic is on life-support (the movies), and the only alternative to allowing it to die was a ridiculous solution. From a larger perspective, the sensible thing ultimately may be to let superhero comics as we know them die.

Oh, yes, you are correct; all those stories are still in my collection. Perhaps I shall simply re-read them and save the money and time I would have spent on new comics, and well, if I avoid new comics and I happen to no longer follow your work sir, well, that would seem to be a logical consequence of following your advice.

Thank you very much and good day to you,

Michael

After much whining and complaining on my part, I sat down and actually read the story and... it wasn't that bad. Not great, but not bad, either. From the way the story was presented, to my reading at least, they seem to have left open the possibility that Mary Jane remembers the marriage, which I think offers at least a connection to the "old" way, and could provide interesting stories down the road. Or I'm just reading into it what I want to.

Either way, I think this story and new direction would have been better served without all the hype that's surrounded it. So many people are so deadset against it that it's not going to get a fair shake no matter how good it is.

Kevin said:
"It's funny, every time I see OMD, I read it as OMG."
-----
And I see the new series as Spider-Man: BTK.

I agree with PAD that it is disturbing to be drawn into an argument one has been careful to avoid. It's true that readers can infer whatever they want from "Let's just say it's not the direction I would have gone in" but this says nothing other than what it says - I would have done something else. PAD says enough risible things - Let's not see an argument where there is nothing.

As for the changes in continuity, I don't read the titles, so they don't affect me as much as some, but I agree that making one's entire collection and memory non-canonical can be expected to alienate the current fans. Mr. Quesada's statements appear foolish and insensitive. On the other hand, Quesada is far more of a showman than a serious writer, so perhaps the whole thing is hype. Maybe the real story is not that continuity is being discarded, but rather that writers will be able to write in a different continuity for a while. It may even be that the progression toward restoration of reality/continuity is the real story. How many times have Marvel, DC and others written "What if no one had ever heard of Superman/Captain America/Professor X/whomever?" DC has done it many times - "'Hey, stranger, why are you wearing that blue leotard?' 'Why...I'm Superman. I've lived here for years!' 'Yeah, right. I'm just going to call Captain Sawyer, and she can take care of this.'" It's happened many times, but the continuity has been restored. "Crisis on Infinite Earths" came closest to eliminating the previous continuity: It looked pretty completely done, but the recent introduction of "Hyper-Time" really limits the change to "Well, yes, that thing did happen, but...uh...it wasn't here that it happened. It happened somewhere else, and THAT's the explanation for (current writer)'s mistake in issue 508 - He was writing about what happened - really happened - in reality 46L."

I personally hated the last four pages of OMD because even without the continuity problems and my confusion now as to Spidey's status with the New Avengers and Civil War in general, I simply think there were better/less convoluted ways to handle the step backwards in powers and the ending of the marriage/love. I also see no advantage whatsoever in bringing Harry back and Mephisto's trick of "everyone will forget the secret ID now" is a bit too close to the Spectre doing that for Wally West for me (especially when the Initiative issues already started planting the seeds of people beginning to doubt that Peter was ever Spidey). I am hoping that six months to a year from now Spidey will reboot this alternate timeline and get things mostly back to normal and I'm glad they at least left a window open for that since we don't know what MJ bargained.

That said, I am in agreement with you that while this is annoying and may make me drop the Spidey books (I will reserve final judgment on that until after the new stories come out), it is not something to proclaim as ruining comic books nor am I suddenly concerned that the books I own from the last decade or so will suddenly vanish from existence. They're still good stories and if someone says "Do you have a tear-jerking Spider-Man comic I could read?" I will still pass them, among other things, the death of Harry Osborn even if it's no longer "canon" (whatever that means anymore). I just did a column talking about how people can't look at movie adaptations as ruining their comics because the fact is even if a movie shows Batman weilding handguns and sporting heat-vision, your comics where Batman DOESN'T do that still exist in your boxes and can be read at any time. it seems silly to gripe over "oh my god, this issue of mine is now fan-fic or an alternate timeline that can't be considered as worthwhile!"

Marvel screwed up with the Clone Saga and hit the reset button later. It'll happen again eventually with this I'm guessing. The REAL issue is: When is SPIDER-MAN 2099 coming out in trades?! :-D

hahahaha, this is genius: someone posted a on newsarama a form letter to send to conservative talk show hosts complaining about Spider-Man's deal with the devil:

http://forum.newsarama.com/showthread.php?t=141584

Rush Limbaugh gets the e-mail and goes off about "The War On Spider-Man And Morality". That would rule!!

and well, if I avoid new comics and I happen to no longer follow your work sir, well, that would seem to be a logical consequence of following your advice.

Well, no. Not really, since I'm not writing any Spider-Man books at the moment. On the other hand it makes sense if you're engaging in the time-honored maneuver of trying to get back at me because I've said something that you didn't want to hear. Then it's logical.

PAD

Luigi Novi, you said everything I was going to say about why continuity matters, much better than I could.
I don't think this was well done at all. I can see why Harry might be alive (since he wouldn't have died rescuing Mary Jane) and maybe even sane again, but by what possible logic would this deal with Mephisto have de-aged Peter (as Quesada says it did?).
The answer: This is basically a crisis-style reboot (at least of the past couple of decades) but fudged with "magic" so that they won't have to worry about any complications in other books (Quesada said in an interview that the problem with JMS' original ending is that there would have to be a general revamp of Marvel continuity afterwards. Which is also why Mephisto didn't apparently have any booby-traps in the deal (but yeah, Peter should have backed off on the assumption there would be).
I must admit, I did like Mephisto's line that" Idon't want your soul, you super-heroes just stand around in hell feeling noble about saving someone, no matter how I torment you."

As other people have semi-alluded to, I think one of the main problems here is that Joe Quesada just can't keep his big mouth shut.

He didn't NEED to tell us of his dis-like for the marriage. And beyond that, he rammed it down our throats how much he disliked the marriage time and time again. In my opinion, all that did was fan the flames and help us to dislike this story even more (for those of us that do not like it.)

I think that if Joe had A) kept his mouth shut and B)didn't make it so obvious that this was forced into the story, A great deal more people would accept this more easily.

Instead, there was a buildup of animosity even before the story was published, and an explosion when there was.

If this was all kept quiet, and it seemingly flowed from a natural story progression, I think the outpouring of anger would be much much less. I'm not saying people wouldnt still be upset or pissed...But I think it was just handled very very poorly.

In some ways, this parallels all the Crisis-undoing we've had over at DC, where most of the changes Byrne made have been undone in favor of a more Silver Age feel to things (ditto stuff like Wonder Woman being Silver Age again, Superman being in the JLA from early on, etc.). Quesada's turning back the clock to the days when he was reading Spider-Man as a fan: Peter single, living with Aunt May, Harry alive (and he said they considered resurrecting Gwen too). In fairness, I don't know if that's his chain of thought, or even his unconscious chain of thought, but it makes me more skeptical about his claim this is all about satisfying the young fans.

It's the story Marvel is telling now, but it doesn't have to be the one it tells forever. When the owners feel the EIC has made a decision bad for their interests, either the EIC will have a change of heart or Marvel will have a change of EIC. Beyond the current storyline being offensive to many readers, I don't think it has more permanence than any other storyline. Now they say X didn't happen, but Y did. When they feel otherwise, Y will not have happened, but X (or something similar to X, or maybe Z) will have happened, and we will all be encouraged to forget that Y foolishness the old EIC pushed.

@ Luigi Novi:
As far as I am aware, this "making the rounds" refers to a post on the Comicboards Spider-Man Board, where the poster AJ made a post referring to PAD's OMD post on this board which had an unintentionally misleading header. Unfortunately the archives are offline, so I can't get you or me a link, but IIRC it went something like "Peter David comments on OMD - bet Sacasa hates it too". In the actual body of the post however AJ merely stated that Peter David had expressed reservations about OMD Part 4. Not that long after, Peter David made a visit to the SMB and set things straight in a post very much like the one this thread of comments is attached to. AJ immediately apologised for the the misunderstanding and overinterpreting Peter's comments and so PAD's position on OMD was cleared up in a very short while, as far as those participating at the SMB were concerned. It may well be, of course, that AJ's original post had been referenced in other forums before this happened.
However, some of the other people at the SMB then aroused Peter David's ire because they felt he was being a bit harsh on fans in general for characterizing all of them by questionable and outrageous statements of a few. Peter David replied he just forgot to add "some" before fans etc. I was another offender because I found it hard to believe that there really fans out there who were treating OMD as a crime against humanity. No, PAD replied, that was an exact quote. I pointed out that "fans are treating an updating of "Doctor Faustus" as if it's a crime against humanity" could only have been a quote if it was said about these fans by someone else, in which case it was an interpretation (of what they actually said). I also suggested that maybe if some people had called OMD "a crime against humanity" it could well have been a case of dramatic hyperbole. [I am now wondering if it might not also have been used ironically, because it does seem that in the OMD debate way too many people have disengaged their irony and sarcasm detectors]. But PAD was having none of that, saying that that kind of minuscule parsing of words was what gave comic fans, or some comic fans, a bad name. I backed down, wrote a placating reply and since that did not satisfy another poster, wrote another one post saying it was my fault for thinking PAD had meant his comments as an attack on fans in general, even if his phrasing was unclear. But then some idiot whose name I did not recall seeing on the board before made an asinine and tasteless post (opening a different thread) suggesting the nickname "al-Quesada" for Joe Quesada for his "terrorism against fans". Peter David triumphantly seized on this, asking if after this outrage, comparing the EiC of Marvel with a terrorist organization that had killed thousands, anyone still wanted to argue that he was exaggerating about the reaction of fandom. I am unable to give the exact quote, but it was understood by everyone responding as a clear attempt to characterize all fans by this isolated and outrageous example, and one response suggested that Peter would not like it if he as a comics creator was held responsible for what John Byrne said. (The offending poster was, needless to say, hooted down and also by the evidence of things immediately banned by the moderators). And an example of a guy who in all likelihood was a troll out to provoke outrage (although one other poster suggested that maybe it was an unfunny attempt to lampoon what some of the people who hated OMD had said about Quesada). As for me, Peter David's post reminded me of the way how in the run-up to the Iraq war all war opponents were lumped together with a handful of isolated extremists and crackpots in order to discredit the entire peace movement. So naturally I (a fan of Peter David's writing since the 1980s) was very disappointed in him.

Two more points: The nickname "al-Quesada" is tasteless and inappropriate, but this kind of thing is hardly unique to comic fans. Speaking personally I find it obscene that in the US there is such a low threshold for using the word "nazi" (member of a political movement responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of people, including hundreds of thousands of Americans) as a label for people one dislikes, especially in compounds like "feminazi", "anti-smoking nazi", even "soup nazi". These words (and Osama/Obama jokes) are used with less of a social sanction than "al-Quesada" got here among comic fans.

Obviously I can't write about this as if I had not taken part in those SMB debates, but I tried to stay as factual as possible. Once the archives go online again, you should be able to check the relevant threads out at
http://www.comicboards.com/smb/
I may not return here as I'll be trying to cut down on participation in OMD-related debates...

Posted by: Fraser at January 2, 2008 02:34 PM

I must admit, I did like Mephisto's line that" Idon't want your soul, you super-heroes just stand around in hell feeling noble about saving someone, no matter how I torment you."

Who is THIS imposter? He certainly sounds much different from the character who spent years lusting (for my lack of thinking of a better word) after the soul of Norrin Radd.
Incidentally, how many super-heroes are in Mephisto's realm and when did they get there?
Sounds to me like someone decided to toss out any sense in favor of a cheap but clever "soundbite".

That is disappointing, Menshevik.

Btw Luigi Novi, you are now my hero. Congratulations. :)

Comic book companies have been making choices about characters for a really long time. (Jean Grey? Black costume? Robin dying? ANY of this ring a bell?) For better or worse, these characters have stuff happen to them. If they didn't who'd read the books? And, if this proves anything, anything that's done in a book, can be undone.

Thank you to Fraser, Menshevik and Rob Brown. :-)

Alan Kistler: I personally hated the last four pages of OMD because even without the continuity problems and my confusion now as to Spidey's status with the New Avengers and Civil War in general...
Luigi Novi: Exactly. I've been enjoying New Avengers for several issues now, because I like the idea of them being fugitives, but still trying to be crime-fighting adventurers. But now, I gotta wonder: What's gonna happen in the next issue? Is Spidey suddenly gonna vanish with no explanation? Is this going to happen every time a story touches upon something that occurred to Spidey between The Amazing Spider-Man Annual #21 and The Amazing Spider-Man #545?

Unfortunately for you, PAD, it is easy to read into what you're saying with your original comment. At this point, the impression most are going to draw from comments by anybody who isn't lock step with Joe Q over OMD is that they disapprove of the story on some level or another.

Luigi Novi -
What's gonna happen in the next issue?

According to Joe Q in an ongoing interview on Comic Book Resources:
"All the books count, all the stories count -- except in the minds of the people within the Marvel U, Peter and MJ were a couple, not a married couple."

Yet, somehow, JMS' idea of going back another 10 years and wiping more stuff out would have been sooooooooooo much more damaging than what Joe Q decided upon.

Go figure.

But, to me, here's the real kicker of the interview so far:
"However, how would a parent feel when they had to explain to their kid that Spider-Man just got divorced from his wife?"

I'm sorry, but this is the biggest pile of @#$% I've ever read or heard from Joe Q.

Does he think we're dumb? Mindless zombies who will agree with anything he says? Or is his ego just that damn large that it gets in the way of any common sense?

Spidey can't get divorced or have kids out of wedlock, but he can make a deal with the devil that wipes out his marriage and all the memories of it?

Before that, he comments on how Spidey can't have kids out of wedlock (thus the reason Gwen's twins are not Parker's), and how bad that would look as well.

More than half the marriages in this country end in divorce. I don't even want to guess at the figures about the number of children born out of wedlock. Yet, these are somehow worse topics than making deals with devils.

What a complete and total crock of @#$%.

I fervently wished a British military officer had walked in and called a halt to the whole stupid thing on the grounds that it had got too silly. Didn't it occur to these two dimwits [Peter/MJ] that there was a third person involved? Oh, wait, yes it did. "What if it's her time to go?" MJ asks, or something to that effect. Yet neither of them even pauses to wonder "What would May have to say about this?" I'm betting the farm she'd be horrified. But who cares, right? After all Peter's got this misplaced guilt he has to get rid of, so ...

Just as well the FNSM title ceased to be because I'd have hated to stop reading a PAD title, but this unforgiveable mess (which I'm glad to see he's not all that happy with) has decided me to drop Spidey titles from my to read list. Yes, things change in real life, too. But not this idiotic way.

JMS' wordless story showing how, even though they were now separated, Peter and MJ just couldn't stop thinking about each other was a powerful statement of their underlying love for one another and one of the all-time best comics I've ever enjoyed. OMD makes it all to have been a pathetic joke because, well, we can't have that, can we? So let's all pretend it never happened and go on from there. Feh.

How can anyone not love that book? Peter Parker makes a deal with the devil to end his marriage and save his aunt. LMAO :)

Peter Parker MADE A DEAL WITH THE DEVIL. He did it to "save" a women who has been on death's doorstep since the moment we met her :). Man, Uncle Ben is soooooo pissed at Peter right now.

Speaking of Uncle Ben, I'm sure Mephisto would have willing to toss him in if Peter was willing to part with his memories of Gwen Stacy.

PAD: good clarification.

These days I've read a lot of comments about OMD. A lot of them state their worry about what will happen with the stories that have already been told. Hace they happened? Do they have the same value as they did one month ago? I think that is not what really matters. I reckon that OMD has hurt a lot Peter Parker as a fiction character, but not because what it has done to the past stories, but for it will be done to the future stories. The editorial has purposedly erased what they didn't like about the character, so it's right to think that that kind of things won't be happening in the future. So Peter Parker won't be marrying ever more. And Peter Parker won't be telling his aunt who he really is. Harry Osborn won't die again.
I think this certainly limits the possibilities and the character. Marvel has stated that Peter is a full-grown teenager, and that they pretend to keep him that way forever. I don't think it's a good idea to limit that much Peter's potencial. And I don't know if I will fancy reading many more of that "soap-opera" stories knowing that they will lead to nowhere.
And, form a personal point of view, I've always thought that there are characters that you like and characters that you love. Those that I've come to love have always been those who evolve as their storie goes. I like Superman, and Batman, and Captain America very much, but I LOVE characters like Wally West (whose realtionship with their children gets to my heart; thanks Waid for it), Jack Knight-Starman, Gaiman's Morpheus, PAD's Linda Danvers and... Spider-man. The sorrow I feel about Spider-man after OMD is that I know that maybe I will like the character, I will find his new stories very cool, but I think i will not be able to love him anymore because I know he will be frozen in the new old status that the editors want him in.
And that's whay I don't like OMD.

(You can't imagine how tough for me it is to write the hyphen of Spider-man. In Spain, he is known as Spiderman, without it, and remembering to write it is a real pain in the... ehem!)

What's really ridiculous is that if they wanted to save lives, Peter and Mary Jane should have sacrificed their marriage to erase the supreme court 2000 election decision instead.

>> Posted by The StarWolf at January 3, 2008 03:45 AM
I fervently wished a British military officer had walked in and called a halt to the whole stupid thing on the grounds that it had got too silly. Didn't it occur to these two dimwits [Peter/MJ] that there was a third person involved? Oh, wait, yes it did. "What if it's her time to go?" MJ asks, or something to that effect. Yet neither of them even pauses to wonder "What would May have to say about this?" I'm betting the farm she'd be horrified. But who cares, right? After all Peter's got this misplaced guilt he has to get rid of, so ...

I know, I was thinking, you're talking to the devil and not once do you consider the possibility that "wait, will this keep Aunt May out of heaven? What if she's like--'I see Ben, dang! Now I have to sew up Peter's socks for the next fifty years.'"

Peter,
As the former FNSM writer were you ever a part of the brainstorming to "fix" the Spidey-marriage? Any development backstory you could share? Did you joke that Peter should make a deal with the devil and everyone jumped on it as a great idea a la the Wolverine/losing his adamantium thing?

Over at CBR, they have a big OMD interview with Mr. Q. In it he implies that the end result was always a Peter/MJ reset but JMS had a different mechanism in mind to achieve it. Some people have mentioned that Loki was set up to owe Peter a favor earlier in his run and that perhaps Loki would have been a more logical choice as a deus ex machina. Considering JMS is also writing THOR, the most likely place for Loki to show up next, it would seem that he would be an ideal character to use.

I haven't read the final issue of OMD, but I was impressed with the introduction of the alternate path Peters of part 3. I think my biggest complaint is that this change has been telegraphed by Mr. Q for years. Where's the twist? I had sort of the same feeling about the Winter Soldier/Bucky thing. If everyone is hinting that he's really Bucky and the dramatic conclusion is "Yes. He's Bucky.", it ain't so surprising.

The StarWolf -
Yet neither of them even pauses to wonder "What would May have to say about this?" I'm betting the farm she'd be horrified.

I posed the same question yesterday on the Newsarama boards.

Yet, has bothered to respond one way or the other about it. Apparently Aunt May being the comics equivalent of Terry Schiavo just isn't that important.

Posted by: Craig J. Ries at January 3, 2008 12:57 AM

I'm sorry, but this is the biggest pile of @#$% I've ever read or heard from Joe Q.

Does he think we're dumb? Mindless zombies who will agree with anything he says? Or is his ego just that damn large that it gets in the way of any common sense?

Spidey can't get divorced or have kids out of wedlock, but he can make a deal with the devil that wipes out his marriage and all the memories of it?

Don't even be sorry, Craig. What you're saying is really valid.

Even if you forget about deals with a guy who we're calling the devil (because he's got almost everything in common with the devil after all, and you could say he is *a* devil, although there are others like Satannish), one of Spidey's enemies can blast his own head off with a shotgun (Kraven, of course), another one can develop more than one personality as the result of being molested as a child (Vermin), another can one pull Spidey's eye out of its socket and eat it (Morlun), etc.

Despite those things and many, many more, JQ is suddenly going to say that Spider-Man books are suitable for all ages, and for that reason divorce is off the table? (Not that I would've liked a divorce, mind you, but still...) But suicide, sexual abuse of children, and cannibalism are more acceptable for young, impressionable eyes? Yes, that IS stupid.

Posted by: The StarWolf at January 3, 2008 03:45 AM

I fervently wished a British military officer had walked in and called a halt to the whole stupid thing on the grounds that it had got too silly.

Bwahaha! Python ftw! :D

but this unforgiveable mess (which I'm glad to see he's not all that happy with)

I don't know whether he dislikes the decision to break up the marriage more, or the shitstorm of protest that has resulted. Both are JQ's fault, however. The guy's been in the business long enough to know what the fallout was gonna be.

Here is the sad thing. According to this guy, they probably will sell more comics than before after this. They're going to sell more comics than before just because they are putting out three issues of ASM per month instead of one, and ASM sells well just because of the book's title.

I won't put it past Quesada to produce three times the amount of a historically successful product as he did before, and then make a public statement to the effect of "See? We're selling more copies of Amazing Spider-Man than ever! That proves that readers like a single Peter Parker better than a married one."

That kind of arrogance, btw, is what moves people to give him names like "al-Quesada", never mind whether it's too much or in bad taste. If you're still bothering to read these comments, PAD, I know this guy's your boss and I know you worked with him on X-Factor, but by treating us like this he is bringing it on himself and I have no sympathy for him. I'm sorry.

Posted by: Craig J. Ries at January 3, 2008 12:57 AM

I'm sorry, but this is the biggest pile of @#$% I've ever read or heard from Joe Q.

Does he think we're dumb? Mindless zombies who will agree with anything he says? Or is his ego just that damn large that it gets in the way of any common sense?

Spidey can't get divorced or have kids out of wedlock, but he can make a deal with the devil that wipes out his marriage and all the memories of it?

Don't even be sorry, Craig. What you're saying is really valid.

Even if you forget about deals with a guy who we're calling the devil (because he's got almost everything in common with the devil after all, and you could say he is *a* devil, although there are others like Satannish), one of Spidey's enemies can blast his own head off with a shotgun (Kraven, of course), another one can develop more than one personality as the result of being molested as a child (Vermin), another can one pull Spidey's eye out of its socket and eat it (Morlun), etc.

Despite those things and many, many more, JQ is suddenly going to say that Spider-Man books are suitable for all ages, and for that reason divorce is off the table? (Not that I would've liked a divorce, mind you, but still...) But suicide, sexual abuse of children, and cannibalism are more acceptable for young, impressionable eyes? Yes, that IS stupid.

Posted by: The StarWolf at January 3, 2008 03:45 AM

I fervently wished a British military officer had walked in and called a halt to the whole stupid thing on the grounds that it had got too silly.

Bwahaha! Python ftw! :D

but this unforgiveable mess (which I'm glad to see he's not all that happy with)

I don't know whether he dislikes the decision to break up the marriage more, or the shitstorm of protest that has resulted. Both are JQ's fault, however. The guy's been in the business long enough to know what the fallout was gonna be.

Here is the sad thing. I've read one person speculate that they probably will sell more comics than before after this. (Have a look here: http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/forums/showpost.php?p=1400103&postcount=93 ) They're going to sell more comics than before just because they are putting out three issues of ASM per month instead of one, and ASM sells well just because of the book's title.

I won't put it past Quesada to produce three times the amount of a historically successful product as he did before, and then make a public statement to the effect of "See? We're selling more copies of Amazing Spider-Man than ever! That proves that readers like a single Peter Parker better than a married one."

That kind of arrogance, btw, is what moves people to give him names like "al-Quesada", never mind whether it's too much or in bad taste. I'm not going to call him that because it's stupid, but I can totally understand why somebody would be angry enough to do so.

If you're still bothering to read these comments, PAD, I know this guy's your boss and I know you worked with him on X-Factor, but by treating us like this he is bringing it on himself and I have no sympathy for him. I'm sorry.

clatterboot, the third part of the CBR mechanism is up and it explains what JMS wanted to do differently. He wanted to go farther back in time with the retcon and change a lot more stuff.

The fact Quesada said he gave serious thought to resurrecting Gwen really threw me: Other than the initial shock value, what could she bring to the storyline that any other blonde love interest couldn't? Nothing I can see that's worth raising her from the dead.
As to Mephisto, I know Mockingbird is currently in his section of Hell, as was Hellcat for a while. Off the top of my head, I can't think of any others, but I believe there are some.

"If I could remove one word from the english language, it would be continuity. It's done more to harm comic books than anything..."

Snipped to avoid de-railing.

My toddler son is potty training. In order to encourage him to sit on the potty long enough to learn how to go #2, I've taken to telling him stories. He's very fond of the Three Little Pigs.

Imagine telling that story, expect when you come to pig house #2, instead of the Big Bad Wolf showing up to huff and puff and blow the house down, you get the Rabid Dog, and he's armed with a bulldozer. What happened to the BBW from House #1? What happened to his MO of Huffing and Puffing? Well, who cares, because the story of the Rabid Dog and the bolldozer is well told and exciting in it's own right.

What do you have when you don't have continuity? You don't have a story, that's what. You have a tale that people are not interested in following because it lacks the basic structure that is required for the audience to remain interested. It shows a discipline of the tale-teller that says that they care about the yarn they're weaving, and at least informs the audience that there's a good chance that there's a payoff at the end of the tale worth sticking around for. These are fiction, fantasy stories, but it's imperative to maintain an honesty regarding structure and past events. Otherwise, the audience lacks anything concrete to hold onto, and you run the great risk that their attention will fail.

Imagine reading The Lord of the Rings, and in book 4, Frodo dies. Only to appear again in book 5, with no explanation as to him dieing. Maybe you'd finish the book, but if that event were unresovled, chances are you'd never read Tolkien again, because he hasn't demonstrated that he's a good writer that maintains continuity in his stories.

Marvel is the house that pretty much brought continuity to comics. They imbedded references to past issues, even to issues of other books. Continuity matters because Marvel made it matter. They made it a selling point. Their shared universe was attractive for the very existence of continuity.

From what I see, Marvel is trying to Secret Wars every book. Not content to have the once or twice a year crossover event, they are now trying to make every book have an event every year, and make it last all year long. They're trying to capture those sales by making every issue part of an event...and you have to get every part in order to get the full story. It's a model that the comic consumer has proven works...but at the level Marvel is attempting, can the market bear that? When every book becomes the latest IT book, will those boosted sales continue? Or to paraphrase the Incredibles, when every issue is Super, won't that mean that none of them actually are?

My first time posting on anything anywhere. That provides some sense of the intensity of my reaction to the OMD direction for Spider-Man.

Let's set a few things aside first.

I think the world of JMS. Even when I think his story premise is fatally flawed or wrong-headed (e.g., the Gwen's kids story), I can count on him to have a credible sequence of events and dialogue that sounds like intelligent people thinking about what they're doing. No difference here.

I think the JQ administration has been a net positive for Marvel. Talented creators doing good, original work. Not everywhere but still.

My problem is that the tone of Spider-Man has been severely altered. The original Peter Parker through the first couple hundred issues was a high school or college age youth with all the possibilities of a life barely begun, colored by the problems and challenges of a realistic life situation (a sick aunt, opinion leaders who turned everything positive he did into a negative, and the one bad decision that had irreversible bad consequences). Getting rid of Mary Jane does not take him back to that youth. What we now have is a Peter Parker well past college who has yet to find a career niche that comes close to using his extraordinary gifts (and I mean his scientific knowledge, not his super-powers). He is now an aging bachelor who has never really enjoyed dating and a chronically depressed, glass-half-empty man without anyone close enough to him to help him through those periods. And according to Mephisto (who is SO reliable), he and Mary Jane will both have a subconscious awareness of the loss of their relationship that will sour an already sour personality even more.

By my count, this is the third major Marvel attempt to eliminate Peter's social support network. First, we send him off with his entire network of friends and family in favor of a clone who is a blank slate. Massive outrage and that is undone. Second, we kill off his wife (but not really) and after a year of moping, that is undone. And now this. Stan Lee has come in for a lot of criticism for marrying off Peter for sentimental motives, but his take on the character and the character's arc is looking better and better to me all the time.

So if we want a relatable Peter Parker with the original spirit and inspiration or some defensible alternative, here are our choices: (1) The Spider-Man comic strip, for all its lack of action pieces and emotional depth. (2) Spider-Girl, even though Peter is not the focus. (3) Ultimate Spider-Man, though Bendis has that Peter so beaten into the ground that it overshadows any possibilities of youth. (4) The Spider-Man movies, though they have dropped Mary Jane's condition to sad and doomed. (5) The old comics, which are still wonderful but a little less so because you know they are not leading anywhere good. (6) The Marvel Universe Spider-Man, if and when saner heads prevail and not only undo this latest mess but also stop trying to replace it with a better designed lunge in the same wrong direction.

Further proof this was a bad story from the start - check out CBR and Newsarama for the back and forth between Joe and JMS about the ending, the whole thing just seems like a clusterbomb.

Fraser wrote: "As to Mephisto, I know Mockingbird is currently in his section of Hell, as was Hellcat for a while. Off the top of my head, I can't think of any others, but I believe there are some."

Refresh my memory, why is Mockingbird in hell?

It's unfortunate that your statement was misinterpreted, but your statement that "fandom needs perspective" is a bit too harsh of a rebuttal. I think based on the glimpse behind the curtain we've seen the last few days, an angry reaction is justified. And while I understand your annoyance, I think part of the reason people assumed you hated the story is because most of us hated it, most of us (despite what you might think) loved your run, and therefore assumed that you were "with us." Bad assumption I know, but in a weird way, flattering to you.

For all those of you still reeling from the OMD/BND controversy like I was, you must go to this site and read the compelling, extensive exposé done by this guy, Thomas Mets:

http://thecomiccrypt.com/viewtopic.php?t=4440

He successfully dissects, provides arguements from both sides, and discusses pros and cons of the new Spidey directions, past, prensent and future. A well-structured must read, he's been at it since september. I'm not even done entirely reading it yet, but it's vastly entertaining.

Wow. Looking at the newsarama article, I think it's clear that Joey Q had absolutely no concern about continuity or how it would be changed. He wanted it to be a certain way, whether or not it made sense within the story, and that was the way it was going to be. After all, "It's magic, we don't have to explain it."

Unlike some, I have no problem with the premise of Peter giving up his marriage to save Aunt May. He would make any sacrifice to save his mother figure from death, especially from a death that he indirectly caused, especially after failing to save Uncle Ben (his father figure) from a death that he indirectly caused. But Mephisto can't let Peter forget the sacrifice (where is the torture if he doesn't remember what he lost?), and Aunt May only gets another day or two before she's killed randomly. If he is going to be the djinn in the story, he should act as such.

I originally blamed JMS for this, but now it sounds like editorial (i.e. Joey Q) is responsible for most of this.

Refresh my memory, why is Mockingbird in hell?

During Avengers West Coast #100, in a battle with Mephisto, Mockingbird is basically sucked into whatever realm he inhabits (I'm not sure that's actually Hell or not).

According to the Dreaded Wikipedia, during the Hellcat mini-series:
"She later returns as a reanimated corpse as part of the Grim Reaper's plot to destroy the Avengers. She also seen fighting endless battles in a hell[3], in which she has an opportunity to return to life but turns it down while indicating that she still has a purpose to serve in death."

>What do you have when you don't have continuity? You don't have a story, that's what.

Worse, you have no reason to care because whatever happens will probably be deemed irrelevant down the line and be changed to something else at editorial whim. And if they don't care, why should you? And why should you then spend money on it?

"Fandom really needs to get some perspective here."

Whatever could be wrong with this - It's straightforward, accurate and (particularly for PAD, who does not quail at harshness when he feels like it) very nearly mild. If a bad storyline is being told about one's favorite super-hero, gee - don't buy it, and complain to anyone who wants to listen. In this instance, Mephisto has sorcerously altered reality: Maybe that makes for a bad story, and maybe not. I'm not reading the series, so I don't know which it will be. There is no reason to think any changes cannot later be restored - by sorcery, a convulsive spasm of reality insisting on its true course, the necessary steps being taken to duplicate all first meetings and impressions, or some other means. Rather than a permanent continuity-change, this may be nothing but the particular storyline of early 2008 - like killing girlfriends, revealing identities, changing the medical prognoses of old characters or "permanently" killing villains.

John Hall, if I understand Quesada's interview properly, Peter isn't the aging guy he would be if the marriage had simply unhappened: He's also been deaged to somewhere in his early twenties. Which makes no sense in terms of the pact or the Marvel timeline but it gets Quesada the Spidey he wanted. And for whatever it's worth, he said that one of his goals is to re-establish a broad supporting cast for Peter.
I presume the same reasoning lies behind the lack of a poison pill in the deal with Mephisto: Having him booby-trap things so Aunt May dies anyway would be more his style, but it's not what they want, so ... Likewise, the assertion that this hasn't affected any aspect of continuity other than his unmasking being forgotten and the wedding not coming off--if this were a WHAT IF, I'd be laughing at the idea (actually I've seen several alternate history stories in which huge,sweeping changes somehow lead to the same world we have now, and I don't laugh, I curse at the wasted time I spent) but again, that's the decreee.
Jeffrey, it's true this can be fixed (I'm sure that's also part of the appeal of using Mephisto), but that's the problem: Why bother to follow the stories if Marvel can unmake them on a whim? Sure, it's easy to say, as DC did post-Crisis, that "None of the stories ever happened! They're fiction, remember?" but the point of reading a story is to believe in them, that they happened, that the outcome mattered. Which is hard to do.
I believe Mockingbird is in Hell partly for her murder of the second Western Ghost Rider over his seducing her magically. Though I'm not sure.

"Like it or not, fans invest emotionally in characters and stories. Good stories move people and imprint themselves on us. Sure, people can throw whatever snarky comments they want on boards -- and everyone knows how too many board-dwellers love to kick folks when they are down -- but its that emotional investment, sustained over time, that makes comic books so special and the fans so, well, fanatical.

I guess I'll own that. "

I agree whole heartedly with you. Im a fan myself. I guess you took my thoughts a little too personally but I wasnt being snarky. I wanted to address the reality that I experiance when a character goes through a change that inevitably, some fan doesnt like, and I get told that the creator "sucks" because the fan didnt like the story. Well...I dont happen to think a creator sucks because I didnt like the tale. I just look at it as a different idea.
Im not trying to devalue how you feel about a story. I love stories that touch so deeply it makes you laugh or cry while reading a comic.
And I certainly did not mean to kick you while you were down. I wouldn't do that. Im just voicing an opinion.
Another opinion I realize is that no matter what a creator does, not everyone is going to like. That's fine too. I guess I'm looking for a different, less-volitile approach to the fans general thought process other than; "You suck".

"Parts of 20 years of work undone in the span of a few pages. Yeah, people have a right to be pissed about this kind of change."

No. That's an expectation on the comic book community that is frivolous in thought. Comic creators don't tend to be ticked off about what comes after thier run, just that they had a good run. That the story was heard and loved. I get that. What I also get, is that to expect a creator to continuously research and have to keep EVERY little word or nuance that a character has had in over 30 decades worth of work, is ludicrous.

Actually, the only type of comic that can deliver the kind of continuity you desire is a creator owned independant book. Or books that are creator owned like "Sin City".
To expect the conglomeration of workers and freelancers at Marvel to uphold your ideals is a bit much. If you've been reading comics by either of the top two companies for an amount of time over, say, 5 years, you understand how they work.
I'm not saying that the big two are right in thier treatment of the characters. I think it sucks. I do, however, know that they are not about to change.

First, a sick thought: What if Peter gives up his marriage, goes back in time (along with the rest of the frickin' Marvel universe), sees his now-healthy Aunt May -- and she walks outside and gets killed by a bus? Anyone who's read science fiction (or FAUST) knows that deals with the Devil never turn out as one had hoped. (If they did, the Devil -- being evil -- wouldn't make them.)

Second, many MANY comments ago I suggested the reset was a bit like DALLAS years ago where they brought back the deceased Bobby Ewing by saying that the past season had been a dream, and that fans felt more ripped off from having their enjoyed storylines turned imaginary (dreamlike, I suppose) and out of continuity. Someone suggested that my example was dated, so here's another one:

It's the final episode of LOST. After many plot twists and struggles, the survivors are on the verge of learning everything. They've beaten the Others, they have a way off the Island, but first they are about to enter the room where all the answers lie. They burst through the door...

And Charlie wakes up! Yes, the entire show had been in Charlie's head when he O.D.ed, and all the show's elements were part of his crash or hospital stay: The Island is from when he fell into the ocean, Jack is his doctor, Sawyer is a patient who always beats Kate at cards when she visits, Hurley is a patient in for a stomach stapling because he can't seem to lose weight (and the infamous Numbers were mentioned on tv as the winning #s for the MegaJackpot), etc. So it was all in his head, there were (in the show's continuity) no Others or conflicts or adventures.

Who here will be fine, taking pleasure in the fact that the old episodes may have been deemed imaginary but can be enjoyed as much as before?

I think it'd cause a bigger outcry than the SOPRANOS ending. And it's because fans don't want their continuity screwed around with.

I should've posted this earlier, but here's a good idea on how OMD could have been fixed. You know what, I like it so much that I'll link to it AND copy it in here.

http://mightygodking.com/index.php/2007/11/30/geez-do-i-gotta-fix-everything/

To all those complaining about the shitty “Mephisto makes Peter give up his marriage to save Aunt May with devil-magic” storyline currently going on in Amazing Spider-Man - look, this one is so easy to fix it’s almost redundant to mention it, and by “fix” I don’t mean just retconning it away, but instead making it work on a larger scale.

Ready? Because it’s really easy.

The sniper’s bullet would have missed Aunt May if Mephisto hadn’t altered its course just so.

There. That is all you need. The problem with this story thus far is twofold:

1.) Splitting up Peter and MJ is dumb;
2.) Having Mephisto make this deal is dumber.

Now, #1 is easily dealt with because in a couple of years they’ll reunite, just watch. But #2? That’s why you need the twist I just mentioned. Because, instead of just opportunistically marching into the plot and saying “moo hoo ha ha, I am evil and will force you to make a cruel O. Henry sort of decision, Peter Parker,” Mephisto is now driving the action.

As a matter of fact, maybe Mephisto’s plan wouldn’t just be to get Peter to make the deal. I mean, come on, the endgame can’t just be “make Peter suffer,” because the Green Goblin does that all the time and you’d think Mephisto would be playing for higher stakes, right? He is, after all, the Debbil.

Indeed - if it were me writing, I’d say that Mephisto wants Peter to sacrifice his marriage so that Peter suffers - and then finds out about what Mephisto did. Easy enough to have Dr. Strange notice it at some point. And come on, we’ve all seen Spidey lose his shit when somebody targets his loved ones before, right? (Come to think, isn’t that what he just did?) And Peter is, unfortunately in this case, brave and prone to rash decisions at these moments.

Say, like, maybe he enters Hell - literally - to make things right. (Because he reads it somewhere in a magic book that of course Mephisto didn’t make sure he’d find.)

And maybe that’s what Mephisto wanted all along - because he can’t get Spidey’s soul while Spidey’s on Earth, it’s pure and untouchable, but if Spidey goes into Mephisto’s realm, he’s fair game. (Why yes, I did read Triumph and Torment, why do you ask?) Getting a shot at a pure soul like that suddenly justifies all the work Mephisto put into this - not just Spidey’s soul itself, but all the knockoff effects (imagine the despair in the hearts of all the Marvel heroes if Spidey has to rot in hell for all eternity; maybe one or two would even mount an ill-advised rescue attempt! Or even more, if Mephisto decided to, shall we say, subtly encourage things).

Just imagine a run of issues where Spidey goes through the nine levels of Hell. It could be horrific, to be sure, but done properly it could also become literal translation of the metaphysical anguish that encapsulates Spider-Man’s life: the ultimate iteration, if you will, of suffer-worse-worst-triumph-momentary burst of sheer happiness-repeat that is more or less the entire history of Spidey comics.

And there’s so much more you could do with it. Mary Jane-slash-Jackpot charging into Hell after him halfway through when she finds out the truth of what happens. Somebody finally calling in that boon Loki owes Spider-Man from about five years ago. And yes, I can already tell you how it ends: with Peter and MJ, bruised and beaten, staring up as Mephisto swells to a thousand feet high or more to confront the equally giant attacker who, at the last moment, has come to save people he loves, and who can take Mephisto on, even in Hell -

- but I’m not giving that away yet. Who knows, maybe I’ll get to write it.

(I believe the appropriate answer to that is “shyyyeeeah.”)

"I should've posted this earlier, but here's a good idea on how OMD could have been fixed."

Except it's not an idea on how to fix OMD. It's just an overly elaborate declaration that this guy wishes they'd never done OMD.

I dont agree that the marraige is no longer relevant (and I know by that Peter means in "present context"), that would be like saying Peter being bitten by a spider, then a practical NUKE going off (Spider-Man: Chapter One) was still canon whilst Peter just remembers it as a slight pain in the hand

Brand New Day is just another failed rebranding. I think if Dan treated it more like She-Hulk, full of irony and fourth-wall breaking, it could have an "All-Star Batman" appeal to it. Suffice to say, this Peter Parker so far in the story is a lifeless, directionless loser...and there's no charm in that. The Peter I know triumphed over his social problems, and MJ, despite several attempts at running away, returned to stand by him and conquered her own problems. They both had the power to do it, and the responsibility to look after each other

That is real life. Not Arhcie, not Spawn, REAL-LIFE. With coustumes and powers (and all Peter does is climb up walls and has a sixth sense)

Marvel isnt telling stories about Spider-Man anymore, and havent for some time. They are telling storylines about SUPERMAN, SPAWN, and other CHARICTURES of who they want Spidey to reflect

Rivethed, you have a point in general about continuity but not in this case: This isn't someone forgetting a minor detail ("Spidey said Flash was the second person to use the Vulture's suit--how could he forget Blackie Drago?") but wilfully rewriting it.
James Lynch, while I agree with you, I know several people who LOVE that kind of twist: When Buffy did the insane asylum episode, several online friends predicted the final episode would be us discovering Buffy really was insane and the whole series had been a hallucination and wouldn't that be AWESOME? And I've heard the same said about lost.
A different thought: Wouldn't Peter and MJ being forced to divorce cause them more pain? To be told to breakup and that Aunt May would live as long as they stayed apart? Instead of remembering in some small part of their mind to have a reminder every friggin' day? Constantly? Certainly for MJ because even if she could understand Peter's choice, the choice would have to bite. And wouldn't it sure as hell screw up any dating they tried to do later.
Of course, that wouldn't have resulted in the Brand New Day setup Quesada wanted, so it's irrelevant, but I thought I'd throw it out.

"Fandom really needs to get some perspective here."

Maybe it's Marvel publishing that needs to get some perspective. Marvel fans...at least, ones that go back more than 10 years or so...expect some level of adherance to continuity. Resets are something DC does, because for so long they didn't pay any attention or care for continuity within their published universe, and the Crisis and related events were efforts to bring continuity. Which of course requires additional resets. Marvel built it's name on telling stories more grounded in reality, where dead meant dead more often than it did in DC's world.

The past 10 years, Marvel's moved away from that, and caused a growing disallusionment within their older customers. We keep hearing about how comics aren't bringing in enough new readers...if that's true, then Marvel does need to get some perspective. Not that a reset can't be accepted by the readers, but that if it's going to happen, it needs to happen in a well-told story. One that makes sense. I've seen countless stories over the past 3 years where Marvel characters do things merely for the sake of the story. No care for staying true to their character as established by Marvel, no care for working to tell a story that's consistant with past stories. Just telling stories for the sake of telling a story.

DC's always done this. It make the first Crisis a publishing necessity. Then it lead to the Elseworlds label. Somewhere along the way, Marvel started doing this in their mainstream books.

I haven't finished a Marvel mini-series in close to a decade. The only Marvel books I buy are titles acquired from Dabel Brothers. While I've already past my limit for accepting the stories Marvel is trying to sell, it remains to be seen whether OMD represents the final straw for a critical mass of customers or not. There's a large vocal outcry against the way this story was told, but if it's not accompanied by action...dropping Marvel books...nothing will really change.

Just read a post by JMS in which he says he raised several objections to Quesada's claim this doesn't alter continuity ("Either Harry's been alive all these years or he was just raised from the dead.") and was told repeatedly "It's magic. Mephisto fixed that too."

I think, as some have suggested, that mephisto fans should be the ones pissed. Is Mephisto so hard up these days that he needs to make deals just so he can hear souls in pain? What, he doesn't have enough souls in his realm to listen to? What kind of deal is that where he wipes out the unmasking and Aunt May's verge of death in exchange for Peter and Mary Jane feeling Melancholy once in a while? What kind of deal is that? Hey Mephy, maybe you should have thrown in Uncle Ben to sweeten the pot or season tickets to the Mets? Seriously, has he lost his touch or what? I remember when even had his own limted series, which come to think of it, did occur around the same time as the marriage...hmm. Anyways, Mephisto must be hard up if this deal was in anyway appealing to him. No wonder Franklin Richards wipes the floor with him.

As an aside, it's nice to see the positive tone of this discussion/debate. When politics are discussed here, the posts often and quickly degenerte into massive generalizations, personal insults, and often cries of being picked on. The discussion here has been long, passionate, and full of contrasting and disagreeing voiewpoints -- but folks have remained civil and polite to each other. It's very good to see that debate doesn't have to be mean spirited.

Assuming you guys have not already linked and/or read these, there is a nice discussion of the pros and cons of different types of retcons (along with the author's feelings about "One More Day" and unrestrained retcons in general) at: http://www.websnark.com/archives/2008/01/retconning_just_1.html

J. Michael Stracynski also explains his talks with Quesada and his feelings about OMD at: http://forum.newsarama.com/showthread.php?t=141756

Both are excellent reads.

I don't have Part 4 of OMD yet (couldn't get to the store last Friday and it sold out--I'll get mine on the reorder), but I haven't bothered avoiding spoilers because we all knew Joe Q wanted the marriage gone.
Here's the thing: My biggest problem with the idea is that it's lazy. It's just lazy. Spider-Man's married. He's been married for ten years. You don't want him to be married.
Too damn bad. That's the character you've got to work with at this point in history. You work with a 30ish, married Peter Parker who's a schoolteacher and sometimes supplements his income by taking news photos. That's who Spider-Man is. When you work on a character with a long history, you deal with who the character has become over the course of that history, you don't hit the Reset button to make him the character he was when you were twelve.

I really liked Augie DeBlieck's imagining, over at CBR, of a Joe Q speech at Wizard World 2009, in which he says, essentially, "We got rid of the marriage and made Spidey a lonely loser, and it sucked. Now the marriage is back. Enjoy."

My husband was curious when I told him that I feel being "Dallas-ed" about what just happened in the Spider-Man universe and when I explained to him what I meant, he completely agreed. He added, well... Dallas didn`t survive much longer after the infamous shower scene with Bobby and the reason is, the audience is not stupid and people don`t want to be treated as such.

I don`t want Spider-Man to end and I don`t think there is any danger of that. But I hope that sales figures will fall deep enough in order to give TPB reason to undo the damage they did, as much as that is possible.

I'm tickled by the strawman that's floating around that fans are being irrational because they expect perfect continuity. Hardly anyone beside obsessive nitpickers expect all the details of the past to have a stranglehold on the stories of the present, but that's extremely different from wiping out a substantial portion of the past.

It's like a bad time travel story and worse the writers are probably going to assume that everything that happened before in the old timeline still happened except that MJ wasn't involved and Harry didn't die. Doesn't that implicitly say that MJ was a wholly unnecessary character?

Yes, it'll probably all change back but it'll only change back because fans are mad like they are now. If they had 'perspective' then there wouldn't be any push for change.

As for the idea that well, the old stories still exist on some meta level is rather disappointing to hear from an author. The thing about comics is that they're a living, evolving universe. In reading fiction, you're supposed to pretend that it's real. Some may think it's silly to be outraged if a story turns out to be a dream because the story didn't exist in the first place but I think that misses the point. If the characters don't exist even in their own self-contained world it changes how you feel about reading past stories.

Would I feel the same about the ending of Romeo and Juliet if it turns out to be a feverish dream? Or if I know it's just going to end with a deal with the devil erasing everything that happened before?

What popped into my head last night was one more reason why this is wrong.

MJ is part of the family now.

I will grudgingly concede that Quesada has a point when he talks about how the buildup to the marriage was rushed and it was unrealistic to have Peter and Mary Jane to go from being just friends to being madly in love to getting married in three issues times or whatever.

But it happened, and it's been the status quo for such a long time that MJ is, again, part of the family instead of just another character.

She isn't like Harry, or Gwen, or Liz, or Flash. When she took her marriage vows, she became part of Peter's family. That familial bond only strengthened the longer the two of them stayed together.

So I think that this is one reason why it is unacceptable to so many of us. This isn't just a breakup of two characters who were romantically involved, but it is taking somebody who was a member of the Parker clan who shared a special connection with Peter and turning her into just another friend. That's no good. It wouldn't be any more acceptable to remove all memories of Aunt May and Peter being related--connected--and to cause him to just think of her as "that old woman" and her to think of him as "that nice young man."

Even if the two of them got divorced instead, they would share a residual bond because of their memories of being together, of connecting. With the magic retcon, they don't even have that.

Maybe the marriage was wrong, but two wrongs don't make a right, and OMD is very wrong.

I've been wrasslin' with the arguments in my head since the issue came out, and I'm still clawing at my brain. See, I'm not completely against the idea... provided good stories can be told. I welcome the return of the mechanical webshooters, as those were always nifty.

What I object to, however, is the crummy patch job this does on reality. "It's magic" doesn't work for me. Not when they've shoved the genie back into the box regarding his secret identity. Now they're claiming that no one knows it? No one at all? And they just forgot? Did all the media, pictures, videos, etc etc etc just vanish? The world knows Spider-Man unmasked, but then they forgot... but how many people out there can now go "I knew who Spider-Man was... and I -forgot-? WTF? I'd better investigate this!" Iron Man, Reed Richards, Wolverine, Dr. Strange. Daredevil, Norman Osborn, J. Jonah Jameson, Human Torch, and so on... all people who you'd think would have a stake in wondering what happened. Because Mephisto, we're told, didn't have time to read 600 comics and pick and choose these things, he just handwaved and made everyone forget.

Apparently, he also rebuilt the house in Forest Hills, wiped out everything that came about as a result of Aunt May being shot, raised the dead, altered the timeline to bring new people into the social picture. We're told that Peter and MJ's -relationship- happened... just not their -marriage-. That they were together until recently, when something happened. So what is it? Did Mephisto surgically excise the fact and knowledge of the marriage out of reality, or did he change the past and create a new timeline of events? What's still relevant now? That time spent living in Avengers Tower? Spider-Man's membership in the New Avengers? All the stuff that happened to Peter and MJ solely because they were married?

To cut a long list of examples short, it's just a massively awkward, ill-concieved, poorly-executed kludge. Marvel utterly FAILED by not IMMEDIATELY having something ship that would step back and look at the big picture and tell us what's still relevant and what's not. Let's face it. In one breath, Joe Quesada tells us that it doesn't matter about the immense negative reactions seen online, because the online commentators are a small fraction of the reading audience, and in the next, he's giving interviews and offering clarifications online. The average reader, whether they've been reading for one year, five, ten, or twenty, is going to be confused as well, without the benefit of these interviews and explanations. So where's the SPIDER-MAN: BRAND NEW DAY #1 that sits us all down and tells us how everything fits together?

I can enjoy the stories just fine, but as a long-time reader, it bothers me that I don't know how things are supposed to work. If the webshooters are back, did the events where Peter got organic webshooters never happen? Are his other new powers gone? Did Mephisto change the past so it never happened, or just wipe them out in the here and now? If Harry Osborn is alive, did Mephisto change the past, or bring back the dead? If the Forest Hills house is back...

I'm not going to insist on perfect continuity. Just, y'know, explanations on how we got from point A to point B in an acceptably logical manner. "It's magic" only goes so far. Either we had a total time travel reality rewrite, a la "Age of Apocalypse" or we had a reality overlay, a la "House of M." To use elements of both is sloppy and confusing.

I have a lot of thoughts, and they're getting unwieldy. I'll keep reading Spider-Man to see how they handle this, but I really don't like the way in which it all went down. Even for comic books, it strangled disbelief and leaves too many gaping chest woun- I mean, questions.

So in conclusion, the sooner that Marvel explains these things, the better.

Layla Miller.

I picked up my comics at my local comics shop last night. I told the clerk I needed to amend my pull list. I was dropping Amazing Spider-Man. He said I was hardly the the only one. People have been dropping Spider-Man since One More Day started. He said they used to order about 80 issues but their down to about 30 now.

I don't know how widespread this trend is but that is a 62.5% decrease in orders at my shop.

That should be "THEY'RE down to about 30 now."

Apparently I'm better at math than grammar.

Been thinking about this for a day or so, and also lurking around a few fora(if that's the correct spelling) and I realized something. On the internet, most people won't allow themselves to see "fairly neutral" as, well, fairly neutral. There HAS to be a deeper meaning, EVERYTHING has to be a confrontation or THE BAD GUYS WIN!! The BAD GUYS, being, of course, anyone that disagrees with you. ANY comment, EVERY comment, is the deepest darkest representation of the typist's soul.

Or, at least that's the way some people seem to treat it. When I saw the post that said it wasn't the way PAD would've handled it, I said, "Huh, not the way I'd've done it either, but that might be why I do unmade screenplays and not work for Marvel." Or, something equally self-deprecating. Guess what, friends? If PAD had written the story, IT'D BE DIFFERENT! Better? Worse? Who knows? Just DIFFERENT. Heck, I could give PAD anything I've written(and brother, is there a lot of it) and tell him to rewrite ANY of it, and you know what? IT'D BE DIFFERENT! (For one thing, the jokes would probably make more than three people on this planet laugh...) And even the worst things that happen in a comic book, TV series, movie, comic strip, serial novel, or really bad joke eventually get made all right.

Sometimes, take people at their word. Don't analyze every micron of every letter of every word if the message is simple.

Paul Balze: Spider-Man's married. He's been married for ten years.
Luigi Novi: This is a Marvel time reference, right? Where has this been established, just out of curiosity? (I assumed you weren't talking about real time, since they've been married in real time for 20 years.)

In Marvel time, they've probably been married about 3-7 years. Franklin Richards was 4 1/2 when they got married, he's somewhere around 10 now (give or take a couple of years, and assuming that his kidnapping to another dimension and subsequent return left him with no net gain in age), so we'll split the difference and call it a five-year marriage. (Part of the problem is that Marvel's "aged" a lot of characters off-panel during Quesada's run as EIC; Kitty Pryde went from about sixteen or seventeen in the 90s to her early to mid twenties now, with no real timeframe for it. Ditto with Franklin, who spent ages at four or five, then jumped to ten or eleven within the last few years. Admittedly, character aging and timeframes are tricky to deal with, so I don't blame any specific writer, but it does seem to be a relatively recent trend to assume these characters must be older, because they've been around for so long, instead of assuming that they don't age much during and between stories.)

Which has some relevance, I suppose...the characters have aged a lot more during Quesada's tenure as EIC, so it's not entirely surprising that he's trying to reverse that trend.

"On the internet, most people won't allow themselves to see "fairly neutral" as, well, fairly neutral. "

That's a large part of the nature of the internet. People who don't have a strong opinion about something won't even bother finding a message board in the first place. So when they go to the message boards looking for people to agree with them, they always find that agreement whether it's really there or not.

Actually, when I said the Parkers had been married for ten years, I was thinking real time. I guess it's Superman and Lois Lane who were married in 1996, though, isn't it? Since I wasn't a regular reader of Amazing until JMS started writing it, the dates of earlier events don't spring readily to mind for me...as a matter of fact, the first Spider-Man title I took the trouble to order was Tangled Web, and I initially ordered that because Garth Ennis and John McCrea did the first story arc.

OMD had me up to a point, then it "jumped the shark" and pulled a Scooby Doo ( cue ret-con sfx) ending.
Harry what? hummina wha? Not so much the plot, but the execution therein. It would have been more interesting had Peter retained his memories and been placed in that situation- how does he -older Peter-deal with the people in his past now that he's "wayback" Peter.

Nobody seems to have picked up on it the first time, so ...

Layla Miller.

Think about it.

What about Layla Miller?

I just wanted to say thanks for your run on FNSM. It was the most fun main-U Spidey book I've read, and seeing you work with Todd Nauck again really just made my week every time. I wish you could continue. You always take things perhaps foisted upon you by crossovers and editorial directions and make them work for the story you want to tell. That's cool.

That said, I think that One More Day was pretty horrible and I am not looking forward to the new direction at all. I was really only reading FNSM regularly anyway, so I'm just going back to Ultimate Spidey. 616 Spidey no longer interests me. (I liked the marriage a lot...As pathetic as this sounds, it was a nice glimmer of hope to hold onto. Now...it's gone.)

Anyway, glad you aren't letting yourself be used by us upset fans. You gotta stick to your own principles, not be tossed around by others.

Looking forward to more of your She-Hulk and Fallen Angel, and always keeping my fingers crossed for a comeback of Young Justice!

Hi everyone,

my english is pretty bad so I will do it quick.

Like many of you I don't like OMD.

Recently they put online one draw from JRJr where Marvel say not even Daredevil knows Spidey is Peter Parker.

I would like to know Mr David... so, what about your old arc on the Death of Jean DeWolff where Spidey and DD team-up and DD cries a "Peter" to Spider-man ?

Mephisto erased that story too, by magic ?

Or Jean is back from the dead just like Harry ?

I very much doubt that Jean is back. But I suppose it's possible.

PAD

OK ...

Layla Miller knows stuff.

In fact, she knew about the screwed up universe in the House of M scenario.

Isn't it convenient that she's not in the 'here and now' when Spidey's life is altered?

Any bets that she knows something's wrong again and can be used as a back door to set things back the way they're supposed to be?

It might be a bit of schadenfreude, but I do sort of enjoy how no one is really happy how things played out.

Quesada is unhappy because they had to delay issues to ham-fistedly re-write and add art to the last issue and a half to line things up with Brand New Day.

JMS is unhappy because the story ends with a completely illogical magic reset instead of his slightly logical magical can of worms.

The fans are unhappy because the story reads like a ham-fisted, completely illogical magic reset.

Hey, kids! Comics!

http://www.comicbookresources.com/news/newsitem.cgi?id=12664
http://www.comicbookresources.com/news/newsitem.cgi?id=12673
http://www.comicbookresources.com/news/newsitem.cgi?id=12681
http://www.comicbookresources.com/news/newsitem.cgi?id=12688
http://www.comicbookresources.com/news/newsitem.cgi?id=12694

The links are for Quesada;s 5 part interview @ comic resources. My understanding is that ALL the stories happened. It's the MEMORY of Peter & MJ being married and the unmasking that are "forgotten" by everyone.

Joe V.

The plug for ASM#600 in June 2009 is the biggest clue this is a two and half year swerve

Luigi Novi on 01/01/08 9:24PM did indeed state eloquently and succinctly why continuity (the overarching kind, not the minutiae kind) is important.

Someone else stated on the other thread that while they could rant about the situation, they just don't care anymore.

I'm almost there. Spider-Man has been my favorite for as long as I can remember. I've been reading his stories since 1978 and collecting them since 1985. I wore out several pairs of Spidey underroos. I've spent years and thousands of dollars acquiring a near-complete run of ASM (only 12 issues away!). I care deeply about the character.

Good stories are only a good start. Good stories are so much more satisfying when they are part of a finely-woven tapestry of character development and consistent progress that allows the reader to truly suspend that disbelief that becomes so much harder to ignore the older we get. Stories like OMD (and the atrocious "Sins Past" raping of Gwen's character) lead me to question the money, time and emotion I have dedicated to both this character and comic books in general over the last 30 years.

Perhaps this is, at last, the final straw. I left Spidey when the Clone Saga hit, but came back after a couple of years. I'm leaving Spidey again now. Maybe this time I'll decide to save myself the time, money and inevitable anguish that will accompany a future return. I'm just tired of it.

1The basic concept of continuity is a staple to the average comic book produced on a monthly basis. I pick up comics because of favorite writers (I've hunted your's down, Mr. David, since the arc you did on Spidey in the 80s), sometimes favorite artists, and rarely because of the character(s).
I can bend to some screw ups in continuity. I can understand new writers/editors wanting to go in a new direction, even when it's a bad decision. What I cannot abide is sloppiness, or cheesiness in my reading.
Making MJ the one who makes the deal with the devil keeps Pete clean. Erasing their marriage instead of a divorce or killing off MJ keeps Pete clean. I've stayed with Spidey for decades through clones, erased baby of Pete and MJ (yet not in the Spider-girl comic, weirdly enough), power changes, spider totems and more mostly because of the character involved and how I can relate to him. To some degree the writers/editors have always made some sort of attempt to provide continuity/believability (except for vanishing/erased/forgotten baby). But this is beyond my acceptability.
A decade or so the powers that be in Marvel went a different way with Incredible Hulk, losing a writer I thought had made the Hulk better than ever yet always steeped in the history and continuity that came before him. I stopped buying the Hulk immediately.
For some reason it's a whole lot harder for me to do that with Spidey... but I am.

Thanks for the place to rant.

I don't know if this has been said, so I'm gonna say it.

Good stories could come out of this. REALLY good stories. Not just after the fact, but DEALING with this. Like maybe The Watcher meets up with Q who meets up with the Beyonder who show the webhead that there is a different path his life could've gone and he's gotta fight through. What's been reset once can be reset again. You know, eventually.

I just read ASM #546. It turns out that the unmasking in Civil War did take place, but no one remembers who he turned out to be.

This has got to be the dumbest, stupidest wrinkle in this whole mess yet. They couldn't just have Mephisto erase the unmasking? They had to leave it in, but not let anyone remember who it was? That's just plain fucking stupid.

And what about Mary Jane? That same page says, "Absolutely no one knows that Peter Parker is Spider-Man, not Daredevil, not the Avengers, not anyone." This makes no sense. Daredevil has known forever. Mary Jane knew from shortly after Peter became Spidey, when she witnessed him jumping out of his bedroom window one night as Spidey. Puma and Wolverine know for the same reason Daredevil did. How is it that Mephisto erased these things (when he never indicated he would), but not the unmasking? It just plain makes no sense! Won't Professor X, or Dr. Strange, or hell, EVERYONE, realize that something is seriously wrong if they can all remember that he unmasked, but can't remember who it is? Won't they realize that their memories have been messsed with? And what happens when they go to look up the unmasking in the papers? What will they find? All the relevant pages missing? Who's goddamn retarded idea was this????

Sean Good stories could come out of this. REALLY good stories.
Luigi Novi: Good stories could follow this. But I can't see how they'll come out of it. The only good one that could come out of it would be a reversal of it, and only if they could execute it in such a way that made OMD seem like it was always planned to be undone eventually because there was some reason for it.

I went to the comicbook shop today, and the owner seemed to love the story. I don't actually read Spider-Man, but the whole idea of Brand New/One More Day leaves a bad taste in my mouth. There are better ways than magic to do away with every little problem (I now came to realize that House of M wasn't as unique and interesting as I once thought it to be, since the future of all Marvel comics will rely in magic resolving everything), and I think the excuses Marvel gave to JMS (which he then relayed in in some interview) are just lazy writing. I have never given into the popular trend of bashing Marvel or the editors before, because I think they're doing a great job, but this story is making me understand just why people hate them so much.

On a funny note, when I was at the shop today, there was an old What If about What If Peter and MJ never got married on display right next to the latest issue of Spidey.

Luigi Novi sez:

"I just read ASM #546. It turns out that the unmasking in Civil War did take place, but no one remembers who he turned out to be.

This has got to be the dumbest, stupidest wrinkle in this whole mess yet. They couldn't just have Mephisto erase the unmasking? They had to leave it in, but not let anyone remember who it was? That's just plain fucking stupid.

And what about Mary Jane? That same page says, "Absolutely no one knows that Peter Parker is Spider-Man, not Daredevil, not the Avengers, not anyone." This makes no sense. Daredevil has known forever. Mary Jane knew from shortly after Peter became Spidey, when she witnessed him jumping out of his bedroom window one night as Spidey. Puma and Wolverine know for the same reason Daredevil did. How is it that Mephisto erased these things (when he never indicated he would), but not the unmasking? It just plain makes no sense! Won't Professor X, or Dr. Strange, or hell, EVERYONE, realize that something is seriously wrong if they can all remember that he unmasked, but can't remember who it is? Won't they realize that their memories have been messsed with? And what happens when they go to look up the unmasking in the papers? What will they find? All the relevant pages missing? Who's goddamn retarded idea was this????"

Whoa! Luigi, you were always the rational one. still, to tell you the truth, If this "gd" idea is Joe Quesada's then it is exactly the kind of thinking that Bob Harras (who and let me be frank was in my opinion the actual writer for the spider-titles during the [laughs derisively] relaunch after the v.2 #1's of each book because there is no way repeat no way in all the levels of Hell that Ralf Macchio would have let Howard Mackie write like that [I shoud also note that the issues of Amazing Volume 2 that Byrne wrote were Byrne's on Harras's "advice") said when in the Life of Reilly column devoted to the clone saga,when told that Aunt May's return from the ersatz dead would contradict a line that Harras requested in the Osborn Journal one shot (that came out shorly after the clone saga ended to explain why Norman had his fingers in so many Clone Pies... mmm Cloned Pies) that Osborn was not involved in everything and so commented that it was a "pity he was not responsible for [May's] death." Harras replied to the effect of "And he didn't because May wasn't really dead."

Actually when thinking about this, I kind of find it bizzare that Joe Quesada who had hired JMS to fix Spider-Man would choose to co-plot JMS's swan song like this because it seems to be that "if it's fixed, then don't break it and calling it fixing." Most people would have said if it ain't broke [anymore], don't fix it." But mine is more literal.

Still, I read on Newsarama that so many people are cancelling Spider-holds in their comic shop. Will this lead to DA Q's downfall? (like I said earlier, don't want it, but won't be surprised)

Oh yes and in direct reply, maybe Mephisto is going o cloak Puma, DD, and Wolverine's senses. Oh wait, I just saw pigs fly at that idea.

Meant to say "maybe Mephisto is going to cloak Puma, DD, and Wolverine's senses."

Coming in very very late to this ... but it's right before exams, so I've been busy with the Grading Monster.

I think the statement quite a ways upthread says volumes:

Here's the thing: My biggest problem with the idea is that it's lazy. It's just lazy. Spider-Man's married. He's been married for ten years. You don't want him to be married.
Too damn bad. That's the character you've got to work with at this point in history. You work with a 30ish, married Peter Parker who's a schoolteacher and sometimes supplements his income by taking news photos. That's who Spider-Man is. When you work on a character with a long history, you deal with who the character has become over the course of that history, you don't hit the Reset button to make him the character he was when you were twelve.

That, to me, is the biggest problem. I mean yes, the rampant illogic of this "it's magic, we don't need to explain it" quick fix bugs me quite a bit, but the sheer laziness of Mephisto/Quesada waving his hand and "fixing" the situation Quesada never liked is what really bugs me.

One of the first rules of improv comedy is that when you respond to someone, you can't just say "no" to what they said and shut an idea down. Once it's said, it's said -- and you can build on or try to ways to work around it, but you cannot simply remove it.

Same problem here. Good writers get that. Our host here has made his share of sweeping changes to books, but it's always been by building on what's gone before, not knocking over all the blocks. Other writers (Busiek, I'm looking at you) have made mining Marvel continuity an incredibly rich activity.

As I'll be writing to JQ shortly, I've been a reader of the Spider-Man books since 1977. I own Marvel Masterworks covering issues 1-50, and I own issues of everything after that (Amazing, Spectacular, Team-Up, Web ... the works) up through the mid-1990s.

I left during the Clone Saga, and then came back with JMS.

I'm gone again. I'm not sure what will bring me back this time, but it'd have to be pretty impressive.

Lazy, lazy work -- and work that does a great deal to sever the emotional bonds fans have with the character.

No, thanks.

TWL

I've been thinking about this for a while...

I recently discussed the controversy surrounding “One More Day” with a friend and co-worker, and we both agreed that A) making Peter single via a “deal with the Devil” instead of via divorce or making him a widower was (to be kind) silly; and B) a better route to take would have been something akin to the Angel episode “I Will Remember You.”

For those unfamiliar with that episode, from season one of that series, Buffy Summers comes to Los Angeles to essentially demand Angel explain who he thinks he is to have show up in Sunnydale (in the Buffy Thanksgiving-themed episode “Pangs”), and not tell her, acting like a…well… guardian angel, whose unseen help he felt she needed. Before their argument gets very far, a demon attacks and in the course of the battle, Angel is exposed to its blood. For some reason, this makes him human.

Buffy and Angel seem to have what they’ve always wanted- the ability to have a real relationship- but Angel comes to realize that he’s a liability as a human; that Buffy could and probably would be killed trying to protect him. So he asks the Powers That Be to let him take back the past day and change things so he isn’t exposed to the demon’s blood. He argues that if things continue along this path, they’ll eventually lose two champions- himself and Buffy.

The Powers That Be agree to let him go back and change things, but tell him only he will remember the way things happened in the original timeline. Angel tells Buffy of his decision. They embrace and she tearfully promises over and over that she won’t forget.

Time jumps back to the moment of the demon’s attack. Angel immediately kills it (having remembered how from the battle in the original timeline), so there’s no protracted battle and he’s not exposed to the demon’s blood. Buffy says what she came to say about his visit to Sunnydale, and leaves. From her point of view in the altered timeline, she spends less than five minutes with Angel. And it wasn't a happy encounter.

And yes, he does remember the original timeline. He says as much to Doyle in a subsequent episode.

Now imagine something similar happening to Peter Parker. For some reason (and I admit I can’t think of any- but then I’m not reading any of the Spider-Man books) for the sake of New York/the country/the world/the universe/whatever Peter must go back and change things so he was never married- but he still remembers being married. Obviously this wouldn’t be part of a deal with Mephisto (or any other Marvel analog of “the Devil”), but a decision made for the “greater good.” Perhaps Dr. Strange (or some other good guy capable of such things) arranges for it to happen. Once again, Peter Parker can’t catch a break. For a time he was happy; things seemed to be going well; and then he loses yet again.

Again, I can’t think of a reason why Peter would have to sacrifice his marriage (and all memory of same) for the “greater good”, but the “I Will Remember You” type of situation, to me, would still have been the better route to take. Peter’s (and M.J.’s, for that matter, if she were the one to step forward) decision would have been more in character than a deal with Mephisto; and I suspect it’d have been more palatable to the readers, even those who didn’t want the marriage to end.

Yes, there would still be questions of which past stories still happened and which didn’t, but these things are gonna happen when you change decades worth of published history.

Rick

I know I'm late weighing in on this, but I tend to accumulate my comics and then read a story arc all at once, so I've only just read all of the "Back in Black" stories and "One More Day."

I've learned to not concern myself with continuity, so long as the story is good, but I must confess my initial reaction was an angry one. I don't see myself boycotting all Spider-Man titles, but I lament the stories that might have been. Groundwork was laid for some potentially interesting stories, but now they've been completely negated. Now there will be no aftermath to Wilson Fisk's humiliation at the hands of Peter Parker. Now we won't see what will become of a Daily Bugle run by a Jameson who knows Spider-Man's identity. (loved your last story in FNSM, PAD.) And I was actually looking forward to seeing the directions the Spidey titles would go in now that he'd been outed to the public.

I also kind of feel sorry for all of the Marvel writers who now have to consider if the story they're working on will work in a Post-"One More Day" universe. Considering how often we've been told of the ripples one event can make in the course of history; ("What If ...?", "The Age of Apocalypse","House of M", etc.) it was even emphasized in this very storyline; will those ripples conveniently dissipate before they reach the other Marvel books?

And personally, I've been reading Peter and Mary Jane as a married couple for twenty years now, and I like them together. I've never liked seeing the hero and heroine happily together in a movie only to separated and arguing with each other by the time the sequel comes around simply as a writer's convenience.

I'll keep reading, but I really don't think this was the way to go.

Oh! And can we please not go back to Aunt May being a load again? I really like how JMS fleshed her out as a character; I'd hate to see that fall by the wayside.

Im a Spiderman fan and im boycotting all spiderman titles for atleast a few years.