This week the second issue of Marvel's newest experiment, the thrice-weekly shipping of Amazing Spider-Man came out. True to my resolution to finish the first arc before quitting the series for the foreseeable future, I bought the issue, ASM #547, and to my surprise was thoroughly impressed by what I saw.
Am I backpedaling on my decision to put buying Spidey on indefinite hiatus? Not really, considering I still need the money and considering the team behind this story arc will only last until next issue, but I have to say that while I still disagree with the methodology used to bring about this new status quo, I am starting to see why Joe Quesada was willing to brave fanboy ire, online and offline, to establish it.
Recently a friend of mine briefly discussed one of my posts here with me, in particular asking why Marvel felt the need to "un-marry" Spider-Man, saying that between the two of us, we led pretty interesting lives even though we were already married.
Now, I value my friend's opinion quite a bit but I have to say I understand the logic here; Spider-Man was created for a young audience, for the teenagers and twenty-somethings still trying to come to grips with the fact that the world more often than not doesn't work the way they want it to, and a Spider-Man married to a supermodel somehow damaged that paradigm. How could Peter Parker be a lovable loser when he's married to one of the hottest women in the Marvel Universe? And, more crucially, could kids and college students, many of whom are hard-pressed to get a date at that point in their lives, really relate to a married guy, let alone a guy hitched to and regularly boinking a supermodel?
Marvel's plan to void Spider-Man's marriage was, although problematic for me, not my main beef with them, but rather how they pulled it off. This matter has been discussed in this blog and elsewhere ad nauseam, so there's really no point to rehashing any of those old diatribes here.
What I will say is that, after the tumultuous "reboot," the creative team of writer Dan Slott and penciler Steve McNiven, inker Dexter Vines and colorist Morry Hollowell (the art team collectively known as "Team Civil War") pretty much hit the ground running. Had the first couple of issues been scripted as ineptly as the epilogue to One More Day, for which Joe Quesada has accepted blame, this "new" Spider-Man would almost certainly be stumbling out of the gate. That is definitely NOT the case here.
To wax cliche, Slott demonstrates that he was born to write Spider-Man. From Peter's character moments to Spider-Man's battle banter, Slott seems to have everything about him down pat. As much as I enjoyed my issues of JMS' run, I have to admit his take on Peter was pretty short on the witty comments, which is pretty essential to the whole affair. Slott hearkens back to the old Stan Lee days of snappy patter without the goofy, anachronistic tone from which Lee's recent writing efforts (e.g. The Last Fantastic Four Story) have suffered.
That Slott is not quite able to completely remove the bad taste that One More Day has left in my mouth is through no fault of his own; it's simply been too soon since that storytelling debacle. I have to say, though, that with the second issue, Slott manages to come a lot closer to making me forget One More Day than I thought possible.
As impressive as Slott's writing is, however, the main reason for my loving this story arc is the reason my resolve to drop this book remains, which is that there is no way, barring a change of editorial heart, that Amazing Spider-Man will ever look this good again, at least in the near future, because McNiven is, quite frankly, a penciling god, and upon his departure from the book after next issue, he will be SORELY missed.
The quality of McNiven's pencils, ably abetted by Vines and Hollowell offers stark testimony to the advantage of giving artists buckets of lead time to prepare their work; it's better than it's been in years. The last time I enjoyed his art this much was when he had just started on Marvel Knights 4. In the projects he had done for Marvel since then he was either hamstrung with scripts that didn't exploit his talent properly (his run on New Avengers) or rushed into meeting deadlines (Civil War), such that his work, while still better than that of 80% of most other mainstream artists noticeably dipped in overall quality.
For two issues out of three, however, this has not been the case for ol' Stevie. McNiven has long said he's wanted to do Spider-Man and his love for the character absolutely shines through here. He even pulls a bit of a surprise and channels Todd McFarlane for one glorious splash page. Looking at the page from afar my father thought the art had been digitally rendered rather than hand-drawn. That's how good the guy is.
Marvel, however, have been pretty candid that McNiven is kind of a marketing hook to whet readers' appetites for Spider-Man's new direction; after #548 ships next week he's off to join Civil War collaborator Mark Millar on a yet-undisclosed project, undoubtedly to the anguish of many a Spider-fan who may have hoped he'd draw Peter Parker's adventures forever. After he leaves, with due respect to the artists they've got lined up, including my sentimental favorite John Romita, Jr., the book will simply not look as good.
So while I'm still taking my indefinite break from the title after McNiven leaves, at least now I'm leaving with a lot less bitterness.
My wallet thanks you, Marvel, and now I can say I thank you for seeing me (and possibly a lot of other readers) off with a great story, and some absolutely stellar art.
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