Well, Peter Parker isn't even back in control of his own skin yet, but it seems Marvel have already got a heck of a lot lined up for him upon his much-hyped return. Later this year, every single Spider-Man who ever saw publication will team up with Peter in five-issue adventure pitting him (and them, I assume) against Morlun, the deadly, seemingly unstoppable quasi-vampire created by former Spidey writer J. Michael Straczynski back in 2001, who nearly killed Spidey in the very first story in which he was introduced, and who ACTUALLY killed him four years later in another mammoth storyline, "The Other." Spider-Man got better, of course, only to be "killed" by Doctor Octopus some years later, but apparently Morlun wants to take another crack at putting Peter Parker in the ground for good.
With French artist Olivier Coipel (of Thor and The Siege fame) on art duties, I feel assured that this book will look better than it has in years; with due respect to the current rotating crop of artists like Humberto Ramos and Giuseppe Camuncoli, their work is, at its best competent, and at its worst (especially in Ramos' case) quite difficult to look at, while Coipel is certified A-list.
The real question for me, though, is how writer Dan Slott will pull such an ambitious story off; his audacious Ock-as-Spidey series was basically just one extended storyline, and even though it definitely had its pitfalls here and then I really have to hand it to the guy for having the balls to attempt and actually succeed at something that, years ago, might have seemed bats**t crazy to the folks at Marvel editorial.
Slott's not my favorite writer at the moment, that distinction goes to Mark Waid, currently writing Daredevil and who has also written an upcoming Spider-Man graphic novel with James Robinson and Gabrielle Del'Otto, but I do enjoy his work quite a bit, and, love him or hate him, I don't think anyone can deny that where Spidey is concerned, the guy thinks big. Slott's predecessor, J. Michael Straczynski had a storied, often debated six-year run on The Amazing Spider-Man, of which I have the first thirty-three issues (with John Romita Jr.) a few in between, and the controversial final four (which contained the status-quo shattering "One More Day" storyline with art by then Marvel Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada). In none of the issues that I have, nor any of those that I have read or heard about, have I seen a sense of scope to rival that which Slott puts on display in his run. It's not that Slott's necessarily a better writer; he's just more ambitious in terms of scope.
Straczynski was content to write his own Spidey stories and introduce new, ultimately forgettable characters like the Shade, a Doc Ock usurper named Carlyle, the gamma-powered monster made up of dead mobsters called Digger, and Shathra, a mysterious, murderous woman who, I think, was meant to be a spider-wasp. And then, of course, there was the debacle of having Norman Osborn retroactively sire twins by the late, lamented Gwen Stacy, twins which were actually supposed to have been Peter's. Fortunately, I didn't stick around for that story. Morlun, however, stood out, and though he may be derivative in some respects, being a vampire of sorts whose name sounds a little too much like Morbius, an existing Marvel vampire, for comfort, those first six issues of his appearance were really electrifying to read. I am therefore genuinely curious to see what Slott has planned for the character, who has quite literally been in limbo, or Marvel Comics' version of it, since another writer used him in a Black Panther story.
Sure the hype machine is starting up early for this story, but considering that Marvel actually delivered on the last Spider-event it hyped, namely Superior Spider-Man, I'm definitely along for the ride this time.
No comments:
Post a Comment