The Four Color Media Monitor

They're going to publish Amazing Spider-Man almost weekly, while doing away with two other titles (Sensational and Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man). Augie DeBlieck says that:

Marvel is making THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN into a book that publishes three times a month, while doing away with the other two monthly Spider-Man titles.

You're not overthinking it to believe that this is mostly a cheap publishing stunt. I don't mean "cheap" in a condescending way. I mean it in a very real way: it won't cost Marvel any more to keep the same number of creators around to produce the same number of books each month. In the end, slapping the same title on the cover of each book is a big win for their bottom line.

Marvel will sell more comics, overall. I'm sure they're working on a way to divide the work and the continuity so that the book flows seamlessly from one story to the next. They're going to make a show of NOT just printing three books a month in a seemingly-random order with the same title. (They do have some sense of shame, after all.)

But, in the end, it's a cheap marketing trick. Marvel will make more money. Retailers will likely make more money. And readers will read more Spider-Man comics.

But will they include this humble Spider-fan here? Unless there's really good writing involved, I doubt I'll be among them in such a hurry. That's why the step really isn't something to be impressed with either way.

Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public. So said Henry Mencken. The man was clearly a genius. Because if the creators on the new AMAZING SPIDER-MAN had been doing three separate Spider-Man books, only one set of creators -- those on AMAZING -- would benefit from the blind adherence of fandom.

I can't blame Marvel for playing the hand they're dealt here. It's just silly and insulting, as a comics fan, that it'll work so well.

What fools we mortals be.

Alas, yes. That any readers would just continue to buy and buy and buy with complete disregard for story quality is what's really sad about all this.

What's more, I'm of the mind that yes, this is a cheap marketing trick that does nothing to include good writing, what Spidey needs just now, and without the right writers will do nothing to improve the book. No matter how good or bad an idea cancelling the other spinoff titles is, it does not improve the writing quality for our favorite wall-crawler.

Labels: marvel comics, Spider-Man