« Home | The politics of Mike W. Barr » | 7 tweets by Erik Larsen » | Sugarcoated column about Aquaman does reveal his s... » | Eric Esquivel speaks, but avoids taking real respo... » | A new history book about the 90s cites Malibu comi... » | IDW's still got the Transformers license, and is r... » | Marvel infuriarates India Buddhists with a new X-M... » | I seriously doubt the leaking of the 7th Heroes in... » | Is it possible Dragon Ball wasn't translated by th... » | G. Willow Wilson leaves the Muslim Ms. Marvel, and... » 

Wednesday, December 26, 2018 

Marvel puts Doctor Octopus back in Spider-Man's body

It may be a cloned body this time instead of Peter Parker's own, but what Marvel's up to with a new volume of Superior Spider-Man - written this time by Christos Gage - is more waste of financial resources for the sake of revisiting one of the most loathsome of recent moments in Spider-history that was all intended for trolling the fans, not entertainment value:
Otto Octavius leaves the moniker of Doctor Octopus behind and once again becomes THE SUPERIOR SPIDER-MAN! If you think you’ve already read the most intense and surprisingly heartbreaking Superior Spider-Man story, prepare to be wrong. Otto is going to prove to the world that he’s the most effective and (to him at least) the best super hero in the world. But when a villain that overpowers him by so much shows up in San Francisco, there’s no way Ock can win, right? Can you see Otto smirking from where you’re reading this?
I can see Quesada and Cebulski doing so if anyone's foolish enough to waste money on an homage to an awful previous series. It's just unbelievable how much money is throughly wasted on all these pointless spinoffs, especially if they're formatted as ongoings instead of miniseries. This is precisely why Marvel's fortunes have plummeted so far down.

Labels: , , , ,

Yet another example of "critics love, casuals hate" in the world of entertainment.


In the 2010s, in the comics industry
Critics are usually people closely aligned with the stuff they criticize. They already have link-minded people in editorial and other administrative positions who are trying to produce the material they prefer. The critics exist only exist as watchdogs to make sure the material being produced remains on-message. Critics are also important because they are who the
REAL CUSTOMERS of American comics publishers by and large. They are often educators or other people in academia who order graphic novels or ask that students read them for class.

Superior Spider-Man, which many fanboys found themselves liking, because the story that created him the story was okay, is on-message. The critics subscribe to
Cosplay philosophy regarding popular characters. Spider-man is just a set of powers. Anyone can be Spider-Man. Get with the Spider-verse, bro.

Superior Spider-Man s on-message because critics are hungry for more flawed, brooding and reluctant superheroes. Some casual fans are too but that's another story.
In this day and age, the idea of any man doing something altruistic is no longer believable--he must be fucked up in some way. It is more believable that he is secretly a villain...as we've seen with the recent treatment of Captain America, Cyclops, Iron Man, and Reed Richards.

Something like is Spider-Man for people who don't believe in heroism . To people who don't really believe in heroism, which includes many "critics", there's nothing specific that makes a superhero a hero. Anybody with the right powers and an ulterior motivation could do it.




Unfortunately, we live in a time when all altruism is dismissed as virtue signalling and anybody who cares about anything beyond oneself is dismissed as an SJW. The current motto is that with great power came putting great blame on everyone else besides oneself while tweeting all day.

Comic book critics come in all stripes - including anyone who wants to start their own blog or webpage or youtube channel. Look at Meyer's Perversity in Comics youtubing for example.

If you look at the most recent treatments of Captain America, Iron Man, and Reed Richards, they are not secretly villains. Their current writer, Dan Slott, is treating Richards and Iron Man as pure hero in the current revivals; Iron Man as villain was an old plot, from the Civil Wars era, and even then he was more misunderstood George Bush than gloating evil mastermind. Captain America secretly a villain is a misunderstanding of the Secret Invasion storyline; it was about an alternate reality version of Steve Rogers, one raised and twisted by Nazis or nazi analogues to feel loyalty to their cause despite his misgivings, and was at its core about the personality traits and core beliefs, the strength of will and idealism and loyalty, that made Steve Rogers a hero. It was a confused and ill-coordinated story, but not a nihilistic one.

Comic book spin offs are an old old story. Before the Spider-worse, there was the Marvel Family, the Superman Family, the Batman family, the Green Lantern Corps, - every successful superhero has all or most or multiples of an opposite sex version, a junior version, an ethnic version, a villanous version who shares his origin, and animal versions. It is a law of comic book nature dating back to the 1940s, to which Spider-Man succumbed later than most. Dr Octopus seeking redemption and to make up for old wrongs by acting spidery is nothing new. And what fan does not take some secret, even if embarassed, pleasure in seeing Spider-Ham hanging out with Spider-Gwen?

Post a Comment

About me

  • I'm Avi Green
  • From Jerusalem, Israel
  • I was born in Pennsylvania in 1974, and moved to Israel in 1983. I also enjoyed reading a lot of comics when I was young, the first being Fantastic Four. I maintain a strong belief in the public's right to knowledge and accuracy in facts. I like to think of myself as a conservative-style version of Clark Kent. I don't expect to be perfect at the job, but I do my best.
My profile

Archives

Links

  • avigreen2002@yahoo.com
  • Fansites I Created

  • Hawkfan
  • The Greatest Thing on Earth!
  • The Outer Observatory
  • Earth's Mightiest Heroines
  • The Co-Stars Primer
  • Realtime Website Traffic

    Comic book websites (open menu)

    Comic book weblogs (open menu)

    Writers and Artists (open menu)

    Video commentators (open menu)

    Miscellanous links (open menu)

  • W3 Counter stats
  • Bio Link page
  • blog directory Bloggeries Blog Directory View My Stats Blog Directory & Search engine eXTReMe Tracker Locations of visitors to this page  
    Flag Counter

    This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?

    make money online blogger templates

Older Posts Newer Posts

The Four Color Media Monitor is powered by Blogspot and Gecko & Fly.
No part of the content or the blog may be reproduced without prior written permission.
Join the Google Adsense program and learn how to make money online.