I quit reading Spider-Man a few years ago when the comics industry went nutzo, and I became disillusioned with the story lines they were subjecting Spider-Man to. But I’d kind of like to know what’s going on in Spidey’s world, what happened with all that alien-costume-getting-its-own-comic mess, and the clone nonesense, and rumors I’ve heard that Aunt May died, and Mary Jane died and what the story is with this Spider-Girl.
Anyone still reading.
I can’t even keep track of Marvel’s continual revamping of it’s entire universal timelines. Last I heard, Spidergirl was Spiderman’s daughter set 20 years or so in the future.
wow, a lot has happened with his story line. right about now I think Mary Jane is dead. Spider girl is his daughter set in the future. i can’t pull any details out of my head, i stopped reading about five months ago for lack of funds, but i plan on catching up soon
A lot happens in five months, good luck sis. I collected spider-man for some time, then stopped just after the whole clone thing was resolved. Though i kinda liked the scarlet spider thing, or whatever it was called, i forget now. But yes, spider girl is his daughter (the one abducted from mary jane) shortly after aunt may died (how long did you expect her to live? and Peteys gotta grow up and be on his own you know…). Marvel likes to twist things so much that you have to buy 20 different comic books just to keep up with one story line. Very capitalistic…
there are only two spiderman titles now that are directly with parker–amazing spiderman and peter parker, spiderman—or i think those are the two
Slightly off topic…
But I understand shooting is about to commence on a feature-length live-action Spiderman film.
Not as of about 3 weeks ago…
Sorry, you asked for a synopsis, what you’re going to get is a rant, with a synopsis thinly veiling said rant.
I just quit, after <gad!> 25+ years of reading the book.
Your questions, answered as best I can, in order (keep in mind that some of what’s going on currently is gibberish, so if my answer doesn’t make sense, blame the writers of the book) 
#1)The costume who became Venom: His wife just died so Venom could become a bad-guy again.
#2)I never understood the clone gibberish myself, but the attemped explaination is this: Norman (Green Goblin) Osborn never died. He’s been hanging around funding people to bug Spider-Man. The whole Clone thing was just an elaborate mind-game on Spidey… Keep in mind, we saw Norman stabbed through the chest (and pinned to a wall by the stabbing implement) and buried in Spider-Man 122. Turns out, he was jes’ foolin’ and has been hanging around ever since. Bleah!
#3) Aunt May died in a beautifully written story in Amazing #400. Touching, moving it was an example of the best type of comic-book writing. She died of (essentially) old age. She and Peter spent about 10 pages just talking and coming to terms with the situation. Aunt May also admitted that she kinda knew that he was Spidey for a while now, but she couldn’t admit it to herself. And that she was proud of all the good he’d done. Wonderful stuff. (and Stan Lee, who for decades refused to let Aunt May die, allowed it, after reading the script)
Sadly, it’s been screwed up. Remember Norman Osborn in the last point? The idiot writer decided that Aunt May shouldn’t be dead, and said that Norman had paid an actress
to pretend that she was Aunt May and die while meanwhile, kidnapping the real Aunt May. So the dedicated actress was the one who died. Norman’s big plan was give some closure and resolution to Peter. This makes no sense to anyone. So Aunt May is still around. But she shouldn’t be.
#4)They’re playing coy with Mary-Jane. She was being stalked by someone, we never knew who, and then the plane she was on blew up. The end. This is what convinced me to quit the book. What’s going to happen (I’ll give 20:1 odds) is that Peter will “get on with his life”, he’ll meet someone new, they’ll get involved, get serious and then Mary Jane’ll show back up. Blech.
#5) Spider-Girl. This is convoluted. During the whole Aunt May is back from the dead and so’s Norman crap at the end of the Clone thing, MJ was pregnant. The idiot writer decided it was too confusing for Peter and MJ to have a kid. Osborn paid a nurse to announce that the baby was still-born, and kidnapped the kid. The kid may or may not be dead. Marvel’s being coy about this too. Anyway, Spider-Girl is from an alternate Earth where she wasn’t kidnapped/murdered by Osborn and her story takes place in that alternate world. It’s the one Spider-book I’m still getting. It’s pretty good.
#6) You didn’t ask, but remember Sandman (the guy made of dirt, not DC’s Dream character)? Over the course of 20 years (1980-2000 or so) he’d reformed. It was a nice bit of slow growth and characterization, showing that even hardened criminals can reform, given time and work. The same idiot writer said that Sandman’s reformation was simply a plot so that he could get in good with the heroes. He plotted and schemed for all those years so that so that he could…knock over a jewlery store. Uh-huh. Oh, and since he and Norman Osborn have the same hair-cut, they’re cousins. :rolleyes:
The big problem is that the idiot writer(s) want Spider-Man frozen at what was going on when he/they were reading the book, so Spidey’s now a swingin’ bachelor, livin’ the groovy life while rooming with Robbie Roberton’s kid. Aunt May is back, paranoid of Spidey and…been there, done that. It’s crap. If you want to read a Spider-book, get reprints, or Spider-Girl. At least that has the flavor of a Spider-book.
Fenris (taking this far more seriously than is good for him)
How come, in the new(ish) animated series, the Green Goblin turned into Hobgoblin? At least I THINK it’s that same character, just less green in his longjohns.
Was Marvel concerned about alienating any possible green-skinned readers?
Yeah, Uke.
The Vulcan demographic is easily offended.
Indeed. One major change that Sam Raimi is talking about, was one made in Jim Cameron’s original treatment, no webshooters.
Live-action Spidey will be able to produce his webs and fire them directly from his wrists.
Is this change worth the 10-20 minutes of story time it would free up (ie in not showing young Peter laboriously creating the webfluid and constructing his shooters)?
Spider-girl. This character was spawned from an issue of “What If?” comics, which deals with stories in alternate universes or timelines.
In this particular alternate timeline, young May Parker, daughter of Peter and Mary Jane, was either not kidnapped or recovered. Peter lost a leg battling the Green Goblin, subsequently leading to him hanging up the tights. He then goes to work for the police as a forensic scientist.
May Parker, thanks to Marvel’s laws of genetics, is a mutant. She has her father’s speed, agility and Spidey sense - but I’m not entirely sure she’s as strong as her dad. Consequently, she’s a star athlete and hasn’t suffered the same bullying Peter went through.
All the info I get on the Spider-Man movie is from Wizard Magazine…but does anyone know who is starring as Spider MAn yet?
If you want to read up on it, it’s http://www.wizardworld.com
No one at the time of this posting. Off the top of my head, Heath Ledger and Freddy Prinze Jr are most often spoken of in connection with the role.
Lifted from Ain’t it Cool News, who lifted it from E!
…check in on that hot flick in development Spider-Man. You know the drill, I’m sure: Sam Raimi is directing a script written (for now) by David Koepp and James Cameron. And, babycakes, everybody wants to play the nerd, Peter, who becomes a superpowered arachnid.
In fact, exec word of mouth is that Sarah Michelle Gellar’s good-lookin’ beau pulled a Sean Young recently (remember when the wacky broad showed up on TV in a catsuit, hoping to get the Batman Returns Catwoman gig?), when he paid Mr. Raimi a visit at his office.
Gossipy movie types tell me Freddie so desperately wanted the role that he surprised Raimi, who wouldn’t see him. In fact, Raimi is apparently very against the idea of giving the young star a chance and has said, “If I have anything to do with it, Freddie won’t even be allowed to go see it, let
alone be cast.”
Fenris:
As I suspected, it was a big bag of shit, and I’m glad I didn’t eat it. Sure, there were other storylines that were frustrating, but ultimately made for good stories, like Peter’s relationship with the Black Cat, or (at some long lost point) the Alien Costume.
A friend of mine and I used to dream of taking over Marvel at gunpoint and straightening out their storyline. This was during the multiple-Venom phase, and the irritating Vermin era, in which Sal Buscema apparently decided that Mary Jane should look exactly like Vermin but with different skin color. Of course, everyone else had decided that slim, straight-haired Mary Jane should suddenly have enormous tits and a huge ass and curly hair that with a mind of its own and she should always be seen in her underwear.
So, they finally disgusted me to the point that I managed to get that monkey off of my back. Just hearing about the clone saga made me queasy. But I could forgive them for merely bringing Green Goblin back. I take deaths of comic books villains with a grain of salt. I could forgive them for killing off Aunt May, except that if they do so, they must give Peter other personal obligations to conflict with his heroic life. Bringing her back after killing her, though, is unacceptable. Taking out both Mary Jane and Aunt May is basically ripping out the core of the character. Now, what, he can web-sling freely without ever worrying about who’s worrying about him? Bah!
I even like the idea of Spider-Girl, but I think it’s a load of crap that they were forced to set it in an alternate universe because the writers have been dicking around.
Where the hell is Peter David while all this is going on?
This is taken from the short lived SPIDER-MAN 2099 comic where the future Spider-man actually had spider DNA grafted to his own and was able to produce his own webbing. When this first happened, he exclaimed, “Ewwww. Gross!”
Mr. Blue Sky wrote:
And, if I recall correctly, he also said, “At least they don’t shoot out of my butt.”
A friend theorized, and I love this theory, that it’s an alternate universe where Peter aged normally. In other words, he became Spidey in, what? 1963? It’s now 37 years later.
(Spider-Girl is supposed to be set in the future, but it doesn’t look or feel like the future.)
Anyway, if you have the urge for a Spider-fix, Spider-Girl’s the way to go. (They also go out of their way to make it accessable to new readers. Most stories are single issue tales, with a rare occasional “Two part epic.”)
Fenris
I’d say about 5’ 11".
WHAT?!?!?! ducks and runs