I'm glad this happened

I'm glad this happened.

Get flayed alive.

I don't like you.

>Afterword by Stan Lee
The fuck did he even say?

>Now I get even more royalties from this book! Excelsior!

You sir, are the devil
Same thing he always says, random nonsensical praise for shit he stopped caring about

I have a feeling people will call me a troll, so let me elaborate:

While I don't think OMD was the best way to go about un-marrying Peter, I am glad the character was un-married. Anyone who thinks that Marvel hasn't wanted this for decades is simply dead wrong. It was very gratifying to have the 'traditional' Spidey back.

And no, I'm not Joe Quesada.

Kek

Basically no story told since required an unmarried Peter

What exactly is so bad about Peter being married and how does it prevent him from being "classic Spidey"? We all know why they did it, a return to status quo and its easier to write the same shit over

>Except all the stories involving Peter meeting new love interests and dealing with girl trouble, a staple of the character since his debut

>halved asm's sales
>reverted a character almost back to square one
>ruined a great relationship
>basically a middle finger to toaa
>the devil wins and gets what he wants
>all to undo a marriage because it "made peter old" and doing a divorce wouldn't fix that
>pretty much took a dump on spider-girl by making obvious that it can never happen

It was editorially mandated suicide. The fact they allowed this comic that rivaled Batman in sales to sink this low and be so mediocre is beyond me.

So basically you want Spider-Man to be a harem anime in order for you to self-insert. Gotcha.

Ah yes, the same rehashed "can't let my partner find out I'm spidey #500". I was referring to the arcs as spidey

The fuck are you on about? I didn't say that means having multiple girls AT ONCE.

>Being married makes him too oooooold
>Being a Dr and a CEO is okay though.

It has nothing to do with 'writing the same shit over and over' and everything to do with Spider-Man as a marketable character.

Spider-Man is probably the most marketed fictional character in the world. Maybe Santa Claus has him beat. But he's up there. There are children in America right now that only know two words in the English language: Spider and Man. He is huge as a money maker. I work in a school, and let me tell you almost every classroom you'll go in has a half-dozen Spider-Man backpacks, lunchboxes, shirts, or shoes. It's even bigger when a new movie comes out.

Now, you'll notice that in virtually - if not every - other medium besides comics, Spider-Man is unmarried. This is because the character's 'default' is a student working for the Daily Bugle with all sorts of problems - the least of which usually isn't a string of problems tied to a female love interest.

Other characters deal with this too - for almost twenty years Adam West's portrayal of Batman was the default. It took a big-ass movie to change that into the dark, brooding hero we think of today.

The girl trouble was a crutch they could reuse for cheap drama. It got old, fast. It didn't help that they kept teasing MJ which added salt in the wound

Spider-Man being married fundamentally detracts from that marketable 'default' status. It ages him at least ten years, and it is not interesting to younger readers. A kid could go watch, say, the latest Spider-Man movie (TASM2) and read a comic where Spider-Man is married and there would be an element of confusion. Maybe it wouldn't last very long, maybe it would, but it would decrease the chances of that kid reading another Spider-Man comic.

Most superheroes aren't married for that very reason. It takes a certain aspect of their character and grinds it to a halt, along with all the other drawbacks I mentioned. Fuck, they gave Batman a kid and still didn't marry him. The only superhero who it seems to work for is Superman, and that's because Superman and Lois Lane has been a thing for almost eighty years.

And they STILL un-married him when New 52 came around.

The fact is, Spider-Man's marriage was a publicity stunt that, somehow, tied to the cartoon strip of the time. I guess it was popular back then, because that's the only reason why I'd see editorial thinking it would be okay - to match one up with the other. Who knows.

All I do know is that they have been trying to undo it ever since, and even if it took a mediocre ass story, I'm glad Joe Q had the balls to do it.

I thought the marriage was a bad idea, but the way they ended it is amongst the most laugahable things ever.
They should have just killed her. It was good enough for Gwen. Leaving him married would have been preferable, however.

Anyway, what ASM runs do you all like?
Lee/Conway era is my favorite although I like Micheliene (especially with Larsen) and Stern as well.

Well that 'cheap drama' has been a part of superhero comics since Action Comics #1.

There is no 'wound'. Not every comic story with MJ in it is there to mock the fact that you don't like OMD. It's insane to think that way.

...

Why the fuck would you care about any of that? You aren't seeing any of the returns.

Damn, "The Death of Mary Jane" would've been fucking phenomenal in an age where status quo reigns supreme.

Marriage worked great for Reed and Sue as well.

Do you really think OMIT was released just to mock the vast minority that wants the marriage back?

Because Spider-Man is my favorite fictional character of all time, and I want to see him continue be popular amongst a new generation.

Yeah, team books tend to handle it better because there's an assumption that the characters are going to share a book anyway. Hence all the X-related marriages.

If you remember the marketing, it was. People where PISSED

Remind me. I remember teases, but nothing that openly mocked the marriage or OMD or whatever.

Really, OMIT is a story that needed to be told.

Peter being married during 2001 to 2006 did not prevent the Raimi films from being successes. In fact, Spidey saw his biggest growth in popularity during the time he was married. And then there's Batman who has a goddamn kid, but that didn't make him less marketable. No one minded he was married, save the old fogeys with muh Spidey. And kids don't buy comics anymore.

>Peter being married during 2001 to 2006 did not prevent the Raimi films from being successes.
No shit, Sherlock, but think about that in reverse.

>And then there's Batman who has a goddamn kid, but that didn't make him less marketable.
And yet, still not married. Huh.

>And kids don't buy comics anymore.
It's cute that you think that. Even if kids don't buy as many comics anymore, they are still the obvious target of things that the comics guys hope will lead to them buying comics at some point in the future.

At age 8, I got into Spidey by playing the ps1 game, and he deliberately called MJ his wife. I've enjoyed the character since. Kids can like Spider-man with the marriage just fine. You're a retard.

>Still not married
user....

I don't have any examples, but for the most part it just referenced OMD a lot. There was no hint on the story, so most people who hadn't touched the comic since OMD thought they where undoing it. A lot of current readers thought it too. Instead they doubled down, and after it was over Breevort told everyone that angry readers generated more sales than apathetic ones. So yes, they like kicking the hive.

Ah, so you are retarded. That settles it.

Yeah, and how big of a role did his relationship with MJ play in that action game? My guess is, not much of one.

>You don't think a comic book writer would pull a fake-out on a marriage proposal...do ya?
user....

>Shit, I've ran out of things to say...better call this guy retarded. Should I mention one of his points and refute it? Hm...nah.

they should have never let them get married in the first place. but they did. with that being done, they should have thought of a much better way to separate them than making a deal with the Devil. but they didn't.

Even having done all that, in the immediate aftermath, i was OK with it. take Spidey in a new direction. Whatever.

But 10 years later and Peter Parker is one arc away from being in the exact same place in 2017 as he was in 2007. his character has not had any memorable stories that required a single Peter Parker in that time span (hell, he hasn't had any memorable stories period except maybe Spider Island).

basically Marvel said we can tell better stories with him single. 10 years later and we all know that's not true (how much of that is because Slott sucks is another issue though). The experiment failed. Given the venomous reaction, and how to this day 10 years later people still argue with fervor about the story, this has to go down as one of the worst moves a comic book has ever done.

...Fuck I can't prove you wrong. I actually kind of agree with you. Still, Spider-Man has been undeniably shit since OMD I believe. It has had consequences large enough that I'd prefer it if he were married.

But other than that, I agree with you somewhat.

>not much

It was basically the thrust for the secondary storyline involving Venom and the longest individual section.

I googled the dialogue for this game. The word 'wife' is said twice in one cutscene It's never said again.

Remember Kraven's Last Hunt? When are we going to have a Spidey story like that again?

There's no point in arguing further with an obvious bait

If he said it 5000 times, you'd just complain the marriage gets in the way. There's no winning with you. Either the marriage detracts from Spider-man or it's not necessary.

The New 52 unmarried literally everyone, that's why we had that shitshow over Batwoman that caused the creators to leave in a huff.

Amazing Spider-Man only selling 51k right now is all I need to know about how good of an idea OMD was.

My point is that the game writers obviously didn't worry too much about making Spider-Man's marriage a big element in their PS1 action game.

user seemed to imply that he was cool with Spider-Man being married, but that was an incredibly small portion of the game's plot. It's not comparable to your typical Spider-Man issue whose plot structure is radically different to a PS1 action game.

What marketability? Normies don't give a fuck about Spider-Man's marriage status.

They will when they decide their Spider-Man cartoon/movie/bedspread/birthday cake is pretty neat and they want to check out the comics that explore Peter's personal life in detail.

They won't care. They are not like you and I.

Why would they care?

>Why would someone care about the story of a book they bought?
Come on dude, think about what you're saying before you hit 'Post'.

No, why would they care if he was married? You're not looking at this from the right POV. They will not say "Spider-Man is married? He's ruined!" and stop buying Spider-Man related paraphernalia.

>We wanted to take Spidey back to his roots as an everyman hero.
>That's why we had him sell his daughter's soul to the devil in exchange for a secret identity.

No, it'll be more like 'This isn't like my Spider-Man movie/cartoon/light-up tennis shoes/coloring book!'

Couple that with the fact that most younger people aren't interested in stories about married couples. It makes the hero look older and, therefore, less relatable to the younger reader.

That's not even remotely what happened, user.

He sold his unborn daughter's future which is pretty much the same thing.

If what you say is true then they'd care more about how bad OMD was to Spider-Man's character than Spider-Man's marital status

OMD was like a month's worth of comics. Your typical comics newbie won't even know it exists. A marriage status quo stays with the book forever unless you tear off the band-aid (which they did).

They don't care about his personal problems at all. They care about him being Spider-Man.

I'm trying to wrap my mind around how absurd that is. Spider-Man, and all Marvel characters, are directly tied to their secret identity.

If you think all new readers 'don't care about his personal problems' then no one would stick with the book because Spider-Man's personal problems are what the book is about in the first place.

Believe it or not, kids like reading comics with good stories too - not just colorful superhero action.

So if they care about his personal problems then that means they want to see him sort through his problems. They want to see him learn from his problems. That means they want to see him grow.

Doesn't sound like they're gonna care that he's married.

You are making logical leaps.

A newer, younger reader wants to see Spider-Man solve problems. Superhero problems and secret identity problems. That's a given. Growing/learning from your problems is good, but that has nothing to do with getting married.

Marriage is not a problem, it's a status quo. You could write about Spidey's marriage problems, but does that sound like something a 12 year old wants to read?

Notice that Hulk, Batman, Iron Man, etc. have all 'learned from their problems' and still aren't married. You are desperately grasping for straws.

I forgot Hulk was married for a bit, but his wife died and then came back as a Red She-Hulk, and I think after that she died again, so I guess they didn't care for that marriage either. Whoops!

That's funny and would be cool if the marriage had flopped in 1987. too bad it didn't. So...

No one's talking about it's impact in 1987. OMD happened because the impact of the marriage was not good in the long run for all the reasons I've laid out in this thread.

Your argument would mean something if kids were complaining about Spider-Man being married.

The long run? The marriage lasted 20 years. that's an eternity in comics.

This is Joe Quesada, no doubt about it....Or at least one of the other fags who voted for it, possibly Slott.

Yeah, why weren't there more kids on Sup Forums from 1987 to 2007 complaining about a few comics they read?

>if kids were complaining about Spider-Man being married.

I'm 19, and I know some younger readers who think undoing the marriage was a shit decision.

Betty died because PAD was going through a divorce and killed Betty off because she was his ex-wife's favorite character. I don't remember how well Hulk comics did in sales after that, though.

Yes, and editorial has been trying to undo the marriage for the majority of that length of time.

I guess will deny it.

Marvel Editorial is fucking retarded. Don't use them as a good reason to do something.

My point was that though the marriage did last that long, it wasn't due to Marvel editorial wanting it to be there. It lasted that long because no one could think of a neat way to undo it. Joe Q tried, and he still fucked it up, though as I said before I am glad he finally bit the bullet.

Yes, look at where the Spider-man comics are now. In the drain both quality and sales wise.

Doesn't look like any of those kids who couldn't relate to a married Peter started reading the comics, my man.

They wanted to undo it for bullshit status quo reasons, which is retarded when most the fucking adaptations show him getting with MJ. At this point MJ endgame /is/ the status quo that is recognizable to normies no matter how much they deny it.

And yes, I know this is a shill from Marvel trying to stir up controversy for when they reveal it's undone in Marvel Legacy, but still.

>It makes the hero look older and, therefore, less relatable to the younger reader.

I heavily disagree on marriage making characters less relatable. What marriage changes is how the various readers relates to a character.

A 27 year old Peter Parker married to a 26/27 year old Mary Jane with a 6 year daughter named May is not someone who is unrealatatble. 27 year old super scientist Peter Parker with a multi-billion dollar company is unrealatable to most of the audience.

At the same time being single is a status quo. 27 year old single Peter Parker is not a 12 year old's power fantasy or someone they can really relate to. 15 year old student Peter or 21 year old college student Peter? Relatable as he is a student just like them.

If they really wanted Peter Parker to be relatable they would have done this:

Peter Parker (27) is married to MJ (27) with 6 year old May as their daughter. Peter has 2 jobs (Lab Assistant and Spider-Man) and MJ works as an Office Lady. Both would prefer to be able to pay the bills with Freelance Photography and Modeling which would allow them to spend more time with May.

Miles (15, Spectacular Spider-Man) and Gwen (17, Spider-Girl) are Peter's two proteges.

Readers would have 3 different ways to relate to Peter. Peter as them if they are old enough, Peter as hard working parent who wants to spend more time with them but can't due to responsibilities through May, and Peter as Mentor through Miles and Gwen.

And you being glad does not make it a good thing.

Superior Spider-Man. That's about it though.

Oh, please. ASM has been a top 20 comic every month so far this year, and I suspect it will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. I agree, the book's slipping in terms of story but that has nothing to do with the marriage.

>Doesn't look like any of those kids who couldn't relate to a married Peter started reading the comics, my man.
You dumbass, the effects of OMD were not meant to be immediate. It was meant to sustain the character for another 20 or 30 years. Are you really going to tell me that younger readers have not been buying ASM because of OMD or some shit? That the entire audience of that comic - 100% of it - is made up of old farts like me? Give me a break.

See my two posts above for why that is not the end-all be-all reasoning behind OMD:

>Superior Spider-Man. That's about it though.

Superior could have been done even with the marriage.

You lack a very fundamental reason why Spider-Man is as popular as he is now. He's popular because we've seen him grow from an edgy loner kid to a responsible adult who tries to make time for his wife. Kids don't give a shit about what you describe, when they see Spider-Man they see a funny super hero who makes jokes and don't think much past that. You're deluding yourself if you think kids get confused over that shit.

I was going to respond to this, but it devolved into fan-fiction.

I read Spider-Man comics when I was nine, and I thought it was cool that Spider-Man was married.

51k is great for any other comic. For the flagship ASM? That's abysmal. It literally just placed #27 last month.

This. My only exposure to Spider-Man as a kid was Spider-Man TAS, which features a married Spider-Man and nightmare fuel. Saying kids can't find Spider-Man relatable is literally the same thing as saying he's not relatable if he works because kids don't have jobs.

This would be the best answer about the topic right now.
You could argue the industry as a whole is in an all-time low, but Spiserman sales while strong compared to Marvel's lineup are getting lower.
As another user said, Spiderman was in a direct competition with Batman for the top sales, and now what?
Batman has a kid, Superman has a kid and married (being his marriage much more iconic). Neither of them are in a slump, kids won't stop buying them just because they got kids or grow up and settle (for fuck's sake, being Starklite makes Peter much older than a fucking marriage); I guess just like 1987's kids didn't stop buying Spiderman

Nothing interesting came of it. Hell it ruined a lot of Peter's relationships: MJ, Norman, Harry, etc.

Also, not to mention, married Peter /sells/. Name the last time a non canon Marvel book sold as well as Renew Your Vows?

>B-B-But it only sold because of Spider-Man.

Bullshit, Spectacular flopped.

You're so right dude. I totally remember throwing away all my Superman comics as a kid because he was married to Lois when he wasn't in every other piece of media.
Oh wait, I didn't, because only autists like you with divorced parents would think this way

I read married Spider-man as a 12 year old and I loved that he was married. It set him apart from other heroes and he always had someone to support him. It only made me want to grow up to be more like him.

Comics writers are unbelievably petty, but PAD takes it to a new level.

erm, i thought ryv was tanking?

Jesus, you are either very stupid or trolling.

Spider-Man was popular before the marriage, during the marriage, and after the marriage. Him being married contributed literally nothing to that. I have never heard someone say they liked Spider-Man because he was 'the married super-hero' (I'm sure plenty of people will say that now, though). You attributing his popularity to that is both hilarious and wrong.

>Kids don't give a shit about what you describe, when they see Spider-Man they see a funny super hero who makes jokes and don't think much past that.
Again, you're claiming a kid doesn't care about half the story he's reading, which is ridiculous.

How is that OMD's fault?

They were married for one season, and I'm pretty sure they copped out at the end too with a 'she was a robot all along' retcon.

It's not doing well.

Nope, shit's selling better than Spider-Girl. It doesn't /extremely/ well for a non canon book.

>Bullshit, Spectacular flopped.

Too early to tell. At one store it didn't do well. And of course when the June charts are out, it'll defintely look like it sold well (because it was in Funko's Marvel box recently) but you'll have to wait for the second through fifth issues to see what the drops are like.

manchildren can't relate to him

does*

doesn't that mean anything to you?

the reason they couldn't do it was because it was popular and they couldn't get a story to stick.

it lasted because it was accepted for 20 years until Joe Q. put his foot down, not because fan reaction turned against it.

you can argue whether or not that was the right decision at the time (the story is and always will be one of the worst stories of all time, there is no argument there) but 10 years after the fact, there is no defending the move because they have not done anything new and interesting with ASM.

>kids get confused when they see the actual comics are different than movies/cartoons.

Underestimating and treating kids like they're retarded and can't handle anything is what made those powerful executives be completely out of touch with reality.

>Kids like EDM right so let's make Spidey turn into a DJ! No way can this fail

Something popular at the time does not mean it's healthy for the character's future. There is a reason most comic characters are not married.

I agree with you that ASM needs a new direction.