Great Comicbook Art Thread

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My favorite Spiderman in the Spider-verse is...

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Spider-Man Noir
 
I like the idea and visual design of Spider-Gwen, but I still find it odd that Peter has no reaction to hanging around with his old dead GF that he blames himself for the death of...

I guess just further confirmation that the modern Spidey is not the same character.
 
I don't subscribe to the Spider-verse. I love Noir, need the old symbiote; but the whole Spiderman alternate universes is meh for me. I watched 'Into the Spider-verse' and was pretty damn critical of it. Never got into Miles Morales...

You know what?

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I didn't mind Spidey eventually ditching the symbiote suit, I liked it, but I also love the original red and blue more, but I always hated Venom - he's such a DC villain ("Spider-man, but EEEEEVIL, like Reverse-Flash, Bizarro Superman, etc). Thematically, that place was already occupied by the shamefully under-used Scorpion. And then Carnage...eeeuugh
Yeah, Venom is a terrible character from a time when Marvel was just churning out really poor villains like Apocalyse and Mr. Sinister. Oddly enough, modern Mr. Sinister is a pretty fun character.
 
He’s actually kind of lame but I always liked his yellow quilt outfit. My other favorite is Ned Leeds Hobgoblin.
 
Hey, he could be the Gibbon or the Grizzly. You can even add him to your Lego Spider-Man rogues' gallery:
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Yeah, I've always enjoyed Shocker's quilted look and the armbands. I like a lot of Spidey's C-stringers - the workhorse villains that are somewhere between henchman and supervillain - Shocker, Boomerang, Beetle, etc.

I really love what Spectacular Spider-man did, pairing Shocker with The Enforcers
 
That was when I accepted the character I grew up with was well and truly gone forever.

...

I guess just further confirmation that the modern Spidey is not the same character.

I'm not really a comics guy, so tell me if I'm way off base. From my observation, any popular character in super hero comics is destined to be 'officially' drawn and written by two dozen very different people over multiple decades. Inevitably the stories swing from tone to tone and accumulate stuff like parallel dimensions, time travel, clones, what if scenarios, amnesia, publicity stunt 'deaths', and a variety of soft/hard reboots.

A sense of continuity under those circumstances is kind of a subjective personal project, isn't it? Don't you just sort of keep the story beats you like as part of your conception of the character and subconsciously write-out the rest, until you get to an 'era' you mostly don't like and just wait for the next reboot, soft or otherwise?

So I don't understand the idea of a character like that being 'gone forever' in someone's mind.

I mean, to me Spiderman seems to be like James Bond (something I actually am familiar with): Continuity stopped making sense as a priority for him a long time ago, but I still like to watch the character having new adventures. If I don't like a particular incarnation or 'episode' I might like the next one, it's not like I'm concerned about him somehow being in his mid-thirties for 58 years.

I don't mean this to sound like I'm making light of your feelings by the way.
 
I'm not really a comics guy, so tell me if I'm way off base. From my observation, any popular character in super hero comics is destined to be 'officially' drawn and written by two dozen very different people over multiple decades. Inevitably the stories swing from tone to tone and accumulate stuff like parallel dimensions, time travel, clones, what if scenarios, amnesia, publicity stunt 'deaths', and a variety of soft/hard reboots.

A sense of continuity under those circumstances is kind of a subjective personal project, isn't it? Don't you just sort of keep the story beats you like as part of your conception of the character and subconsciously write-out the rest, until you get to an 'era' you mostly don't like and just wait for the next reboot, soft or otherwise?

So I don't understand the idea of a character like that being 'gone forever' in someone's mind.

I mean, to me Spiderman seems to be like James Bond (something I actually am familiar with): Continuity stopped making sense as a priority for him a long time ago, but I still like to watch the character having new adventures. If I don't like a particular incarnation or 'episode' I might like the next one, it's not like I'm concerned about him somehow being in his mid-thirties for 58 years.

Um, I think there's maybe two different types of "contunity" being discussed here - one, which I think is the more common usage, has to do with cannon - a consistent story over a period of time. This sort of continuity is very hard to do when you have multiple creators working on serialized stories over a long period of time. Mainly what it requires is strict editorial oversight and a singular head vision, and Marvel hasn't had that for a long time. I lament the loss of that sometimes, but I also think it's been a double-edged sword ever since it was introduced, in that readers now expect it, and these expectations has led DC, dealing with characters who existed almost a century before Continuity was a concept, constantly trying to impose this, and thus we have the complete reboots of the DC universe every few years, with the notion "this time we'll get it right". I kinda think Marvel needs to accept at this point that Continuity went out the window in the 90s and they're never getting it back.

But when I say "Spider-man now is not the same character I grew up with", while I partially am referring to continuity, as far as Gwen Stacy, I actually am more referencing the actual character - personality , behaviour, and motivation - of the character himself and the tone of the stories that once existed. And I guess the prime example of this, for me, will always be "Brand New Day".

Spider-man has always had a very singular motivation, summed up by the most famous catchphrase in comics - "With a Power, Comes Great Responsibility". That always informed his stories, from the choices he made, to the consequences of those choices. Basically, Peter Parker is a hard-luck character because, despite the fact he desires and strives for all the normal things a man wants - love, friendship, community, prosperity, etc. At every opportunity he will put his responsibility as Spider-man ahead of that. And for yers that has cost him. Cost him relationships, cost him jobs, cost him money. That to me is the essence of the character. If you ever want to know how Spidey/Peter will act in any situation, all you have to do is view it through that lens. Peter Parker has a constant and accute sense of responsibility.

When Peter married MJ in '86 this was a big crisis for the character (for both characters, but I'll leave out my evaluation from MJ's side right now because that's a tangent) - essentially he was very aware that he was now adopting a new responsibility, one that was as important as his responsibility being Spider-man. This struggle was dealt with accutely in the issues leading up to the marriage, and there was a point when it very much looked like he wasn't going to show up, that he couldn't accept this compromise to being Spidey. But he made that choice and took the consequences.

I could go into a long rant now about why this changed the nature of the comic, how the reaction to this adjustment affected writters, and how the loss of Continuity led to people with no understanding of this aspect of the character led to a certain vocal segment of the hobby community in the 90s begin to specifically blame the marriage for "ruining" the character, instead of making him more complex (and thus more human), but lets just say one of those vocal anti-marriage folks got the EIC role at Marvel in the 2000s. And hence the notion to "fix" the character by getting rid of the marriage.

In and of itself, while I wouldn't have liked this at all, myself, it could very easily have been done while staying true to the character in multiple ways - hundreds of ways.

Instead what we got is Brand New Day.

Brand New Day was meant to "fix" them writing themselves into a corner - Spidey had revealed his identity to the world...because...reasons. The in-story reasons were - nonsensical. It was completely against Peter's character - he abandoned his sense of responsibility to those close to him to...make some sort of political statement that it makes no sense that he would even agree with. The REAL reason was to create an "EVENT" to sell comics, which was the order of the day at Marvel at that time.

But that Event is over and the writers are like "oh crap, how do we deal with this now?" So they come up witha way to "reboot" the character and get rid of both the Event that just took place, AND Peter's marriage. How?

By having Peter do another thing that goes completely against the intrinsic core of his character. By having him shirk his responsibilities. On a cosmic scale.

It would be the same as having Bruce Wayne piss on his parent's grave. Not because he was "turned evil" or controlled, or it was some edgy Elseworld's Frank Miller story, but just have hi go "that entire motivation I've had as a character my whole existence? Fuck that, don't care, it's mildly inconvenient for me at the moment".

Peter Parker makes a deal with the devil to get his secret identity restored, and gives up his wife as payment.

This is a blatant example, but it's only one of hundreds starting in the 90s. Everything that defines the character of Spider-man is pretty much....not there anymore. And there's no consequences to that. They treated Brand New Day not like a HUGE event, betrayal by Peter of his essential motivations, but as just a soft reboot.

So that's why I say the character I grew up with doesn't exist anymore.


I don't mean this to sound like I'm making light of your feelings by the way.


lol, no, not at all. I have passion for Spider-man, obviously, but I'm not sensitive about him, if that makes any sense. I know that this is all very silly childhood stuff, and that Spidey isn't owned by me, and likewise I'm not owed any interpretation to appeal to me, personally.
 
Sadly, over time, characters and stories become 'properties' and they lose a lot in that transition.

For the lazy writer, "Superman would never do that," is just asking for a ",but what if he did," story.

I don't know, DC had it down pat in the Justice League animated series and hasn't been able to do a decent thing since.

I think the problem is the corporate directive that gives us heroes saying "fuck" all the time in their shows. I mean, sure I can see say, Hawk, saying it. But it's not about the characterization, it's about the tone and the target audience. It's the desire to be edgy and adult.

To quote the best bit I've ever seen on the topic: "The Crimson Chin doesn't swear!" "Except the nineties Crimson Chin. I got cancelled."
 
Yeah, I've always enjoyed Shocker's quilted look and the armbands. I like a lot of Spidey's C-stringers - the workhorse villains that are somewhere between henchman and supervillain - Shocker, Boomerang, Beetle, etc.

I really love what Spectacular Spider-man did, pairing Shocker with The Enforcers

I always enjoy when you get glimpses of the lesser villain's, mundane day to day life. The revelation that Princess Python was married to Stilt-Man even though I don't think we ever see them together other than at Stilt-Man's funeral, really creates the sense of a bigger, living world. It can also be very funny, and very The Sopranos. There was also a great Defenders storyline in which a Nebulon's Scientology-style cult was teaching B-list villains like Procupine and Eel to become more effective versions of themselves. Didn't last.
 
That Peter Parker acted his age. When BND happened, it’s like they de-aged him back to when he was 21.
 
That Peter Parker acted his age. When BND happened, it’s like they de-aged him back to when he was 21.

Well... that was kind of the point. Quesada didn't like the adult interpretation of the character. He wanted to revert him to a younger variant and go back to the status quo of the 60s and 70s.
 
Yeah, Venom is a terrible character from a time when Marvel was just churning out really poor villains like Apocalyse and Mr. Sinister. Oddly enough, modern Mr. Sinister is a pretty fun character.

The Marauders were great villains but Mr. Sinister was a lame Eveeel supervillain.

Mojo was my favourite X-Men bad guy in the 80s. Still underrated.

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heh, at the Kubert school our class motto was "Mojo V Stands Erect!"

We got t-shirts made and would obnoxiously yell it in public, as dumb young teenagers do
 
I actusally didnt mind Mr Sinister, or Apocalypse. I wasn't a huge XMen reader, but I liked them.

I'm not sure who my favourite X-Men villain is. Sometimes Magneto when he's written right.

I got really excited for Inferno, and so I will always have particular affection for The Goblyn Queen

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Can't say that isn't 99% to do with her being a redhead in gothic fetish gear though...
 
I liked Mister Sinister, but it wasn't really because of anything he did. It was more that he was behind the scenes, implied to be really powerful, but just pulled everyone else's strings. And that worked with Claremont's style of long term plotting.

I also felt extremely satisfied when Cyclops blasted Sinister to dust. It felt so anticlimactic for Sinister to reappear without explanation in Xecutioners Song. I preferred Sinister be a finite villain from Mutant Massacre to Inferno with dark connections to Scott's origin. It made him more... Sinister.

Sinister was best when he wasn't explained, wasn't doing anything directly, and was just an ominous presence.
 
I always liked the visual design of Holocaust from Age of Apocalypse

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Sinister's wheels within wheels, multiclones, and Victorian snobbery set him apart enough to make him interesting these days. Apocalyse is still as dull as can be. Mojo, I've never really liked Mojo, he's maybe better as a Fantastic Four villain or something. I do like the Goblyn Queen, Madelyne Prior deserved better and has every right to be pissed off. The costume's silly in the typical sexy bad girl in black way, but even so, she's acting out and making a point so, I guess it's okay, if a bit too Clairmont. It looks better on her than it would on Mary Marvel anyhow.

For a favorite X-Villain, who isn't Magneto since he mostly wears a hero hat these days, I think I'd go with Sebastian Shaw and the Hell Fire Club. Wealthy people who plan to profit on the suffering of a minority they're a part of.
 
I like the idea and visual design of Spider-Gwen, but I still find it odd that Peter has no reaction to hanging around with his old dead GF that he blames himself for the death of...

I guess just further confirmation that the modern Spidey is not the same character.
I haven't been keeping up with Spiderman lore, but didn't the original Spiderman (who turned out to be a clone of the original Peter Parker) retire and pass the torch to the original who was living under the name Ben Reilly?
 
I haven't been keeping up with Spiderman lore, but didn't the original Spiderman (who turned out to be a clone of the original Peter Parker) retire and pass the torch to the original who was living under the name Ben Reilly?

uh....no. I almost got into the convoluted history of the Clone Saga, but that wouldn't make me happy. Long story short, Ben was the clone all along, everything that happened was pointless.
 
So that's why I say the character I grew up with doesn't exist anymore.

So much this. My favorite Marvel Characters (that aren't mutants) have been Spider-Man, Captain America, Iron Man, Daredevil, and Black Panther.

The reasons for Spider-Man was that they allowed him to grow, mature, and change.

They erased all of that growth and change that we'd experienced... for what?
 
Re: Mojo

The original Longshot miniseries existed at just that right time where I was picking up and reading every Marvel book I could. The art for that miniseries was SO good. It really stood out during that year. And I was super into the story at the time. During those months when that story ran and was new, it just really clicked with me. During that miniseries, I thought Mojo was super threatening and an excellent villain.

But then, Longshot became an X-Man. I often wonder if Claremont really wanted the character in the book. He didn't seem to have any kind of handle on the character. He didn't seem to know what to do with him other than give him the most disposable and meaningless parts in the book. He didn't even give the character a proper farewell from the title, effectively just having him leave mostly off panel. And then there was Mojo.

Mojo got a lot of exposure. It was clear that the writers considered him fun. And I have to admit that the stories with him as the big bad have their moments. But he never had that menace anymore. Mojo just came across as a clown. He wasn't the same character. In the miniseries, I perceived him as a being so alien and malevolent that he simply thought in processes that we would see as being black humor. When he became a regular villain, he just became a goofy psychotic jokester.

That said, when I've revisted the Longshot miniseries, it doesn't work for me like it did that first time. I don't see the same brilliant story I saw when I read it in the mid 80s. I can't say that I particularly like Mojo as a baddie.

But I'd take Mojo any day over garbage like Nanny. And even with the critique I've just given, I'd readily rather have a Mojo story than an Apocalypse story.
 
uh....no. I almost got into the convoluted history of the Clone Saga, but that wouldn't make me happy. Long story short, Ben was the clone all along, everything that happened was pointless.

Brand New Day all over again? Things like this make me happy that I only read arcs after the fact these days.
 
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