Insomniac's Spider-Man for PS4 releases on September 7th

[WebSlingWonder]

I mean, this game is basically handling it like the comics by giving Miles his own title and story as Spider-Man instead of sticking him with Peter. That shows more sense and is more fair then the Spider-Man cartoons where he gets stuck with Peter and can't even use his own bloody codename.

But Miles will be Spider-Man again in Spider-Man 2, so now you have the same situation, no? Are you going to be upset if they share the same codename, powers, city, and missions together? "Sticking him with Peter" is literally how he got to this point; he was trained and mentored by Peter. You want him to be completely independent, but that's not exactly what's happening here. Yes, the game is centered on Miles, and I don't know where Peter is, but it's a weak argument to me when you say "Miles doesn't need to be joined at the hip to Peter" - no, not as his sidekick sure, but there is no reason they cannot be partners in heroism except for BS purist reasons that date back to racist ideology or just pure comic book fandom bull.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

The fact Ultimate Peter was killed off to make way for Miles. Arguably this shows that Marvel didn't think they could co-exist back when Miles was first introduced.

The funny thing is that when Ultimate Spider-Man by Bendis was running high in the 2000s, you didn't hear too many arguments or issues about having comics with two different Peter Parkers in two different continuities. I mean I am sure that it did exist to some extent but it wasn't a big deal as it was with Miles. There was definitely greater confusion (among civilians at least) of mistaking Ultimate Spider-Man as the "default" Spider-Man and in a large sense that did happen (every single adaptation of Spider-Man in the 21st Century is based far more on USM than on 616 Spider-Man). Whereas there's not a lot to confuse Miles and 616 Peter with.

In any case, Ultimate Spider-Man was brought back from the dead eventually, anyway. And they did team-up to fight a resurrected Ultimate Goblin. And for all intents and purposes, as far as the comic shop was concerned, Miles Morales sold comics alongside ASM anyway, so he did in fact co-exist with Peter on the stands and people didn't mind.

The actual Marvel continuity stuff, the characters having the same name and so on, that's far less of an issue in terms of selling a title than it is for fans obsessed with categories.

Compared to Peter, Miles doesn't have much of an established core. His basic personality and backstory vary from writer to writer.

"basic personality and backstory" varying from writer to writer happens with Peter as well. If you go by the live-action movies, Peter has organic webbing, no he has special blood given to him by genius Dad, no he's a house-elf to Mr. Stark. And you know as far as Peter's "established core" the fact is there's a lot of disagreement about what that is. Different EICs have said different stuff.

When Marvel still doesn't know what quite to do with him, it leaves the question of whether or not he can co-exist with Peter partially open-ended.

Fact is nobody is sure if Peter can co-exist with the wider Marvel Universe, whether he should become an Avenger or so on. Not everyone likes that, or his direction in the MCU.

By contrast, other legacy characters like Kamala Khan don't have this issue (she is more similar to Peter in the way she was conceived than Miles is).

Kamala Khan is also far less obscure and well known than Miles Morales. And her story and background has the issue of it being tied to the Inhumans back when Marvel were trying to put them over instead of the X-Men, a period Marvel and fans generally want to pretend never happened.

You can argue that Miles Morales being so adaptable has what led him to become such a big character in the first place.

[Frontier]

But Miles will be Spider-Man again in Spider-Man 2, so now you have the same situation, no? Are you going to be upset if they share the same codename, powers, city, and missions together? "Sticking him with Peter" is literally how he got to this point; he was trained and mentored by Peter. You want him to be completely independent, but that's not exactly what's happening here. Yes, the game is centered on Miles, and I don't know where Peter is, but it's a weak argument to me when you say "Miles doesn't need to be joined at the hip to Peter" - no, not as his sidekick sure, but there is no reason they cannot be partners in heroism except for BS purist reasons that date back to racist ideology or just pure comic book fandom bull.

Isn't giving him his own game, possibly his own game series, a good way of avoiding all of that and incorporating Miles as an independent solo hero? So we can avoid Miles being reduced to sidekick status every time he's paired with Peter in media outside Into the Spider-Verse.

Now they don't have to focus so much on the mentor/mentee angle and just jump straight into Miles being his own hero, which is actually not what I was expecting but probably better for Miles from a character standpoint.

The funny thing is that when Ultimate Spider-Man by Bendis was running high in the 2000s, you didn't hear too many arguments or issues about having comics with two different Peter Parkers in two different continuities. I mean I am sure that it did exist to some extent but it wasn't a big deal as it was with Miles. There was definitely greater confusion (among civilians at least) of mistaking Ultimate Spider-Man as the "default" Spider-Man and in a large sense that did happen (every single adaptation of Spider-Man in the 21st Century is based far more on USM than on 616 Spider-Man). Whereas there's not a lot to confuse Miles and 616 Peter with.

I don't think that's accurate unless we're focusing on the fact that most adaptions stick Peter purely in high school and have all his college-era supporting cast members in high school with him like USM did.

[Alan2099]

1. Racism and paranoia of minorities "taking over" (which goes back decades). I'm not saying everyone who takes issues with Miles and Peter co-existing is racist, but I've seen people try to argue that race wasn't a factor in the Miles backlash. That is a naive thing to say.

I'd agree that there's a certain amount of racism in the Miles backlash. On the flipside, I can also see how a lot of Miles popularity comes FROM his race rather than any aspects of his character.

I think there's a degree of truth in both statements.

[WebSlingWonder]

Isn't giving him his own game, possibly his own game series, a good way of avoiding all of that and incorporating Miles as an independent solo hero? So we can avoid Miles being reduced to sidekick status every time he's paired with Peter in media outside Into the Spider-Verse.

Now they don't have to focus so much on the mentor/mentee angle and just jump straight into Miles being his own hero, which is actually not what I was expecting but probably better for Miles from a character standpoint.

I don't think that's accurate unless we're focusing on the fact that most adaptions stick Peter purely in high school and have all his college-era supporting cast members in high school with him like USM did.

You keep saying "avoiding sidekick status": where has he been a sidekick?

[Frontier]

You keep saying "avoiding sidekick status": where has he been a sidekick?

Have you seen how he has been handled in the cartoons?

They literally called him "Kid-Arachnid" in Ultimate Spider-Man.

[WebSlingWonder]

I'd agree that there's a certain amount of racism in the Miles backlash. On the flipside, I can also see how a lot of Miles popularity comes FROM his race rather than any aspects of his character.

I think there's a degree of truth in both statements.

Yes, there is popularity because of his race, but I would argue that since this game's predecessor and ITSV that has been less the case. People are generally just liking Miles for his personality and character more.

[WebSlingWonder]

Have you seen how he has been handled in the cartoons?

They literally called him "Kid-Arachnid" in Ultimate Spider-Man.

Two interpretations. TWO. Nowhere else has he been a sidekick, except those two. GOOH. You're letting your disdain for Marvel Animation cloud your judgment.

[Frontier]

Two interpretations. TWO. Nowhere else has he been a sidekick, except those two. GOOH. You're letting your disdain for Marvel Animation cloud your judgment.

I only bring them up because they're two of the most prominent media depictions of Miles within Peter's orbit (instead of the other way around like Into the Spider-Verse did) and of media trying to incorporate other Spider-Heroes into Spider-Man's narrative.

[WebSlingWonder]

I only bring them up because they're two of the most prominent media depictions of Miles within Peter's orbit (instead of the other way around like Into the Spider-Verse did) and of media trying to incorporate other Spider-Heroes into Spider-Man's narrative.

But two does not determine this narrative of "he can't co-exist". He can, you just don't want him to. And if you do, you want him to have his own codename or "be his own hero", which is complete BS.

[Frontier]

But two does not determine this narrative of "he can't co-exist". He can, you just don't want him to. And if you do, you want him to have his own codename or "be his own hero", which is complete BS.

I have never said he should have "his own codename." Have I ever said I wanted him to not be called Spider-Man? That has never been my argument. I just brought up how stupid "Kid-Arachnid" was and Marvel themselves came up with it. My argument isn't even that they can't co-exist or how the game is handling it.

Maybe two doesn't make for a long-form narrative but it shows a problematic trend in my opinion.

[Alan2099]

But two does not determine this narrative of "he can't co-exist". He can, you just don't want him to. And if you do, you want him to have his own codename or "be his own hero", which is complete BS.

Miles story tend to depend on their NOT being another Spider-man. Having there still be a Spider-man means he doesn't really have a reason to carry on the name.

On top of that, he's essentially the rookie hero that is trying to live up to a more established legend, so when you put the two of them next to each other, he automatically seems to be the lesser of the two heroes.

It's kind of like how DC had no idea what to do with Kyle Rayner after Hal Jordan came back or the struggles U.S. Agent and Thunderstrike had after they stopped being Captain America and Thor. A large portion of their story was now just gone or unusable. Old Man Logan is another good example.

If Miles is going to stay around, he needs to be in his own universe like Spider-girl or Spider-man 2099 where, where he can be THE Spider-man instead of just being "that other spider man"

[WebSlingWonder]

Miles story tend to depend on their NOT being another Spider-man. Having there still be a Spider-man means he doesn't really have a reason to carry on the name.

On top of that, he's essentially the rookie hero that is trying to live up to a more established legend, so when you put the two of them next to each other, he automatically seems to be the lesser of the two heroes.

It's kind of like how DC had no idea what to do with Kyle Rayner after Hal Jordan came back or the struggles U.S. Agent and Thunderstrike had after they stopped being Captain America and Thor. A large portion of their story was now just gone or unusable. Old Man Logan is another good example.

If Miles is going to stay around, he needs to be in his own universe like Spider-girl or Spider-man 2099 where, where he can be THE Spider-man instead of just being "that other spider man"

He does NOT need to be in his own universe. Period.

[WebSlingWonder]

I have never said he should have "his own codename." Have I ever said I wanted him to not be called Spider-Man? That has never been my argument. I just brought up how stupid "Kid-Arachnid" was and Marvel themselves came up with it. My argument isn't even that they can't co-exist or how the game is handling it.

Maybe two doesn't make for a long-form narrative but it shows a problematic trend in my opinion.

The only problematic trend is purists who just want Peter to be the only Spider-Man in 616. That hasn't been the case for (almost) 10 years now; but just when Miles is getting popular, now it's an issue?

Hell, you literally had Otto Octavius running around as Spider-Man for like five years straight and no one said anything. In fact, people wanted it. But he's in the same universe - does that dilute Peter's look? It's a hypocritical double standard.

[Frontier]

The only problematic trend is purists who just want Peter to be the only Spider-Man in 616. That hasn't been the case for (almost) 10 years now; but just when Miles is getting popular, now it's an issue?

Hell, you literally had Otto Octavius running around as Spider-Man for like five years straight and no one said anything. In fact, people wanted it. But he's in the same universe - does that dilute Peter's look? It's a hypocritical double standard.

Am I saying these other Spider characters can't exist? No. I'm not even denying Marvel doing stuff with Miles because he's so popular. I just believe both Peter and Miles are better independent from each other rather than together, and that media adaptions have furthered that belief in my mind.

When I was reading Superior it was with the adamant belief that Peter would come back and eventually beat Doc Ock. I got the former, and only technically got the 2nd in Spider-Verse. I didn't like Otto being SpOck with an active Peter or all the passes people gave him and I have been pretty upfront about that.