SO....Mephisto STRIKES AGAIN AT THE SPIDER-Verse.... Spoilers for Champions #1

[Huntsman Spider]

Well Did anyone read Champions #4 today or not ?

I did. Broke my heart, that it did. This next bit will be a tad redundant, but . . .

"Damn you, Mephisto."

[CrimsonEchidna]

A brief summary of the issue:

spoilers:

Miles ends up telling Ms. Marvel everything that happens and he ends up quitting the team over guilt, because he can't be around Kamala without thinking about the girl he essentially "traded" so that she could live. Mephisto is watching the scene unfold with Blackheart, who still has a grudge against Miles for their last encounter from Bendis' run. Blackheart wonders why Mephisto didn't offer Miles a "real" deal so that he could corrupt his sould and Mephisto counters that he as a fascination with all of the Spider-heroes and in Miles' case, he wanted to crush his heroic spirit with self-doubt while he is still young. The issue ends with Mephisto implying that his next step is to sick Blackheart on either Miles or the team.

end of spoilers

So I'm expecting this to get followed up on either in Champions after the War of the Realms tie-in issues are done or in the FCBD issue since it seems like Miles and Pete are getting into an argument over something. I'm thinking

spoilers:

Blackheart attacks New York again and Peter and Miles are the only ones available to deal with him.

end of spoilers

[Tofali]

Mephisto is a great villain. I don't understand why ppl hate him? Villainy is his job and he does it well.

[Snoop Dogg]

Mephisto is a great villain. I don't understand why ppl hate him? Villainy is his job and he does well.

It's just jealousy that Mephy has the the soul of the greatest barber of any dimension.

[Glio]

Mephisto is a good villain, the problem is what it represents for Spider-man.

It is impossible to read "Mephisto" and "Spider-man" in the same sentence without bringing back bad memories.

[NC_Yankee]

Mephisto is a good villain, the problem is what it represents for Spider-man.

It is impossible to read "Mephisto" and "Spider-man" in the same sentence without bringing back bad memories.

Mephisto might be a great villain of Dr. Strange who ( along with Mordo and Dormammu) is the arch enemy of Dr. Strange. NOT Spider-Man and should be as far away from ANY Spider-Man comic book as possible. OMD was the worst possible idea ever designed for Spider-Man ( Sins Past and Clone Saga included). IF Marvel.did not want the marraige to continue, that is their right, but do it the right way (see ASM 121 as an example of this) not having Peter's soul sold to a Dr. Strange villain.

[Huntsman Spider]

Mephisto might be a great villain of Dr. Strange who ( along with Mordo and Dormammu) is the arch enemy of Dr. Strange. NOT Spider-Man and should be as far away from ANY Spider-Man comic book as possible. OMD was the worst possible idea ever designed for Spider-Man ( Sins Past and Clone Saga included). IF Marvel.did not want the marraige to continue, that is their right, but do it the right way (see ASM 121 as an example of this) not having Peter's soul sold to a Dr. Strange villain.

You sure you want Marvel going in that direction? Because they already tried to kill off Mary Jane once so Peter would be "free" to move on, and the fans revolted against that so badly Marvel had to bring her back a year later. That, and the increased sensitivity and probable backlash around the issue of fridging, especially one of the most beloved characters in Spider-Man's supporting cast, would make going there pretty much not worth it.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

Mephisto might be a great villain of Dr. Strange who ( along with Mordo and Dormammu) is the arch enemy of Dr. Strange.

Not quite. Dr. Strange, who has a pretty good rogues gallery for a character who isn't constantly published, has in addition to those two, the likes of Nightmare, Shuma-Gorath, D'Spayre and Chton. Mephisto wasn't really a character exclusively tied to him.

Mephisto used to be the arch-enemy of Ghost Rider and of Silver Surfer, and above all Doctor Doom.

He's not a "Dr. Strange villain", he's a peripheral Marvel Universe character.

Doctor Strange was created by Steve Ditko, a Randian objectivist and complete atheist and he wanted to divorce his take on the occult completely away from anything Christian. Which is why instead of a devil you have Dormammu who was kinda-sorta Satan but not really Satan and he ran the Dark Dimension and not hell, and he was obnoxious and had a personality and so on.

I agree with you that OMD is a bad story but I don't think killing MJ off especially, is under any circumstances a good idea since killing off supporting characters ruins a good part of the appeal of Spider-Man. You can kill of Batman's supporting cast, and do permanent damage there, because for Batman his main relationship is with his bad guys and his enemies, and you can similarly do that with Daredevil and of course the Punisher, Wolverine and X-Men, but with Spider-Man and Peter Parker, doing that dilutes the appeal of his story and his corner.

And Mary Jane herself is basically the emotional center and optimistic figure of the entire story, a symbol of positivity which she has been from the very beginning. There's nobody else who carries that much weight. Gwen Stacy was never that, and removing her arguably made the books lighter, since she was a sad-sack when she was still alive and made Peter feel bad anyway, and in death she does that too.

[PCN24454]

And the shipping wars continue...

[Celgress]

And the shipping wars continue...

Yup, honestly (as someone who has written fanfics involving many different love interests of Peter Parker) I find the presence of so many ardent shippers the least appealing aspect of the Spider-Man Fandom by far. IMO, it is a toxic aspect of this community (not the forum rather Spider-Man fanbase as a whole) one which prevents any sort of polite discussion or debate as the various camps are highly polarized.

[NC_Yankee]

Not quite. Dr. Strange, who has a pretty good rogues gallery for a character who isn't constantly published, has in addition to those two, the likes of Nightmare, Shuma-Gorath, D'Spayre and Chton. Mephisto wasn't really a character exclusively tied to

Mephisto used to be the arch-enemy of Ghost Rider and of Silver Surfer, and above all Doctor Doom.

He's not a "Dr. Strange villain", he's a peripheral Marvel Universe character.

Doctor Strange was created by Steve Ditko, a Randian objectivist and complete atheist and he wanted to divorce his take on the occult completely away from anything Christian. Which is why instead of a devil you have Dormammu who was kinda-sorta Satan but not really Satan and he ran the Dark Dimension and not hell, and he was obnoxious and had a personality and so on.

I agree with you that OMD is a bad story but I don't think killing MJ off especially, is under any circumstances a good idea since killing off supporting characters ruins a good part of the appeal of Spider-Man. You can kill of Batman's supporting cast, and do permanent damage there, because for Batman his main relationship is with his bad guys and his enemies, and you can similarly do that with Daredevil and of course the Punisher, Wolverine and X-Men, but with Spider-Man and Peter Parker, doing that dilutes the appeal of his story and his corner.

And Mary Jane herself is basically the emotional center and optimistic figure of the entire story, a symbol of positivity which she has been from the very beginning. There's nobody else who carries that much weight. Gwen Stacy was never that, and removing her arguably made the books lighter, since she was a sad-sack when she was still alive and made Peter feel bad anyway, and in death she does that too.

I have always been 100% Pro-MJ for Pete, so I do not need to be sold on her value. That said, I understand that Marvel can do whatever they want with their characters ( Spider-Man and his supporting cast included). There was nothing I liked about OMD, but selling Pete's soul to Mephisto, is one of those things that is a "Bridge Too Far" ( using Cáncer as another "Aunt May in peril" stories without actually killing her off so extra comics can be sold would be another). As bad as killing off MJ ( Gwen style) would have been ( and we know that except Captain Stacy. Jean Dewolff, and Uncle Ben death is not permanent) it wiuld be better then selling Pete"s soul.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

...

My personal feeling is that if they wanted to do this, don't use Mephisto. Use a random mutant child with Scarlet Witch powers in the same hospital that May is in, who is dying. Kid is a Spider-Man fan, he or she has followed the reports of Spider-Man in the media and Spidey is a hero. They meet Peter and realize his problems and so on, and decide tog help him by using his or her powers, and then the entire process goes awry because "has no control over powers" and so on. Then the kid dies at the end and nobody ever knows what it did.

Mutant powers and quantum time-shuffle propbability yada-yada-yada doesn't need a magical solution. Scarlet Witch's use of powers in House of M was already pre-established. The mutants and the X-Men were at a low point at the time, since they stayed out of civil war and so on, and only few mutants are left, so there's a good reason why the X-Men can't reach this kid. So all of that is done. Using some random one-and-done character works better if your intention and goal is "move past this and don't refer to it again". A similar thing happened at the end of the Peter and MJ death storyline. MJ was "killed" by a bomb in a spaceflight by some stalker and so on, and the person behind it wasn't any of Spider-Man's rogues or any Marvel rogue since that would make this a plot and "old score" but some random one-and-done mutant character who died at the end of that story. As such you got a resolution and it was something that later writers downplayed, ignored and forgot about and the whole MJ was trapped and imprisoned for 6 months thing hasn't been referred to after that, because again rando.

Make the entire thing a reality shuffle caused by this kid as an accident born of good intentions and so on. So that at least doesn't leave the characters compromised and it doesn't conjure this sick feeling of Mephisto sitting somewhere laughing his head off about the time he screwed Peter over, and keeping this an open would that grows larger and larger. Anger about OMD hasn't gone or ebbed, it's both stayed the same and increased. Because Mephisto is a character who still shows up in other Marvel titles, they still keep referring and alluding to this story, they keep putting Mephisto in some part of his corner because I guess alluding to OMD and the possibility it could be undone allows a mini-sales boost.

And morally again I said this, if Doctor Doom in one of the greatest stories (and certainly the best story Mephisto is in) scored a victory over and him and freed his mother's soul from hell...then that puts him morally above Peter Parker. The entire OMD ordeal has made a good number of readers feel like Doom who spent every Midsummer's Eve entering and battling Mephisto to release his mother's soul and he did that for years and years, never giving up until he succeeded.

[NC_Yankee]

My personal feeling is that if they wanted to do this, don't use Mephisto. Use a random mutant child with Scarlet Witch powers in the same hospital that May is in, who is dying. Kid is a Spider-Man fan, he or she has followed the reports of Spider-Man in the media and Spidey is a hero. They meet Peter and realize his problems and so on, and decide tog help him by using his or her powers, and then the entire process goes awry because "has no control over powers" and so on. Then the kid dies at the end and nobody ever knows what it did.

Mutant powers and quantum time-shuffle propbability yada-yada-yada doesn't need a magical solution. Scarlet Witch's use of powers in House of M was already pre-established. The mutants and the X-Men were at a low point at the time, since they stayed out of civil war and so on, and only few mutants are left, so there's a good reason why the X-Men can't reach this kid. So all of that is done. Using some random one-and-done character works better if your intention and goal is "move past this and don't refer to it again". A similar thing happened at the end of the Peter and MJ death storyline. MJ was "killed" by a bomb in a spaceflight by some stalker and so on, and the person behind it wasn't any of Spider-Man's rogues or any Marvel rogue since that would make this a plot and "old score" but some random one-and-done mutant character who died at the end of that story. As such you got a resolution and it was something that later writers downplayed, ignored and forgot about and the whole MJ was trapped and imprisoned for 6 months thing hasn't been referred to after that, because again rando.

Make the entire thing a reality shuffle caused by this kid as an accident born of good intentions and so on. So that at least doesn't leave the characters compromised and it doesn't conjure this sick feeling of Mephisto sitting somewhere laughing his head off about the time he screwed Peter over, and keeping this an open would that grows larger and larger. Anger about OMD hasn't gone or ebbed, it's both stayed the same and increased. Because Mephisto is a character who still shows up in other Marvel titles, they still keep referring and alluding to this story, they keep putting Mephisto in some part of his corner because I guess alluding to OMD and the possibility it could be undone allows a mini-sales boost.

And morally again I said this, if Doctor Doom in one of the greatest stories (and certainly the best story Mephisto is in) scored a victory over and him and freed his mother's soul from hell...then that puts him morally above Peter Parker. The entire OMD ordeal has made a good number of readers feel like Doom who spent every Midsummer's Eve entering and battling Mephisto to release his mother's soul and he did that for years and years, never giving up until he succeeded.

The idea of Victor Von Doom who is a tyrant and who is just outside the Top 10 most evil rogues in Marvel being morally superior to Peter Parker because he battled Mephisto and won, is just another example of the unnecessary character assassination of Peter Parker by Marvel ( I also think of Dan Slott where he made Peter Parker a supporting character in his own book in favor of not only Spider-Man but even worse Doc Ock). I am happy with Spencer who understands the need to balance both Spider-Man and his enemies and Peter and his supporting cast.

[Alan2099]

The idea of Victor Von Doom who is a tyrant and who is just outside the Top 10 most evil rogues in Marvel being morally superior to Peter Parker because he battled Mephisto and won, is just another example of the unnecessary character assassination of Peter Parker by Marvel

I suppose Green Goblin is morally superior to Gwen Stacy going by your logic. After all he managed to defeat her and that's what decides whether a person is right or not isn't it?

[Revolutionary_Jack]

I suppose Green Goblin is morally superior to Gwen Stacy going by your logic. After all he managed to defeat her and that's what decides whether a person is right or not isn't it?

Dr. Doom defeated Mephisto and freed his mother's innocent soul from damnation. He undid a deal and pact his mother made with Discount Satan. That is directly comparable to Peter Parker becoming conned by Mephisto into screwing up the most important and precious thing in his life.

How is that remotely comparable to Green Goblin murdering Gwen Stacy.

Please explain this to me.