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  1. #1
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    Default Lee-Ditko era nostalgia

    I’m seeing a lot of nostalgia for the Lee-Ditko era. People often say that it was one of the best but I don’t see a lot of why.
    People often say that Ditko made the best villains and then I read posts like https://community.cbr.com/showthread...-villains-suck

    People always talk about “If this be my Destiny” as if it’s the only story from that era. That doesn’t inspire much confidence in me seeing how that’s basically the season finale of the era.

    In my mind, nostalgia is when you talk about how much you love something when you really hate it.

    If you really like the Lee/Ditko era, why don’t you reply what it is you like about it and not just say “it’s better than modern comics”.

  2. #2
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    Quote Originally Posted by PCN24454 View Post
    In my mind, nostalgia is when you talk about how much you love something when you really hate it.
    Among the more elegant definitions of nostalgia I must say.

    If you really like the Lee/Ditko era, why don’t you reply what it is you like about it and not just say “it’s better than modern comics”.
    I happen to love the Lee-Ditko era as a whole because

    1) Real Time character progression and aging. Peter graduates from high school to college, and goes from 15 or 16 year old to 19 or 20 by the end of the run.

    2) Most of the time focuses on Peter the struggling poor kid and not the high school student. Most of the stories has Peter at the Daily Bugle. Peter hates high school, he can't wait to grow up and actual academic stuff is cakewalk for him.

    3) The characters being real jerks on the whole explains and makes stuff more coherent when you are doing stuff about "Society distrusts Spider-Man". If Peter has some unlikable traits, and society too has unlikable traits, then that makes more sense. Like having Gwen Stacy be a real B-word makes for a character a million times more interesting than the "fridge-her-already" version Lee-Romita did.

    4) The art is brilliant. 9 Panel grid, scrawny figures, surreal mix of real places and backgrounds. Dave Gibbons cited Ditko's work here as an inspiration for Watchmen and it shows.

    5) Storytelling on the whole feels more interconnected, mixed and correct. The angst, the humor, and the black comedy and satire all flows together in a way that is quite satisfying.

    People often say that Ditko made the best villains and then I read posts like https://community.cbr.com/showthread...-villains-suck
    Spider-Man's villains on the whole are weak when you consider the entire continuity. But they were pretty effective if you consider the Lee-Ditko era in isolation. Ditko's Green Goblin is on the whole the best version of that character. As is his Dr. Octopus and Mysterio.

    And in any case, as artist-designer, for Ditko to create by himself an entire rogues gallery unlike Batman which was built, rewritten, updated by a series of writers and editors (far better than how Spider-Man's writers/editors have served Ditko's rogues). That's commendable.

    People always talk about “If this be my Destiny” as if it’s the only story from that era. That doesn’t inspire much confidence in me seeing how that’s basically the season finale of the era.
    If you think Ditko's era is about high school yeah...the story that is considered best is all about Peter putting teenage days behind him.

  3. #3
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    Lee and Ditko's Spidey was the best scripter of his time working with one of the best cartoonists ever to create pages upon pages of material about a troubled, angsty underdog who was unpredictable and burdened yet guided by a moral code that contrasts him. He was a revelation at the time of his debut and spent his time wearing one of the best costumes ever designed with some of the most inspired abilities ever to face the best designed rogues gallery in comics and spend time with a rich supporting cast. Strong action, hilarious humor, characters brimming with personality, fun plots. It is still around the tippy top of mountain for the character, the publisher, and American comics. Just go reread it. It's great.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Revolutionary_Jack View Post
    1) Real Time character progression and aging. Peter graduates from high school to college, and goes from 15 or 16 year old to 19 or 20 by the end of the run.
    Peter getting his powers at age 15 was a retcon. In Amazing Spider-Man #8 (Oct 1963), Peter is a high school senior. He doesn't graduate until #28 (June 1965). From what I recall, there isn't anything to indicate that Peter was in a lower grade in AF #15 or ASM #1-7.

    Peter begins college in Amazing Spider-Man #31-33, a story that spans four days. In #34 Aunt May is released from hospital, so only a short span of times has passed, Jonah also gets a new secretary. In #35 Peter finds out that Betty quit her job and meets Jonah's new secretary for the first time. In #36 Peter is still in his freshman year. In #38, Ditko's final issue, Betty's disappearing act is still treated like a relatively recent event.

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    Quote Originally Posted by PCN24454 View Post
    IÂ’m seeing a lot of nostalgia for the Lee-Ditko era. People often say that it was one of the best but I donÂ’t see a lot of why.
    People often say that Ditko made the best villains and then I read posts like https://community.cbr.com/showthread...-villains-suck

    People always talk about “If this be my Destiny” as if it’s the only story from that era. That doesn’t inspire much confidence in me seeing how that’s basically the season finale of the era.

    In my mind, nostalgia is when you talk about how much you love something when you really hate it.

    If you really like the Lee/Ditko era, why don’t you reply what it is you like about it and not just say “it’s better than modern comics”.
    The Ditko and the Romita Sr eras offered fresher stories then today's comics. Much of today's comic book content is very much like the content coming out of Hollywood: Remake and reimagine this, and sequel that. Does it mean there are not great issues that are modern and all Ditko and Romita issues are great? Not at all. But on average the Ditko, Romita and later Conway issues ( Death of Gwen and Punisher origin (ASM 129)) are in the opinion of many ( myself included) simply better.
    Last edited by NC_Yankee; 03-16-2019 at 06:42 AM.

  6. #6
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    Quote Originally Posted by Lee View Post
    Peter getting his powers at age 15 was a retcon. In Amazing Spider-Man #8 (Oct 1963), Peter is a high school senior. He doesn't graduate until #28 (June 1965). From what I recall, there isn't anything to indicate that Peter was in a lower grade in AF #15 or ASM #1-7.

    Peter begins college in Amazing Spider-Man #31-33, a story that spans four days. In #34 Aunt May is released from hospital, so only a short span of times has passed, Jonah also gets a new secretary. In #35 Peter finds out that Betty quit her job and meets Jonah's new secretary for the first time. In #36 Peter is still in his freshman year. In #38, Ditko's final issue, Betty's disappearing act is still treated like a relatively recent event.
    http://zak-site.com/Great-American-N...rvel_time.html

    No he was fifteen. It was still during the time when Marvel Comics were real time.

    It was mentioned by Jameson during the first Spider Slayer story that Spider-Man had been artistic for about 2 years.

  7. #7
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    In the first Spider Slayer story that I have right in front of me, Jonah says -- "I've waited months for this moment!"

    Months is bolded in the comic. In ASM #8 the narration says-- "In the senior science class at Midtown High School..."

    The first part of ASM #15 says nothing about his age. Where did the 15 year old thing start? It makes no sense because it implies there was this big period in the MU where nothing was happening. It couldn't have been the Civil War unmasking, right?
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    Quote Originally Posted by PCN24454 View Post
    http://zak-site.com/Great-American-N...rvel_time.html

    No he was fifteen. It was still during the time when Marvel Comics were real time.
    In that link you just posted, Stan Lee said that Peter was around 17 when the strip started.

    As far as I'm aware, Peter gaining his powers at age 15 was first established in 1989's "Parallel Lives" graphic novel. But we're discussing the content of the original run.

    Quote Originally Posted by PCN24454 View Post
    It was mentioned by Jameson during the first Spider Slayer story that Spider-Man had been artistic for about 2 years.
    #25? Can you post an image? I've just skimmed through it and didn't see any dialogue like that from Jameson. He does say "I've waited months for this moment!" when he's chasing Spider-Man with the robot though.

  9. #9
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    hoooooooly shirt, parallel lives ruins everything
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  10. #10
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    Stan Lee, he of poor memory...could also be referring to ASM the magazine itself, and not AF#15. There's a gap between AF#15 (and a gap inside AF#15) and ASM#1. And since Lee said "Strip", he might have meant the newspaper strip for all

    In either case this is diverting the real issue and debate of this thread. The fact is Peter did age and grow up, and progress in the Lee-Ditko era. That much is unarguable. His character progressed. He grew up, and he changed. That's unarguable.

  11. #11
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    Peter was cuter with the glasses.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Revolutionary_Jack View Post
    Stan Lee, he of poor memory...could also be referring to ASM the magazine itself, and not AF#15. There's a gap between AF#15 (and a gap inside AF#15) and ASM#1. And since Lee said "Strip", he might have meant the newspaper strip for all
    He was talking about the Amazing Spider-Man comic book, not the newspaper strip. But yes, the content of the stories takes precedent, and there's no evidence of Peter or the others moving up a grade between Amazing Fantasy #15 and Amazing Spider-Man #7. You could theorize that it happened off-panel, between issues, but it isn't part of the content of the stories themselves.

    Quote Originally Posted by Revolutionary_Jack View Post
    In either case this is diverting the real issue and debate of this thread. The fact is Peter did age and grow up, and progress in the Lee-Ditko era. That much is unarguable. His character progressed. He grew up, and he changed. That's unarguable.
    I'm not saying he didn't. I'm saying that your assertion he went from "15 or 16 year old to 19 or 20", in the original Lee-Ditko run (ignoring retcons outside of that run) is inaccurate. He was never stated to be younger than a high school senior (17-18) and the run ended during the start of his freshman year of college. So evidence suggests he was 17/18 at the start of the run and 18 at the end of the run (or 19, if he has a birthday early in the academic year).

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    Quote Originally Posted by Snoop Dogg View Post
    Peter was cuter with the glasses.
    He got rid of the glasses early in the L-D era...one of the signs of progression in that era.

    One of the things that most fascinates me on re-reading is that there's still a lot of continuity between the L-D and Romita era and later eras.

    Peter for instance is acknowledged to be growing handsome and more good looking as time passes. Sally Green at ESU, this girl that Ditko-Gwen siccs on Peter to see if he likes girls for their smarts (which backfires because Peter to quote him, "doesn't want another Betty Brant situation")...says Peter has a "Dreamy" smile, and even Gwen thinks that Peter is quite manly looking. That might be Lee overwriting Ditko, but even then you have Liz and Betty crushing on him hard. And both of them when they first see Mary Jane in ASM#25, they gasp at her outclassing them and neither of think for once, "Peter's out of her league". We know now that Ditko always intended Norman Osborn to be the Green Goblin.

    Aunt May also set up and insisted that Mary Jane would make a good wife for Peter. And ASM#25 establishes her more or less as "the one" against whom all girls will be found vaunting, and that has remained the case. All before she appears on-panel. Mary Jane is interesting because when Ditko draws her appearance in ASM#25 and ASM#38 he actually designs her in a way that Romita went way off from. She's supposed to be "as beautiful as an actress" but she also wears a babushka, so she's not the super-fashionable girl from later eras. And ASM#38 has her driving a car...which she isn't shown as owning. So maybe Ditko envisioned MJ as more middle-class and homely. I don't think Ditko's MJ would have been as charismatic as the one Romita designed, or be as original and fresh.

    I wonder what Ditko's plans were for Mary Jane, because ASM#25 and ASM#38 were the issues on which he had control over the plotting, and where he and Lee weren't speaking to one another. Mary Jane was mentioned as early as ASM#14 or ASM#15, but Ditko made the choice to feature her appearance and build her up, all by himself. The reaction shots of Betty and Liz, already established she was this great beauty...and her final pre-appearance was the issue that Ditko went in knowing would be his last. So he didn't forget or discard her either.

  14. #14
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    Quote Originally Posted by Snoop Dogg View Post
    Peter was cuter with the glasses.
    Tsundere Gwen was cuter than moe Gwen.

  15. #15
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    Quote Originally Posted by Lee View Post
    Tsundere Gwen was cuter than moe Gwen.
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