I know that MJ is Peter's main squeeze...

[Mister Mets]

Slott was writing Doctor Who and Iron Man using ASM as a canvas.

What's the Doctor Who connection?

[Lee]

The reality was Dan Slott did not like the character of Peter Parker.

Dan Slott says that Peter Parker is one of his favorite fictional characters of all time.

The reality is that he wrote some comics you didn't like, and that's a very poor reason to make shit up about people.

[Snoop Dogg]

Silver Surfer is his Doctor Who tribute. He missed the chance to just make the Living Brain a Dalek, sadly.

[WebSlingWonder]

Dan Slott says that Peter Parker is one of his favorite fictional characters of all time.

The reality is that he wrote some comics you didn't like, and that's a very poor reason to make shit up about people.

Okay, hold on now. It's not that simple and you know it.

[Agent Z]

Slott generally works best when he's working in other people's sandbox rather than his own. If you look at Slott's history, he worked for a long time in licensed and tie-in comics before coming to Marvel. Stuff like Batman Adventures, Batman Gotham Knighs, Justice League Adventures which tie-in to the Bruce Timm cartoons. His stories for Justice League Adventures are great, including two stories that made Chronos the Time Thief one of my favorite DC bad guys. His best Spider-Man story -- Spider-Man/Human Torch -- has him operate in the status-quo of different Spider-Man and Fantastic Four eras.

Slott also doesn't have experience as an ongoing writer. What I mean by that is coming in after an earlier writer wrote a status-quo and left a situation and all. Most of the time he's revived cancelled series like She-Hulk or Silver Surfer, or Fantastic Four and so on. His Iron Man run where he's following on from Bendis is like the only exception but I haven't read that so I can't comment though I do know the usual issues of delays and Jim Zub doing scripting while he plots and other stuff that Slott got up to on ASM continue there. When he began his run Post-BND you had this huge retcon and manufactured blank slate where they basically tried to recreate the Bronze Age (i.e ASM#193-293), right down to similar beats (i.e. May has an elderly suitor -- Lubensky and Jameson's brand new daddy, MJ written out of the books for some 40 issues and so on) and did it badly.



One of the reasons why I feel his run doesn't hold up too well. If civilians stop being civilians then there's no longer a friendly neighborhood or real suspense and tension for Peter to save people close to him. Because apparently, Jameson can do it by operating a Spider-Slayer robot all fine and dandy.

I get that Slott was interested at looking Spider-Man and Peter from the outside. And in all fairness, a lot of great Spider-Man stories comes from doing that. Slott's best Spider-Man work, the Spider-Man/Human Torch series is essentially Johnny Storm's book, it's basically looking at Peter from his point of view, and the entire crux of that is the fact that in all that time Spider-Man never once considered telling Torch his secret identity until the right hostage situation called for it. Roger Stern especially was the best at doing that -- "The Daydreamers" above all. As was Paul Jenkins. JMD of course in Kraven's Last Hunt did a story that looked at Spider-Man from the outside while also doing some of the best work showing Peter's interior thought processes (apparent in that "There is no Spider-Man monologue thought caption at the start"). But Slott is no Stern and Jenkins. There's an absence of human feeling in his stuff. Stuff like "No one Dies" mines emotions out of "villains seem to come back from the dead more than good guys in comics"...here's the thing that's not remotely comparable to real life nor does it make actual sense since we as readers know those reasons. The artwork by Marcos Martin is better than that story deserves.

Slott's interest at looking at Spider-Man from the outside went to the extreme in Superior Spider-Man which is basically removing Peter from his own story for more than a year in real-time, and all centered on Ock making the same observations and insults people had long known and heard before. Spider-Man holds back his powers, he operates small scale, his lack of work/life balance is both a blessing/curse, he comes across as someone wasting his academic life away and so on. There's literally nothing human communicated there.

By that logic, we can't get any emotional investment from anything from superheroes since they aren't comparable to real life either.

[Mauled]

Slotted hated or certainly didnt care for Felicia one bit. The heel turn was his idea. That it was crappy and clearly bad writing, yet they carried on with it for as long as they did would've been down to him.

What can I say I prefer Felicia with Peter and want to see more. I'm sure MJ is the most popular love interest for Spidey with fans but I'm willing to bet that Felicia is a close second and will beat out Gwen for that spot.

[Agent Z]

Slotted hated or certainly didnt care for Felicia one bit. The heel turn was his idea. That it was crappy and clearly bad writing, yet they carried on with it for as long as they did would've been down to him.

What can I say I prefer Felicia with Peter and want to see more. I'm sure MJ is the most popular love interest for Spidey with fans but I'm willing to bet that Felicia is a close second and will beat out Gwen for that spot.

Slott said on this board that he planned to end the heel turn soon but the editors made it continue.

Also, I'd say Gwen has taken Felicia's spot as the second most popular thanks to stuff like the ASM movies and Spectacular Spider-Man.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

By that logic, we can't get any emotional investment from anything from superheroes since they aren't comparable to real life either.

Fact is that superhero comics can speak about real stuff when done well. Roger Stern for instance was talking about real issues in The Kid Who Collected Spider-Man, in The Daydreamers, and so on.

[Lee]

Okay, hold on now. It's not that simple and you know it.

It absolutely is that simple. Slott says he loves the character. Random person on a message board says Slott hates the character.

Lying about comic writers on a comic message board is poor conduct. Lying about people is poor conduct in general.

[WebSlingWonder]

It absolutely is that simple. Slott says he loves the character. Random person on a message board says Slott hates the character.

Lying about comic writers on a comic message board is poor conduct. Lying about people is poor conduct in general.

I think someone else said it better: writers can like/love the character and still get the story all jumbled up. I don't doubt that Slott liked writing Spider-Man. But when you see how the book started to feature less of Peter and more of everyone else in his world, including Superior Spider-Man, and how weak Peter seemed at times, with his treatment of MJ, Felicia, and more, you can't blame someone for being skeptical.

And no, it's rarely that simple. People, creators even, have been known to sugarcoat interviews before. Bendis did it all the time and then did the complete opposite. :P

[Revolutionary_Jack]

...

...

A writer liking/disliking Spider-Man and Peter Parker has nothing to do with the quality of their work. It is possible for someone to like a character and genre and still not get it entirely right. That can happen, it has happened, and will probably continue to happen. It's also possible for someone to dislike a character and concept and still do a good job writing that. "That a man's reach should exceed his grasp" and all that jazz.

One can also add of course that just because someone says they like a character, especially a professional writer giving an interview in a fan magazine for promotional purposes and so on, it is not a given that they are being entirely 100% honest. Artists and creators aren't any more honest in public life as regular people here. There's a history of famous figures who have lied multiple times, serially, time and time again. And great talents too. Stan Lee lied a lot you know, or you know he had a faulty memory depending on how charitable you want to be to him. So people have a right to challenge, question, and doubt the stated views given by anyone in a public context.

[Lee]

A writer liking/disliking Spider-Man and Peter Parker has nothing to do with the quality of their work.

I never said otherwise.

[Frontier]

Slott said on this board that he planned to end the heel turn soon but the editors made it continue.

Which I guess would explain why the Queenpin Black Cat seemed to pop up everywhere but not why the character shift felt so out-of-character.

Also, I'd say Gwen has taken Felicia's spot as the second most popular thanks to stuff like the ASM movies and Spectacular Spider-Man.

Spider-Gwen is probably the most popular interpretation of Gwen Stacy and she is decidedly not a love interest for Peter.

[Miles To Go]

I think if Robbie Thompson had continued using Felicia in Silk, the face turn would have been occurred more beleivably. Slott kind of just boiled it down to "oh I have nothing, we're chill Spider" which was largely unsatisfying. Bendis put her through hell in Defenders, but that was handled a bit more right as a reality check for Felicia.

[Frontier]

I remember when it was first revealed that Peter and Bobbi were gonna date, and I was all for it because I liked their chemistry in his run and it was a fun pairing I thought could be cool to see. Only for it then to turn out to last for literally 7 issues.

Were their initial interactions better then when they were actually dating? Because I read that and Bobbi really didn't come off well as a girlfriend, from rubbing it in Peter's face that his company had imploded, or just in general seeming really annoyed or just barely into Peter in general.

Dan's run makes it seem like he liked Spider-Man more than Peter because he tied the supporting cast into the Spider-Man stuff much more than traditionally with other heroes having roles in all the events and the normal characters getting involved in high-concept stuff, but the irony is that the reason the Spider-Man stuff and all his other books like Iron Man have big ensemble casts is because the consistency of Peter's supporting cast and normal life in Spider-Man ingrained an interest in what other characters are doing into his writing.

I think Slott cares more about Spider-Man as an identity or legacy then he does Peter Parker.

Because when you look at Superior or Spider-Verse...it's more about the idea of Spider-Man and what he represents then it necessarily is about Peter Parker, even if I think that's more the case with Spider-Verse then Superior.

Hence all the spinoff characters that popped up in his run.

I think if Robbie Thompson had continued using Felicia in Silk, the face turn would have been occurred more beleivably. Slott kind of just boiled it down to "oh I have nothing, we're chill Spider" which was largely unsatisfying. Bendis put her through hell in Defenders, but that was handled a bit more right as a reality check for Felicia.

I dunno. I think Thompson only really saw Felicia as a villainous character for Silk in the long run.