Gwen Stacy Gets Her Own Series in February by Christos Gage & Todd Nauck

[Lukmendes]

This sounds terrible. They're only gonna destroy this character more and more. 616 Gwen's revive is inevitable. *Puke*

One bright side of Gwen being revived is that the jokes I make about the similarities between the idea of Spider-Gwen and Power Girl be even more similar, since Karen was around while there was no Supergirl, and eventually post Crisis got Supergirl back.

Not that this is a good thing for other people, just for my weird jokes

I think the main problem with a Gwen coming back is how she isn't much of a character, if I'm right and the Gwen mini shows another very different personality that is just disconnected from Ditko's Gwen, or Romita's Gwen (And those two are disconnected from each other as is), then there isn't much of a point in making saying this is Gwen.

But who knows, we've had character re-interpretations to work, maybe this'll be Gwen's turn, but in no way I'm holding my breath, my negative opinion on Gwen doesn't help lol.

[Cmbmool]

One bright side of Gwen being revived is that the jokes I make about the similarities between the idea of Spider-Gwen and Power Girl be even more similar, since Karen was around while there was no Supergirl, and eventually post Crisis got Supergirl back.

Not that this is a good thing for other people, just for my weird jokes

I think the main problem with a Gwen coming back is how she isn't much of a character, if I'm right and the Gwen mini shows another very different personality that is just disconnected from Ditko's Gwen, or Romita's Gwen (And those two are disconnected from each other as is), then there isn't much of a point in making saying this is Gwen.

But who knows, we've had character re-interpretations to work, maybe this'll be Gwen's turn, but in no way I'm holding my breath, my negative opinion on Gwen doesn't help lol.

I trust Gage will present us with a merger between the two versions of Gwen to showcase her full personality.

[Lukmendes]

I trust Gage will present us with a merger between the two versions of Gwen to showcase her full personality.

Well, from what they described her personality in this mini, it's gonna be another personality that is disconnected from the rest, but who knows? Those descriptions have been certainly misleading, usually for the worse, but sometimes it's for the better too.

[Digifiend]

Don't forget it would be modernised anyway. This is a Gwen of the late 2000s, not the 1960s. That alone ought to cause changes (for example, she should now be tech savvy, as most teenagers are - back in the 60s, a lot of modern tech didn't even exist and anyone who took an interest in that sort of thing was considered to be a nerd).

[Frontier]

The more they reveal about this mini, the more it seems like they are really revising the character (almost in a fan-ficcy way).

[Spider-Tiger]

The more they reveal about this mini, the more it seems like they are really revising the character (almost in a fan-ficcy way).

Agreed. It seems like they're trying to appeal to modern audiences who may be more familiar with the Emma Stone take. Except they're about 6-7 years too late so I'm not sure what the point of this is.

As an aside, all of the supposed alterations (class president/science team captain/part-time Nancy Drew) do nothing to make Gwen a more complex or multifaceted character. They just make her more idealized (by modern standards), and contribute to the whole madonna/whore narrative between her and MJ.

[KangMiRae]

The more they reveal about this mini, the more it seems like they are really revising the character (almost in a fan-ficcy way).

Agreed. It seems like they're trying to appeal to modern audiences who may be more familiar with the Emma Stone take. Except they're about 6-7 years too late so I'm not sure what the point of this is.

As an aside, all of the supposed alterations (class president/science team captain/part-time Nancy Drew) do nothing to make Gwen a more complex or multifaceted character. They just make her more idealized (by modern standards), and contribute to the whole madonna/whore narrative between her and MJ.

I haven't read anything about this upcoming book and you guys are already making me hate it, lol! The real Gwen was a smart socialite who didn't care for heroes and I don't care for any of these revisionist takes.

[Digifiend]

Now that makes me think of something... did Gwen ever meet the Wasp? Janet was also a socialite.

[Lukmendes]

Don't forget it would be modernised anyway. This is a Gwen of the late 2000s, not the 1960s. That alone ought to cause changes (for example, she should now be tech savvy, as most teenagers are - back in the 60s, a lot of modern tech didn't even exist and anyone who took an interest in that sort of thing was considered to be a nerd).

Well, sure, but I don't think that'd make her have a different personality, just have a new interest.

The more they reveal about this mini, the more it seems like they are really revising the character (almost in a fan-ficcy way).

Seems to be a thing about Spidey love interests, like when MJ revealed she knew Peter is Spidey for years (I still think that was a lame ass cop out, even worse when they revealed she learned it during Amazing Fantasy#15), or when Felicia got raped.

Now that makes me think of something... did Gwen ever meet the Wasp? Janet was also a socialite.

At least in her appearances before her death, she was never outside of Spidey's comics, and considering you can count on your fingers the amount of times other heroes showed up in his comics back them, specially Avengers, yeah, they haven't met.

I think the only other hero she met/talked with was Ice Man, and she was happy to see him, because he was fighting Spidey, soon after her father died, so that's all.

[Frontier]

Seems to be a thing about Spidey love interests, like when MJ revealed she knew Peter is Spidey for years (I still think that was a lame ass cop out, even worse when they revealed she learned it during Amazing Fantasy#15), or when Felicia got raped.

The MJ thing seems to be the only one that's aged well.

[WebLurker]

The more they reveal about this mini, the more it seems like they are really revising the character (almost in a fan-ficcy way).

That's basically what everything does with Gwen since she died.

[Lukmendes]

That's basically what everything does with Gwen since she died.

You can argue that happened before her death, considering that Gwen was "Liz before and after he development" under Ditko, but then got her personality changed just to be a better love interest than MJ.

[WebLurker]

You can argue that happened before her death, considering that Gwen was "Liz before and after he development" under Ditko, but then got her personality changed just to be a better love interest than MJ.

Can see the point. Sounds like "Gwen" is basically whatever people want her to be; an un-character of sorts, the anti-Duck Amuck Daffy. Course, the logical conclusion to that train of thought is that if the Gwen series reinvents the character from scratch to the point of being "in name only," then it can't be said to be wrong, since Gwen has no established personality to be consistent to.

[Spider-Tiger]

Can see the point. Sounds like "Gwen" is basically whatever people want her to be; an un-character of sorts, the anti-Duck Amuck Daffy. Course, the logical conclusion to that train of thought is that if the Gwen series reinvents the character from scratch to the point of being "in name only," then it can't be said to be wrong, since Gwen has no established personality to be consistent to.

Gwen wasn't a well-developed character, but she wasn't a blank slate either. A good in-continuity recton makes use of what's there instead of ignoring it entirely.

There are things you could do with OG Gwen. The most obvious is a recton that explains why she softened so considerably after Ditko left. You could explore her relationship with Harry Osborn. You could also explore her relationship with her father while he was still active in the police force. I can imagine how difficult (even traumatic) it may have been as a child to worry about a parent risking their life on a regular basis. Maybe she even felt neglected at times. Maybe that, in some way, influenced her negative attitude towards vigilantes like Spider-Man.

But so far, many writers that use Gwen Stacy have seemed less interested in developing the psychology of the character, and more in idealizing the character. That's why we have all of these disconnected versions.

[Lukmendes]

Can see the point. Sounds like "Gwen" is basically whatever people want her to be; an un-character of sorts, the anti-Duck Amuck Daffy. Course, the logical conclusion to that train of thought is that if the Gwen series reinvents the character from scratch to the point of being "in name only," then it can't be said to be wrong, since Gwen has no established personality to be consistent to.

In a way she did have a "personality", just that it was bland, once she became that colosally bland love interest, she remained like that until her death, with the only "development" she got was starting to hate Spidey, but that runs in a big problem, the personality she got once she became a love interest wasn't something to develop as a character, but to become a girl for Peter, same for her hatred of Spidey, both of those traits rely on someone else for her to be like that, remove that and you have nothing.

So her most consistent "personality" is her relying on Peter to have anything, that's just bad, it's like a worse Silver Age Lois Lane, and that Lois has the problem on relying on Supes/Clark to have a lot of her personality, but at the very least she was a reporter and we see her working as one often enough, meanwhile the only other thing that could define Gwen is her being a science major, which is just an informed attribute, since as far as I remember, she mentions all of one time, and we obviously never see it.

So yeah, Gwen is the peak definition of the "Interpretative character" trope, and that only happens because she didn't have much of a personality, the one thing that could be arguably her "personality" is being Peter's love interest who loves him very much, and hates Spidey, and that's nothing, and it's why I consider Ditko Gwen to be better even without counting her eyebrows, she at least didn't rely on Peter to have her entire personality to exist, even if she was just another of Ditko's interchangeable-2-dimensional-*******-supporting-character, it's still better, even if just marginally.

Gwen wasn't a well-developed character, but she wasn't a blank slate either. A good in-continuity recton makes use of what's there instead of ignoring it entirely.

There are things you could do with OG Gwen. The most obvious is a recton that explains why she softened so considerably after Ditko left. You could explore her relationship with Harry Osborn. You could also explore her relationship with her father while he was still active in the police force. I can imagine how difficult (even traumatic) it may have been as a child to worry about a parent risking their life on a regular basis. Maybe she even felt neglected at times. Maybe that, in some way, influenced her negative attitude towards vigilantes like Spider-Man.

But so far, many writers that use Gwen Stacy have seemed less interested in developing the psychology of the character, and more in idealizing the character. That's why we have all of these disconnected versions.

And if the description of the comic is any hint, Gwen may get yet another disconnected personality from the rest, since at no point she has a "nose for trouble", the "no-quit attitude" is arguably somewhat there, but the way they word it, sounds like it's how she keeps going after crime, not the much more mundane way it was used in the original runs (Which was just "I'll keep pestering Peter!").

It's honestly be weird to convincingly explain why she changed so much, the most nonsensical change she had was her temper, Gwen back on Ditko era was easy to anger, so easy to anger she decides to keep bullying Peter as badly as Flash just because he ignored her, after that she was easy going and calm, never getting angry easily.

I guess maybe you could say she had an epiphany, or George had a pep talk with her, or she had an epiphany after George had a pep talk with her, or whatever, but such a drastic change is just hard to explain properly...