How good was JMS' Spider-Man overall?

[NC_Yankee]

[QUOTE=Revolutionary_Jack;4999262]The Other was an editorial mandate and not from JMS. They wanted to pad out a crossover and asked him to bring back Morlun.

Sins' Past though, yeah that's on him. And he has admitted as much.

In any case, it's not beyond the realm of possibility for a writer to be capable of doing great work and weak work in the same run. And ultimately ongoings are judged on the strength of the best work, especially considering the length of time he stayed on Spider-Man.[/QUOTE
I really disagree with that opinion. Why? It is essentially taking 10 years of Dan Slott and judging them on Spider-Island and Renew Your Vows, and pretending Brand New Day, Silk, Jackpot, and a poorly written Peter, MJ and Felicia did not exist. Every writer ( like anyone else) has to be judged on not only their pluses but their minuses. That is what I did with Conway on my post yesterday.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

I acknowledge that the idea to bring back Morlun and pad out the crossover wasn't his call, but he's responsible for what we saw in the comic itself.

I'd say that's fair to a point. But at the same time, editorial ideas that writers don't agree with or feel comfortable with do have diminishing returns. Take the Robotparents story which is now universally blamed on Danny Fingeroth who forced it on Michelinie.

He was given somewhat vague directions.

Bringing Morlun back, padding out a crossover over multiple titles, some parts of which weren't going to be written by him, and likewise create a situation for Paul Jenkins to introduce "organic webbing" (which was an editorial demand to make Spider-Man in line with the Raimi movies) aren't "vague directions". They are rather clear boundaries and hoops.

The details and the quality of the work are all his.

Even The Other has some good bits and moments apart. So that's true enough.

JMS' run has two-parts, Part 1 - The JMS/JRJR collaboration doesn't have a single bad issue in it. This section largely has Spider-Man in his own corner.

Part 2 starting from Sins' Past and ending with Back in Black is a lot more inconsistent, uneven, with really low lows mixed with high highs. This section has JMS dealing much more directly than in Part 1 with elements of Spider-Man continuity, Spider-Man in the extended Marvel universe, and as such it's lot a weaker since it's so divergent in content and context from Part 1. It's like JMS had to suddenly morph into a different Spider-Man writer midway. And editorial definitely had a much bigger say in this section than in Part 1.

Still Back in Black is aces.

Every writer ( like anyone else) has to be judged on not only their pluses but their minuses.

That's not how art or creative endeavors are judged and evaluated. It's not a report card.

If we want to do a Dan Slott versus JMS comparison, I'll say that Slott never wrote a story as bad as "Sins' Past", but he never wrote stories as great as "Coming Home, The Conversation, Doomed Affairs, The Book of Ezekiel, Back in Black" either. By your metric, Slott would perhaps have a better overall grade by default of not having written a story as bad as "Sins' Past". I mean Dennis O'Neill widely considered to be the weakest run on Spider-Man, or among the weakest didn't write a story as bad as "Sins' Past".

Fact is talented writers and talented artists can write bad stories too and can drop the ball. But that doesn't mean their great work is somehow diminished. David Michelinie is an excellent writer of superhero stories (Emperor Doom, Iron Man, ASM) and yet he wrote Avengers #200. Frank Miller wrote great stuff in the 80s, some of which is still better than the output of several authors who have never written anything as bad as The Dark Knight Strikes Again or Holy Terror or ASBAR which he wrote since 2000.

[NC_Yankee]

I'd say that's fair to a point. But at the same time, editorial ideas that writers don't agree with or feel comfortable with do have diminishing returns. Take the Robotparents story which is now universally blamed on Danny Fingeroth who forced it on Michelinie.



Bringing Morlun back, padding out a crossover over multiple titles, some parts of which weren't going to be written by him, and likewise create a situation for Paul Jenkins to introduce "organic webbing" (which was an editorial demand to make Spider-Man in line with the Raimi movies) aren't "vague directions". They are rather clear boundaries and hoops.



Even The Other has some good bits and moments apart. So that's true enough.

JMS' run has two-parts, Part 1 - The JMS/JRJR collaboration doesn't have a single bad issue in it. This section largely has Spider-Man in his own corner.

Part 2 starting from Sins' Past and ending with Back in Black is a lot more inconsistent, uneven, with really low lows mixed with high highs. This section has JMS dealing much more directly than in Part 1 with elements of Spider-Man continuity, Spider-Man in the extended Marvel universe, and as such it's lot a weaker since it's so divergent in content and context from Part 1. It's like JMS had to suddenly morph into a different Spider-Man writer midway. And editorial definitely had a much bigger say in this section than in Part 1.

Still Back in Black is aces.



That's not how art or creative endeavors are judged and evaluated. It's not a report card.

If we want to do a Dan Slott versus JMS comparison, I'll say that Slott never wrote a story as bad as "Sins' Past", but he never wrote stories as great as "Coming Home, The Conversation, Doomed Affairs, The Book of Ezekiel, Back in Black" either. By your metric, Slott would perhaps have a better overall grade by default of not having written a story as bad as "Sins' Past". I mean Dennis O'Neill widely considered to be the weakest run on Spider-Man, or among the weakest didn't write a story as bad as "Sins' Past".

Fact is talented writers and talented artists can write bad stories too and can drop the ball. But that doesn't mean their great work is somehow diminished. David Michelinie is an excellent writer of superhero stories (Emperor Doom, Iron Man, ASM) and yet he wrote Avengers #200. Frank Miller wrote great stuff in the 80s, some of which is still better than the output of several authors who have never written anything as bd as The Dark Knight Strikes Again or Holy Terror or ASBAR which he wrote since 2000.

Dan Slott wrote Brand New Day ( my single most hated issue), and the Silk story which is right behind OMD/BND as my most hated story. Those two and Clone Saga are the stories that angered me. Sins Past like Year One I simply did not like. As far as O’Neill is concerned, I certainly did not like his stories but they were better on average then Slott’s ( Spider-Island and Renew Your Vows excluded). I also felt Slott gave the finger to fans with his snarky comments like comparing Peter to Charlie Brown.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

Dan Slott wrote Brand New Day

BND is not a single issue or story. It's essentially the entire period of Spider-Man between OMD and Slott's Big Time, and refers to the entire ongoing being published three-times a month, edited by Stephen Wacker, with multiple writers (Guggenheim, Jim Kelly, Fred van Lente, Mark Waid, among others) along with Slott writing the title. So you need to be more specific. Rest of your post is going off-topic and belongs on another thread discussing Slott's run.

My main point, is that you can't judge any writer or run on a title on the worst stuff they did and use that to discount their best work. That's not how things work. Just because the later work of a creator doesn't measure up doesn't mean that their earlier great stuff is somehow discounted. Consistency tends to slag and drop off the longer you work on any title. You look at Stan Lee's time on ASM. The most consistent stretch was when Ditko was co-plotting and co-writing. The Lee-Romita run that followed after that has great stuff but it's also inconsistent, the great stories that people remember from that time are between ASM#39-52 (from Green Goblin Unmasked to Spider-Man No More), and then ASM#87-98 (Death of George Stacy to Drug Trilogy). Between and after that you have fairly mediocre, redundant, and plainly bad stories.

In the case of JMS, it's a testament to his best work that his run is still highly remembered, loved, and influential, especially more than a decade after it ended. The likes of Donny Cates, Chip Zdarsky, Slott and others have all spoken about his work and its influence.

[Ozymandias]

That's not how art or creative endeavors are judged and evaluated. It's not a report card.

They're not? That's a pity, as far as recommendations go, score cards are more useful, the more detailed the better.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

They're not? That's a pity, as far as recommendations go, score cards are more useful, the more detailed the better.

There's a difference between someone saying, "Haven't read JMS? I suggest read the early JMS/JRJR stuff, Back in Black and skim the rest, and avoid Sins' Past" and someone saying, "JMS wrote Sins' Past, he sucks, don't read it".

In making recommendations people will obviously steer you to start at the right place right. That's different from forming a critical judgment and evaluation.

[Ozymandias]

The OP did ask "overall" tough. In such a case, giving an average seems more appropriate.

[Kaitou D. Kid]

The JRJR era is phenomenal, and what came after that varies between bad to pretty good.

Really the only "bad" stories were Sins Past and OMD, which both had significant editorial interference. Outside of that, even the post-JRJR stuff is pretty solid. It's arguably the only time Spider-Man kinda worked as an Avenger.

[David Walton]

My main point, is that you can't judge any writer or run on a title on the worst stuff they did and use that to discount their best work. That's not how things work. Just because the later work of a creator doesn't measure up doesn't mean that their earlier great stuff is somehow discounted. Consistency tends to slag and drop off the longer you work on any title. You look at Stan Lee's time on ASM. The most consistent stretch was when Ditko was co-plotting and co-writing. The Lee-Romita run that followed after that has great stuff but it's also inconsistent, the great stories that people remember from that time are between ASM#39-52 (from Green Goblin Unmasked to Spider-Man No More), and then ASM#87-98 (Death of George Stacy to Drug Trilogy). Between and after that you have fairly mediocre, redundant, and plainly bad stories.

Yeah, Lee's Spider-Man went through a rough stretch where Spidey's adventures were not just boring, but silly. Like when he got amnesia and said, "I don't feel like a criminal, but if Doc Ock says I am, I must be!" Luckily this is also the period when the 'college gang' as we know it pretty much fell into place, which is why it's still enjoyable (and significant) reading.

In the case of JMS, it's a testament to his best work that his run is still highly remembered, loved, and influential, especially more than a decade after it ended. The likes of Donny Cates, Chip Zdarsky, Slott and others have all spoken about his work and its influence.

I don't see how anyone could think of JMS as anything less than one of the greats when it comes to writing Spider-Man.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

Yeah, Lee's Spider-Man went through a rough stretch where Spidey's adventures were not just boring, but silly. Like when he got amnesia and said, "I don't feel like a criminal, but if Doc Ock says I am, I must be!" Luckily this is also the period when the 'college gang' as we know it pretty much fell into place, which is why it's still enjoyable (and significant) reading.

Right. Lee-Romita is still one of the great runs on Spider-Man. And that's because of the strength of the best stories. And even the weaker stuff has elements of interest and appeal to it.

I don't see how anyone could think of JMS as anything less than one of the greats when it comes to writing Spider-Man.

I love JMS' run on Spider-Man but at the same time I can see why people have issues with it, and there are people I like and whose views I respect who dislike his run (not here but in real life) so I sorta see why people could have issues with it. But for me it's a pantheon level run up there with Stern, Conway, Ditko, and alongside Defalco and Michelinie. In addition to ASM, JMS wrote an iconic and landmark Thor run (in the Top 4 alongside Kirby, Simonson, and now Aaron), as well as an update on Doctor Strange's origin. So he's definitely among the best Marvel writers of the 21st Century overall and also quite influential, since Kevin Feige has cited him as one of his favorites and referred to his work when promoting the Thor, Spider-Man and Dr. Strange stuff. Likewise the "You move" speech that Captain America gives in the pages of ASM during the CW-tie ins was featured in the movies (albeit given to Sharon Carter at Peggy's funeral).

The ironic part of his career in comics is the fact that Superman is his favorite character and yet he never really wrote great stories with him, and indeed one of the stories he wrote -- Grounded -- is kind of a joke. In general his DC work doesn't come close to his Marvel output, and of course his involvement in Before Watchmen (as was the involvement of every other writer and artist there) is quite dishonorable, and frankly for me, insupportable because while you can argue that some of them needed the money, he was among the lot that didn't and for a writer who has done so well in unionized industries like TV and Film where you have royalty systems that aren't as rapacious as in comics, it was definitely scab labor on his part.

Outside of comics, he also wrote the screenplay of a wonderful thriller called Changeling directed by Clint Eastwood (with Angelina Jolie's best performance), and above that he has Babylon 5. His recent memoir about his truly horrific childhood is also quite good. On the whole, ASM and Marvel were quite fortunate to have him. Certainly among celebrity or TV personalities who transition to writing comics, JMS > Whedon. Chris Cantwell, who produced Halt and Catch Fire, and is now overseeing the Doom Miniseries, might be his inheritor.

[NC_Yankee]

[QUOTE=Revolutionary_Jack;4999405]BND is not a single issue or story. It's essentially the entire period of Spider-Man between OMD and Slott's Big Time, and refers to the entire ongoing being published three-times a month, edited by Stephen Wacker, with multiple writers (Guggenheim, Jim Kelly, Fred van Lente, Mark Waid, among others) along with Slott writing the title. So you need to be more specific. Rest of your post is going off-topic and belongs on another thread discussing Slott's run.

My main point, is that you can't judge any writer or run on a title on the worst stuff they did and use that to discount their best work. That's not how things work. Just because the later work of a creator doesn't measure up doesn't mean that their earlier great stuff is somehow discounted. Consistency tends to slag and drop off the longer you work on any title. You look at Stan Lee's time on ASM. The most consistent stretch was when Ditko was co-plotting and co-writing. The Lee-Romita run that followed after that has great stuff but it's also inconsistent, the great stories that people remember from that time are between ASM#39-52 (from Green Goblin Unmasked to Spider-Man No More), and then ASM#87-98 (Death of George Stacy to Drug Trilogy). Between and after that you have fairly mediocre, redundant, and plainly bad stories.
The Tablet series was excellent, I also liked the two Vultures story. The only truly bad story was ASM 100 ( and even that is better then Spider-Man Year One and the other rotten comics that have been discussed over and over here). As far as JMS is concerned, not deducting the bad comics, and only praising the good ones is not right. It is fair to say I hammer Dan Slott’s run, but I still credit him for Spider-Island and Renew Your Vows. It works both ways.

[Alan2099]

If you want to compare Slott with JMS, I don't think Slott's high ever reached the same standards that JMS's did, but his lows are nowhere near as bad either.

SO that just leaves comparing the middles of their work. On average, I think an "average" Slott story tended to be more entertaining than average JMS.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

If you want to compare Slott with JMS, I don't think Slott's high ever reached the same standards that JMS's did, but his lows are nowhere near as bad either.

That's something to agree on.
Weak Slott > Weak JMS.
Best JMS > Best Slott.

SO that just leaves comparing the middles of their work. On average, I think an "average" Slott story tended to be more entertaining than average JMS.

The difference between JMS and Slott is that JMS goes deep where Slott goes wide. JMS takes a few simple starting points (Peter teaches high school, reconnects with MJ, opens up to Aunt May) adds in a single big idea story (the Totem) and sticks to working on that. Slott on the other hand constantly goes wide and adds in and brings in gimmicks and gimmicks galore, recycles and alludes to continuity trivia from all over the place. The difference is that midway in JMS run, he had to transition from his strength (taking a deep dive) to his weakness, going wide (having Spider-Man immediately interact with a widening world and having interactions with New Avengers as if they are all besties now) where Slott could keep on one mode going from gimmick-to-gimmick all through his run. JMS is strong on character rather than plot, Slott is very good at plot but quite weak on character.

In the entirety of the JMS/JRJR run he didn't write a bad issue. I don't think one can say there's a stretch in Slott's run where you can say there's not a bad issue. Superior Spider-Man has bad issues, even the Big Time era has weak points. I re-read Spider-Island and while that holds up okay it's still got weak moments. In the post-JRJR era, JMS started with a stinker in Sins' Past, and then wrote a series of middling to very good Spider-Man stories that tied-in to New Avengers and Civil War. He co-wrote The Other, which was a weak point in this but then ended it with an all-time masterpiece like Back in Black (which to me reads like JMS giving vent via Peter at his frustrations and issues at Marvel). And Back in Black > Go Down Swinging.

The longer a run goes on, the harder it becomes to maintain consistency. The most consistent and well loved Spider-Man runs are the shorter ones (Lee-Ditko, Conway, Stern, Defalco) rather than the longer ones (Lee-Romita, Michelinie, JMS, Slott).

[NC_Yankee]

That's something to agree on.
Weak Slott > Weak JMS.
Best JMS > Best Slott.



The difference between JMS and Slott is that JMS goes deep where Slott goes wide. JMS takes a few simple starting points (Peter teaches high school, reconnects with MJ, opens up to Aunt May) adds in a single big idea story (the Totem) and sticks to working on that. Slott on the other hand constantly goes wide and adds in and brings in gimmicks and gimmicks galore, recycles and alludes to continuity trivia from all over the place. The difference is that midway in JMS run, he had to transition from his strength (taking a deep dive) to his weakness, going wide (having Spider-Man immediately interact with a widening world and having interactions with New Avengers as if they are all besties now) where Slott could keep on one mode going from gimmick-to-gimmick all through his run. JMS is strong on character rather than plot, Slott is very good at plot but quite weak on character.

In the entirety of the JMS/JRJR run he didn't write a bad issue. I don't think one can say there's a stretch in Slott's run where you can say there's not a bad issue. Superior Spider-Man has bad issues, even the Big Time era has weak points. I re-read Spider-Island and while that holds up okay it's still got weak moments. In the post-JRJR era, JMS started with a stinker in Sins' Past, and then wrote a series of middling to very good Spider-Man stories that tied-in to New Avengers and Civil War. He co-wrote The Other, which was a weak point in this but then ended it with an all-time masterpiece like Back in Black (which to me reads like JMS giving vent via Peter at his frustrations and issues at Marvel). And Back in Black > Go Down Swinging.

The longer a run goes on, the harder it becomes to maintain consistency. The most consistent and well loved Spider-Man runs are the shorter ones (Lee-Ditko, Conway, Stern, Defalco) rather than the longer ones (Lee-Romita, Michelinie, JMS, Slott).

I agree with you about the time part. Why? Writers can only have so many good ideas, before they run out. But why is the Ditko era the best loved!? I think a big part is the rogues gallery. If you named the top bad guys a good chunk were created in that era: Otto, Norm, Mysterio, Kraven, Electro and Sandman and Vulture. The only exceptions are Rhino, Venom ( Brock), Kingpin, Moulon, Ezekiel, Carnage, Hobgoblin ( Kingsley), and Mr. Negative.

[The Whovian]

I'd say that's fair to a point. But at the same time, editorial ideas that writers don't agree with or feel comfortable with do have diminishing returns. Take the Robotparents story which is now universally blamed on Danny Fingeroth who forced it on Michelinie.



Bringing Morlun back, padding out a crossover over multiple titles, some parts of which weren't going to be written by him, and likewise create a situation for Paul Jenkins to introduce "organic webbing" (which was an editorial demand to make Spider-Man in line with the Raimi movies) aren't "vague directions". They are rather clear boundaries and hoops.



Even The Other has some good bits and moments apart. So that's true enough.

JMS' run has two-parts, Part 1 - The JMS/JRJR collaboration doesn't have a single bad issue in it. This section largely has Spider-Man in his own corner.

Part 2 starting from Sins' Past and ending with Back in Black is a lot more inconsistent, uneven, with really low lows mixed with high highs. This section has JMS dealing much more directly than in Part 1 with elements of Spider-Man continuity, Spider-Man in the extended Marvel universe, and as such it's lot a weaker since it's so divergent in content and context from Part 1. It's like JMS had to suddenly morph into a different Spider-Man writer midway. And editorial definitely had a much bigger say in this section than in Part 1.

Still Back in Black is aces.



That's not how art or creative endeavors are judged and evaluated. It's not a report card.

If we want to do a Dan Slott versus JMS comparison, I'll say that Slott never wrote a story as bad as "Sins' Past", but he never wrote stories as great as "Coming Home, The Conversation, Doomed Affairs, The Book of Ezekiel, Back in Black" either. By your metric, Slott would perhaps have a better overall grade by default of not having written a story as bad as "Sins' Past". I mean Dennis O'Neill widely considered to be the weakest run on Spider-Man, or among the weakest didn't write a story as bad as "Sins' Past".

Fact is talented writers and talented artists can write bad stories too and can drop the ball. But that doesn't mean their great work is somehow diminished. David Michelinie is an excellent writer of superhero stories (Emperor Doom, Iron Man, ASM) and yet he wrote Avengers #200. Frank Miller wrote great stuff in the 80s, some of which is still better than the output of several authors who have never written anything as bad as The Dark Knight Strikes Again or Holy Terror or ASBAR which he wrote since 2000.

I disagree about the Slott vs JMS comparison but that’s because I love Slott’s run. It’s my favorite Spidey run of all time mainly because Otto is my favorite Spidey villain.