Anyone Enjoyed The Post-Clone Saga Pre-Reboot late 96-to 98 Period

[Rzerox21xx]

I been reading them and well you had Todd Dezago with great art by the late Mike Wieringo. JMD 2nd Spec stint with Luke Ross(back then he had a McFarland approach of doing Spidey poses), , all great stuff. and Tom Defalco with Steve Skorce/Bennet art. Howard Mackie Adjectiveless was obviously the weakest of the 4 but yeah Marvel had a good thing going before the reboot came which I dont get. were the sales that weak that marvel wanted do to do the reboot i heard nothing but good things on the Sensational and Spec side of things. there were strong story elements that still kept going like Flash Thompson fight with alcoholism in JMD stories, you have Stern coming back to do Hobgoblin for a miniseries and 1 final arc in Spec before the the Gathering. I just think it was a waste that reboot happened and made it, I mean i heard editorial control made a mess of things in the X-titles at the time like the Seagle Uncanny and Kelly Adjectiveless x-men. so it was that case in spiderman too?

[HypnoHustler]

It was a very strange and relatively quiet time for the Spidey books as they tried to re-establish Peter following the clone saga. Light, but a little aimless. There were a few semi-classics like Spec #250 (Osborn returns), ASM #425 (Spidey and X-Man take on Electro) and Peter Parker: Spider-Man #95 (Peter and Norman trapped in an elevator) and of course the whole ‘Spider-Hunt’ and ‘Identity Crisis’ arcs , but nothing I’d call a true classic. Looking back I have fond memories of most of the issues, but it was a brief period and not particularly memorable besides what I mentioned. It’s also hard to find many of those stories in any collections. While not particularly stand-out, it was certainly better than what followed it with that ‘Gathering of Five’ trash, Aunt May coming back, and then the whole reboot period. Ugh.

[Mister Mets]

I remember someone calling it the intermediate period.

It was solid, but not exceptional.

Every run was generally enjoyable, but there isn't any story I'd clearly rank in my Top 50.

[K7P5V]

I remember someone calling it the intermediate period.

It was solid, but not exceptional.

Every run was generally enjoyable, but there isn't any story I'd clearly rank in my Top 50.

Agreed. Initially, it was nice seeing Mr. & Mrs. Spidey return and be the main focus again.

With that said, the change in art on Spectacular from Sal Buscema to Luke Ross was jarring (to say the least).

[ngroove]

I miss J.M. Dematteis / Luke Ross Spectacular Spider-Man, and catching up to the chronicles of Grizzly and Gibbon, the Boy Monkey.

[Yvonmukluk]

Wasn't the plan at one point that Baby May would be recovered (with the hints bout Kaine, Alison Mongraine and such) before DeFalco got kicked off the book? I know Byrne was the one who demanded Aunt May back.

[HypnoHustler]

Wasn't the plan at one point that Baby May would be recovered (with the hints bout Kaine, Alison Mongraine and such) before DeFalco got kicked off the book? I know Byrne was the one who demanded Aunt May back.

Ugh, don’t remind me. Outside of Joe Quesada, Byrne is one of the worst things to ever happen to Spidey.

[Pav]

Wasn't the plan at one point that Baby May would be recovered (with the hints bout Kaine, Alison Mongraine and such) before DeFalco got kicked off the book? I know Byrne was the one who demanded Aunt May back.

Ugh, don’t remind me. Outside of Joe Quesada, Byrne is one of the worst things to ever happen to Spidey.

I really enjoyed that period of Spidey comics -- I loved every title (with Defalco's Amazing as the slightly weakest in my eyes) and was excited about so many things: lots of different villains were used, the danger of Norman Osborn loomed larger than ever, the art was pretty great overall, and I especially liked how each book had its own aesthetic.

When Kaine showed up again, I was beyond thrilled.

Then, of course, nothing came of it.

Instead of continuing the interesting subplots laid out by JMD and others, we got Byrne and a "back to basics" approach that wasn't really back to basics at all -- it was boring, frustrating, and reactionary in all the worst ways.

-Pav, who hated the fifth Goblin reveal...

[RyanParkerMan]

This is when I first started reading regularly. I remember Peter Parker: Spider-Man as being a solid book. Romita Jr was on pencils, forgot who was writing it but it was solid. There was a story called Freefall with Peter and Norman trapped in an elevator. It was a great single-issue comic. Definitely top 30 all-time for me. Issue 98 was the last book pre-reboot and it was fantastic, playing on themes from ASM #33.

[A Maze Thing]

I thought Black Tarantula was kind of an interesting new villain when he first appeared. Other than that I was just happy the whole clone mess was over. Really don't remember much of the actual stories or plots, so I suppose there really wasn't anything memorable. But at the time anything felt like an improvement after years of clones, clones and more clones.

[David Walton]

I enjoyed this era immensely. While there aren't a lot of stories that stand out, the overall feel and consistency of the line did. I especially like the way they approached the marriage. The problems felt more authentic, things like them struggling to make time for one another while Peter worked on his graduate studies.

And MJ took a baseball bat to the Chameleon!

[Rzerox21xx]

I found a good ebay deal of sensational spider-man that contains most of the Todd Dezago post clone saga art and thinking of bidding due to mostly for the great late Mike Wieringo's art.

[twenty2]

I really liked it. JrJr art was amazing and all books were solid.

[Knightsilver]

I actually enjoyed that era a lot. What followed after it however...

[Tien Long]

I remember this era. I was still coming off of the whole Clone Saga thing and slowly getting back into the groove that Peter was Spider-Man again. I certainly remember this era mainly because of Identity Crisis. That threw me for a loop. Spider-Man taking on different identities and personas? Spider-Man didn't seem to have done that before. The TPB is a good, reliable standby of a story for me.