View Poll Results: Who was a better Spider-Man writer?

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  • Dan Slott

    47 45.19%
  • Nick Spencer

    57 54.81%
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  1. #61

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    Quote Originally Posted by Tabs View Post
    I'm voting for Spencer but my recency bias is against Nick since he destroyed one of the actually good ideas from the BND era: Harry Osborn's reintegration into the supporting cast. He ruined his original death and rewrote Mephisto into one of Spiderman's most influential villain's backstory. He's a better character writer for the protagonist and his supporting cast(except Harry) but he didn't write compelling villains. Everyone's a clone and/or influenced by the devil.
    Very very hard same. Still cannot believe to this day how whisker-close he came to irrevocably ruining Harry. The Kindred mess is still salvageable, I think, future writers don't even have to bring him back to life if they don't want to, but god know it'll probably take years.

    Harry is such a weird character to even want to ruin, which leads me to only one conclusion: Spencer probably met James Franco at some point.
    harryosborn.net -Me rereading every single comic that has Harry Osborn in it, and also writing some articles.

  2. #62
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    I went with Spencer but they are kind of even for different reasons.
    Slott excelled at the big stories. You look at things like Spider-Island and Superior and those are great stories in their own right.
    He had grand ideas like Spider-verse, but the execution would lead to a lot to be desired.
    I think he was on the book for too long.

    Spencer on the otherhand did better at the smaller personal stuff. Some of the best parts of his run where the small one off plots which just built character. However he fell flat mostly because all of his ideas where stopped by editorial.

    Either way, both are talanted, I just think Spencer never reached the lows of slott

  3. #63
    see beauty in all things. charliehustle415's Avatar
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    I enjoyed Slott's voice more than Spencer's, it felt more like what I think a kid from Queens with superpowers would sound and behave like.

  4. #64
    Moderator Frontier's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mister Mets View Post
    The Queenpin story wasn't my favorite of Slott's, but I did like how Slott and Ramos captured a Peter Parker making up for burned bridges in the Superior Spider-Man run, and dealing with new responsibilities as a result of Doc Ock's ambitions. There were some decent action sequences.

    I would consider Learning to Crawl an obvious part of Slott's run, just as Clone Conspiracy was and Sinister War counts for Nick Spencer. It substituted for issues of Amazing Spider-Man at that time (the book was on a one-month subscription) and set up characters that would have an impact on later arcs in Slott's run, especially Clash. When he wrote the mini-series, he had an idea of how it would affect later issues of Spider-Man he was already commissioned to write.

    I don't personally consider Superior Foes part of Nick Spencer's Spider-Man run, because it does not star Spider-Man and he wasn't sure he would even write Peter Parker at the time, let alone be able to use Boomerang as a supporting character.

    There are some grey areas, but sometimes major comic book runs have a flashback arc, so I saw Learning to Crawl as an example of that. This is the same way that Geoff Johns and Gary Frank covered Hal Jordan's origin in an arc of their Green Lantern run, Mark Waid had some Flash Year One stories, Snyder's Batman had the zero year, and King's Batman had the war of jokes and riddles.

    I wouldn't count Spider-Man/ Human Torch as part of Slott's Spider-Man run, although it can count for the purposes of this question. At that point, he wanted to write Spider-Man and he would build on stuff he set up, but it wasn't obvious at the time he would be able to do that.
    Yeah, but when those burned bridges weren't properly executed, it's hard to really buy into them. Like in the case of Felicia's mischaracterization or MJ basically abandoning him for Pedro. Of course a proper reckoning would've made it less believable for Peter to ever be okay with Doc Ock again and that wouldn't have fit Slott's plans for good 'ol Otto "not that bad a guy" Octavius.

    This kinds of reminds me of Marvel's Spider-Man's Superior arc where after getting his body back all of Peter's school friends suddenly hate him just because he was kind of rude and bailed on the school despite everything he and his friends had gone through by that point. Or Miles not even telling Peter that he didn't go to Horizon anymore so he basically made a fool of himself when he came back.

    I don't think Spencer's run works as well without Superior Foes since that basically informed Boomerang, Beetle, and Overdrive's character.
    Quote Originally Posted by charliehustle415 View Post
    I enjoyed Slott's voice more than Spencer's, it felt more like what I think a kid from Queens with superpowers would sound and behave like.
    The problem is he isn't a kid from Queens anymore. Although I think Slott was more comfortable writing Silver Age Peter in Learning to Crawl than he was modern Spidey.

    I feel like Spencer had a much better voice for Peter. I think the only characters who Slott had the best voice for were Jonah and Otto.

  5. #65
    Julian Keller Supremacy Rift's Avatar
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    Slott's lows were much lower than Spencer's, and Slott had a lot more lows.
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  6. #66
    Ultimate Member Mister Mets's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Frontier View Post
    Yeah, but when those burned bridges weren't properly executed, it's hard to really buy into them. Like in the case of Felicia's mischaracterization or MJ basically abandoning him for Pedro. Of course a proper reckoning would've made it less believable for Peter to ever be okay with Doc Ock again and that wouldn't have fit Slott's plans for good 'ol Otto "not that bad a guy" Octavius.

    This kinds of reminds me of Marvel's Spider-Man's Superior arc where after getting his body back all of Peter's school friends suddenly hate him just because he was kind of rude and bailed on the school despite everything he and his friends had gone through by that point. Or Miles not even telling Peter that he didn't go to Horizon anymore so he basically made a fool of himself when he came back.

    I don't think Spencer's run works as well without Superior Foes since that basically informed Boomerang, Beetle, and Overdrive's character.
    This isn't about what makes a run work as much as what counts as part of a Spider-Man run.

    My feeling is that it has to feature Spider-Man, or connect to concurrent Spider-Man stories in a relevant way.

    There are some notable Spider-Man writers who refer to some of their other Marvel comics but I don't call think those part of their Spider-Man runs. JM Dematteis featured Vermin and the Black Crow in his Captain America run, but that's not going to be part of a typical assessment of his Spider-Man ouvre. Roger Stern's Amazing Spider-Man run featured a follow up to one of his Captain America stories, but we don't really talk about that when assessing him as a Spider-Man writer. If we're rating Daredevil writers, we're not considering Alias as a package deal with the Bendis/ Maleev run even if there are connections.

    There are some potential edge cases. You could make a case for the first Venom: Lethal Protector mini-series as being a part of Michelinie's run on Spider-Man in the 1990s (Published while he's still on Amazing Spider-Man, builds on developments in that title, sets up plot points for later issues of his Amazing Spider-Man run), although I'm not sure he'd want you to do that.

    Some writers do a team book at the same time as they depict one member's solo adventures. Geoff Johns wrote Justice League and Aquaman at the same time. He cowrote Hawkman while he wrote JSA.

    In rare cases, a spinoff may overtake the original. I wouldn't consider Spider-Girl part of DeFalco's Spider-Man run because it's so much bigger than his previous work.

    Other people may have slightly different standards and that's fine.
    Last edited by Mister Mets; 04-25-2022 at 05:58 PM.
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  7. #67
    Incredible Member a moment closer's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mister Mets View Post
    I'll go with Slott.

    He wrote more of my favorite stories, and his best was just better for me than Spencer's best.

    There was no part of his run that frustrated me as much as the twenty-issue fight with the Sin-Eater and Kindred, or the rushed finale, where the main defense seems to be that other people messed up.
    Quote Originally Posted by PCN24454 View Post
    It felt like nothing really happened in Spencer’s run, so I’ll go with Slott.
    Quote Originally Posted by exile001 View Post
    Dan Slott for me. As has been said by others, his highs were much higher.

    He gave us Big Time through Superior Spider-man which is one of my favourite Spider-man eras. While the second and third ASM reboot runs aren't great (sometimes aren't even good), I also love their centerpieces of Spider-Verse and The Clone Conspiracy (yep, screw you. I love clones and thought it was super fun!). Red Goblin was pretty fun, too.

    I don't think Spencer actually did much if anything we hadn't seen before and, while I agree with most of the continuity fixes he made, basing a run on fixing continuity issues isn't really the best idea.

    The Kindred thing wore out its welcome way before Last Remains for me and, point fingers where you will, the outcome is that the Kindred saga was a dud.
    All of this. I connected more emotionally to a lot of Slott's stories and character work than I did with Spencer's. I agree that it felt like Slott lost Peter's voice for a short time after he relaunched Amazing from Superior Spider-Man but he eventually found it and finished his monumental run very strongly in my opinion. I also loved Christos Gage's work during that era and anything Bendis was involved in.

  8. #68
    see beauty in all things. charliehustle415's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Frontier View Post
    The problem is he isn't a kid from Queens anymore. Although I think Slott was more comfortable writing Silver Age Peter in Learning to Crawl than he was modern Spidey. I feel like Spencer had a much better voice for Peter. I think the only characters who Slott had the best voice for were Jonah and Otto.
    But after BND, he was basically back to his youth, I mean his age may have not changed (I don't know did he get de-aged?) but mentally he was most definitely de-aged

  9. #69
    Moderator Frontier's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by charliehustle415 View Post
    But after BND, he was basically back to his youth, I mean his age may have not changed (I don't know did he get de-aged?) but mentally he was most definitely de-aged
    I mean, yeah, but there's a difference between writing Peter like he's still in high school and writing Peter like a college-aged adult or older. Which is part of why we have an issue with Peter being seen as a modern manchild.

  10. #70
    see beauty in all things. charliehustle415's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Frontier View Post
    I mean, yeah, but there's a difference between writing Peter like he's still in high school and writing Peter like a college-aged adult or older. Which is part of why we have an issue with Peter being seen as a modern manchild.
    welcome to Marvel my friend, where no one has any emotional intelligence and everyone one throws a temper tantrum

  11. #71
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    Quote Originally Posted by charliehustle415 View Post
    welcome to Marvel my friend, where no one has any emotional intelligence and everyone one throws a temper tantrum
    Yeah, I never understood why Peter is typically the one singled out for this trait.

  12. #72
    The Superior One Celgress's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by PCN24454 View Post
    Yeah, I never understood why Peter is typically the one singled out for this trait.
    To make him appear immature and therefore "young" of course. *sigh*
    "So you've come to the end now alive but dead inside."

  13. #73
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    Quote Originally Posted by PCN24454 View Post
    Yeah, I never understood why Peter is typically the one singled out for this trait.
    Oh we know it's a wide-spread problem, it's just easier to pin it on Peter because he's the flagship

  14. #74
    The King Fears NO ONE! Triniking1234's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Rift View Post
    Slott's lows were much lower than Spencer's, and Slott had a lot more lows.
    I need to finish Spencer's run. The only part of Slott's run I didn't like was the first volume after Superior.
    "Cable was right!"

  15. #75
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    Quote Originally Posted by Frontier View Post
    Again, quality over quantity.
    That's not what I'm discussing. I'm discussing Spiderfan001's claim that Dan Slott destroyed more than he built.

    Quote Originally Posted by Lukmendes View Post
    The relationship with Betty had already ended by that point, since he ended things with Betty in ASM#30:



    Tried get her pissed with him in #32:



    And he intentionally sounded like a danger junkie to push her away in #33.



    And while Ditko made it so Peter isn't aware that she would choose him over Ned, he is aware she still has feelings for him anyway, and is very correct in assuming that Betty would hate it if she learns he's Spider-Man, since in earlier issues, she occasionaly mentions she doesn't like people who put themselves in danger like Spidey (She doesn't hate him though, even tried to find a way to save him from Spider-Slayer), ASM#32 has another scene with Betty not being happy in seeing Spidey:

    https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...88/unknown.png
    I don't know how you can look at those pages and consider the story to be one where Peter comes out with a clear win.

    Quote Originally Posted by Lukmendes View Post
    He did screw up his social life at college, but, so what? He still got a massive win by managing to save aunt May, stoping Otto and even getting some extra money from that adventure, having a bunch of snob assholes like Harry, Gwen and Flash not like him is whatever compared to how good **** he got, specially since he was happy by the end, and didn't really seem to care about Flash, Gwen and Harry hating him afterwards.

    So yeah, bad stuff still happened in that story, but it's mostly good that happened, focusing too much on the negative would be like if he found a cure for cancer, but we only talk about how he stubbed his toe afterwards.
    This is how you described the story:

    I'm not saying the current direction is right, this is boring in the opposite way, just that struggles can keep **** interesting, but Marvel takes it too far with Spidey and make his life be nothing but struggles, and while being the universe's punching bag is part of the point in Spider-Man, he also gets a few big wins once in a while, and that was being done since Ditko era, 'cause while he had some pretty bad losses, he also had very clear wins, and hell, the generally best considered story in Ditko's run is Master Planner trilogy, which gives Spidey a very clear win because he was that desperate to save aunt May.
    The Master Planner story had these wins:

    Peter defeated Doctor Octopus
    Peter saved Aunt May
    Peter got a good payday from Jameson

    And these losses:

    Everyone at college thinks Peter is an *******
    Peter wrecked the furniture in his aunt's house
    Peter was an ******* to Ned Leeds
    Peter widened the rift between himself and Betty
    Peter ended up so bruised and battered that Betty is worried sick

    To me, that's not a very clear win. Spider-Man defeated the villain, which is par for the course, and he saved May's life, but the rest of his personal life is in tatters.

    What do you think the reaction would be to a story told today, where Peter defeated the villain and saved Aunt May's life, but he was on the outs with Mary Jane and the rest of the supporting cast thought he was an *******? Would that story be considered a very clear win for Peter?

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