The C2E2 Spider-man 60th Panel, some interesting things been said.

[Alan2099]

The first one is around whether or not Spider-Man should be an underachieving loser and (more importantly) stay that way.

On top of that one, there's the tendency to describe any form of characterization certain people don't like as him being a manchild or how if anything bad happens in his life he's suddenly a loser.

There's a lot of insults that people try to pass off as legitimate criticism.

[Matt Rat]

If I can't have Peter and MJ together (let alone MJ in the book), I would at least like Zdarsky's Spider-Man to be the standard going forward than BND Spider-Man.

Zdarsky's run tried to drive home the idea Teresa Parker was Peter's legit sister on a flimsy I.D verification premise in an alternate universe. Fans didn't take to that particular bit of 'growth' and Spencer teased walking back on it in his run. Teresa also hasn't been used since Spencer.

The only thing people talk about from Zdarsky on Spec is "My Dinner With Jonah" which can be told with or without a marriage status quo in the background.

[Kaitou D. Kid]

Zdarsky's run tried to drive home the idea Teresa Parker was Peter's legit sister on a flimsy I.D verification premise in an alternate universe. Fans didn't take to that particular bit of 'growth' and Spencer teased walking back on it in his run. Teresa also hasn't been used since Spencer.

The only thing people talk about from Zdarsky on Spec is "My Dinner With Jonah" which can be told with or without a marriage status quo in the background.

Teresa Parker wasn't created by Zdarksy. Most of the "un-Spider-Man" things in Zdarsky's run can be traced to the fact that it wasn't a main title, and that he had to uphold the current status quo like side titles usually do.

I mean, that that's no different than how Slott's Spider-Man/Human Torch mini had to comply with JMS and with the pre-OMD depictions because it wasn't a main title (ironically, that mini is still Slott's best work on Spider-Man). Side titles in general are like this.

Zdarsky's last issue is also talked about often. I would argue it's better than both Slott and Wells' runs.

On top of that one, there's the tendency to describe any form of characterization certain people don't like as him being a manchild or how if anything bad happens in his life he's suddenly a loser.

There's a lot of insults that people try to pass off as legitimate criticism.

Technically the loser accusations come from Marvel and Editorial, not from the fans (either directly or indirectly).

[Lee]

I definitely don't think Peter having a stable relationship hurts sales at all, since it didn't impede Spencer at all.

That's a completely different scenario.

Dropping the book in 2022 so that Marvel will undo a change they made in 2007 (unmarrying Peter and MJ) is unlikely to have the desired result. The time to drop the book was in 2008. If Marvel sees sales drop in 2022, they're unlikely to assume it's a delayed reaction to something that happened in 2007.

Dropping the book in late 2022 so that Marvel will undo a change they made in early 2022 (Peter and MJ no longer being boyfriend and girlfriend) is more likely to have the desired result.

Either way, it helps to send Marvel a polite letter explaining why you dropped the book, otherwise they have no way of knowing.

[Morgoth]

It's not a sales issue at all. Spider-Man sells well both married and single, it's just a way for writers to do what they want while ignoring fan annoyance.
But I'm pretty sure it's not a matter of corporate mandate, it's that most writers somehow feel that marriage limits their ability to write Peter stories they want. Considering how many of them spoke out against marriage and even against MJ herself (Wells, for example, most likely uses this mystery box to not give her more attention than he wants, but still keep her in the plot), this not that surprising. Disgusting, but not surprising.

[Huntsman Spider]

This doesn't get talked about enough, but the OMD debate is actually two debates, not one.

The first one is around whether or not Spider-Man should be an underachieving loser and (more importantly) stay that way.

The second one is whether he should be in a long-term relationship with MJ (married or unmarried).

There is overlap between the two debates, but they're different things.

In theory, you can have a Spider-Man book where Peter is single and MJ is not around, but where Spider-Man is still competent and growing as a person. Like Zdarsky's run on Spectacular. No one ever brings up how liked it was because it doesn't fit the narrative that people are only upset about the marriage being gone.

If I can't have Peter and MJ together (let alone MJ in the book), I would at least like Zdarsky's Spider-Man to be the standard going forward than BND Spider-Man.

And hell, Mary Jane did slip into a flashback in a crucial moment in Zdarsky's Spectacular Spider-Man, during the climax of the Tinkerer's collaboration with alien robots that wanted to annihilate the human race, with Peter remembering what he had to fight for and using that as psychological reinforcement when he was in danger of losing himself mentally.

It's not a sales issue at all. Spider-Man sells well both married and single, it's just a way for writers to do what they want while ignoring fan annoyance.
But I'm pretty sure it's not a matter of corporate mandate, it's that most writers somehow feel that marriage limits their ability to write Peter stories they want. Considering how many of them spoke out against marriage and even against MJ herself (Wells, for example, most likely uses this mystery box to not give her more attention than he wants, but still keep her in the plot), this not that surprising. Disgusting, but not surprising.

What possible stories could they tell with Peter that would really necessitate him not being married? The only ones I can think of are generally related to his dating/love/sex life, and in all honestly, while I could take or leave some of them, him playing the field is played out at this point.

[Mister Mets]

And that's different than what Quesada did how? The creator working on the book decided that the characters shouldn't be together. Seems the same in principle.
Unless you're trying to make the case that anything that Ditko and Lee did together on Spider-Man is sacrosanct, then I've got some bad news for you about Mary Jane.

There is a difference between the creators and someone who is in charge of the brand generations later.

Of course, they're also making comics in a different context.

Lee and Ditko didn't know how popular Spider-Man would be. Stan Lee thought the resurgence of superheroes in the silver age was a fad. He wasn't aware that people would be reading his stories generations later. What it takes to create something is different from what it takes to maintain it.

I definitely don't think Peter having a stable relationship hurts sales at all, since it didn't impede Spencer at all.

Do we have good recent sales data from the latter half of his run (when Sins Rising kicked off)?

I haven't paid attention to it much recently, but I was under the impression estimates are less reliable ever since DC left Diamond.

Zdarsky's run tried to drive home the idea Teresa Parker was Peter's legit sister on a flimsy I.D verification premise in an alternate universe. Fans didn't take to that particular bit of 'growth' and Spencer teased walking back on it in his run. Teresa also hasn't been used since Spencer.

The only thing people talk about from Zdarsky on Spec is "My Dinner With Jonah" which can be told with or without a marriage status quo in the background.

Zdarsky's final issue and Sandman two-parter have been on multiple best of lists.

It's not a sales issue at all. Spider-Man sells well both married and single, it's just a way for writers to do what they want while ignoring fan annoyance.
But I'm pretty sure it's not a matter of corporate mandate, it's that most writers somehow feel that marriage limits their ability to write Peter stories they want. Considering how many of them spoke out against marriage and even against MJ herself (Wells, for example, most likely uses this mystery box to not give her more attention than he wants, but still keep her in the plot), this not that surprising. Disgusting, but not surprising.

It's a bit dangerous to suggest that sales would do well no matter what Marvel does. Brands have collapsed before.

Writers do seem to favor an unmarried Peter, as it does give more flexibility to tell a variety of stories. That's a potential side question- What should writers prefer?

I wonder if Wells is using the mystery box to break up Peter & MJ quietly, kinda like dropping a frog into a pot of water and slowly increasing the temperature until it boils.

[Mister Mets]

Read the newspaper strip version, Peter and MJ eloped within 24 hours, and you didn't even see MJ accept Peter's proposal on-panel in the newspaper version either, Peter simply narrates and says "btw, she said yes", Peter wanted MJ to marry him after she saw him kiss another blonde in the previous story and stormed off.

Both weddings were rushed, but it didn't matter.

An elopement at least makes narrative sense.

Amazing Spider-Man Annual #21 was a different scenario.

There can be stories in which people get married very quickly. But that situation wasn't set up in the 616 comics.

The cancellation had nothing to do with "worries from higher-ups about the vision for the series" and everything to do with Dan DiDio being abruptly fired (and not for editorial reasons). DiDio was the champion of Generations, and when he left, so did the enthusiasm for it.

In fact, this is a perfect example of everything I've been saying: all it takes is for people to turn over at a company for policies to change.



What clique? Are you referring to my use of power clique to refer to the current exec team at Marvel? That's just a factual description of the current situation.

I've said nothing about my personal preferences in this thread. In fact, while I think OMD broke the very foundation of "with great power there must also come great responsibilty" by Peter putting his very selfish personal desires over his responsibilty to the greater good of the entire universe by giving the Devil/evil what he wants and dealing a blow to The One Above All/good, I'm fine if Peter and MJ remain in love with each other without marriage. My issue with OMD is that it broke the character of Peter Parker.

Instead, I am solely discussing how large media corporations act in the 21st century in the United States of America and I've written the equivalent of a novel explaining this in great detail. I have explained the circumstances it would take, in fact, in my very first post on this subject. If you have questions about what I wrote or if I can clarify in any way, I would happy to do so. However, you might want to read my posts first.



Again, Cebulski reports to Feige who reports to Bergman who reports to Chapek. Cebulski would probably need a deck explaining the potential uplift impact on revenue from a status change, and an outline of the marketing and sales plans to support the change to give to Feige and whatever cross divisional Disney heads (marketing, PR, erc) who may be asked to weigh in on the plan's merits. That's it. But Disney cares so much about Marvel Comics, they made them the centerpiece of their earnings call today--

Oh. Wait. Marvel Comics wasn't mentioned at all in their earnings call today. The only mention Marvel got was producing more original MCU content for Disney+, which IS a business that is core to Disney.

Disney brass honestly do not care about what is in the comics and keeping the brand "safe" for kids for generations to come. If Disney micromanaged Spider-Man's image, then Superior would never have been allowed to see print. Peter and Silk would not have been allowed to screw every chance they got because "pheromones." Blood would not be flying when Tombstone beats up Peter. They trust Marvel to make the best decisions for its audience that will hit the performance metrics set for them.

And one underappreciated aspect of this argument is that it isn't about personal preferences at all.

Corporations like Disney make decisions based on projected profit. Marvel is now part of Disney - they were bought in 2009, or two years after OMD - and Disney is one of the most data driven companies on this planet, which means Marvel is now beholden to the same army of Excel spreadsheet warriors as the rest of the company.

If Marvel/Disney decides it is more profitable to create a big sales event because the comic book market is fading into obscurity - and manga currently outsells monthly floppies - and they decide to appeal to Gen X/Millennials, as Gen Z shows little interest in comic books, by appealing to audiences who are nostalgic for stories from the 90s/early 00s (which they are already doing to some extent with titles like Michelinie's Venom and JMD's Ben Reilly/Lost Hunt) - and a Spider-Man wedding is seen as a way to buy some splashy global publicity and big bucks not only from the comics but other tie-ins and merchandise and TV special and maybe it's tied to a TV series or film:

They will do it.

Or whatever other circumstance in which changing Spider-Man's status will create profits and/or publicity and/or fulfill a key metric.

My point is that no matter how passionate Dan Slott was in 2017, he doesn't have a crystal ball. People leave companies and are replaced all the time. Corporate policies change all the time. Insisting some rule is set in stone "forever" is irrational and ignores the basic reality of how businesses work.

It seems unlikely that Didio's firing has nothing to do with the ambitious overhaul that was scuttled when he was out.

The clique reference was a response to your use of the word. I read your posts; I wasn't persuaded by the arguments.

I think we're getting into a pedantic territory on the arguments about preferences. Something that someone believes would be profitable generally fits their personal preference.

It would be dumb for Marvel to do a major event that has permanent changes for short-term reasons.

One guy with a slideshow is not going to be enough to change the permanent status quo of a major franchise.

You're being disingenuous.

I don't believe you would say "I am citing reality how corporations in 21st century United States work. If you want to receive your MBA to better understand my souce of reality, I can point you to some very good programs. I'm sorry reality isn't a good enough answer for you, and you failed to answer if you have ever worked for a corporation, much less held a management posiiton, so you might lack the experience/knowledge to grasp this is indeed reality, but it is reality nonetheless." to someone you just met in person, when talking about Spider-Man. But I could be wrong about that.

At this point the conversation is no longer about Spider-Man. I'm here on the Spider-Man forum to talk about Spider-Man, without snark or rudeness.

This gets messy in that even though we're talking about Spider-Man, we're presumably meant to be taken literally. If someone has a flawed understanding of the business, that is certainly relevant to a response.

I don't think he made the case, but that's a difference question than whether he should be encouraged to try.

[TinkerSpider]

It seems unlikely that Didio's firing has nothing to do with the ambitious overhaul that was scuttled when he was out.

DiDio was fired abruptly. There was no official reason given but credible rumors are it was for fostering an abusive workplace; when media companies get rid of someone that quickly when he was presumably still under contract, it usually does point to an HR issue instead of a performance issue, and the lack of a reason backs that up (media companies usually say "left to pursue other opportunities" when it is a more graceful exit). He was in the middle of writing a miniseries himself. None of the rumors attribute it to Generations; I doubt Pamela Lifford at Warner Bros., who was DiDio's boss, cared much one way or another and left it to the team that remained to decide what to do with it. And DiDio was Generations's champion; when he left, the enthusiasm within DC left.

The clique reference was a response to your use of the word. I read your posts; I wasn't persuaded by the arguments.

Cool. You don't have to be persuaded because it's not really an argument, it's how corporations in the United States in the twenty first century operate.

I think we're getting into a pedantic territory on the arguments about preferences. Something that someone believes would be profitable generally fits their personal preference.

No, that's not how most successfully publicly traded companies work.

The board of directors of publicly traded companies have fiduciary responsibilities to shareholders and investors. Chief among those responsibilities is to enhance shareholder value by increasing the company's worth. That is what drives companies. Period.

If analysis comes back that Disney would make more money by embracing, say, Gay Days at the theme parks which used to be a very unofficial event and one Disney staff turned a blind eye to because condoning it was felt to upset their more traditional, conservative base - then Disney would embrace them and create an entire Pride Month of programming and sell rainbow Mickey merchandise prominently in all their parks. And that is what Disney currently does, because the uplift from attracting new people to the parks and being seen as inclusive is greater than any loss from upset fan, even though there are people at Disney whose personal preference would be not to have official sanctioning.

It has nothing to do with personal preference and execs who rule by personal preference are often out of a job if they don't also align their interests with the market.

If an argument is made that a sales event/promotion/publicity stunt with, say, Florida oranges will bring in additional dollars that can't be ignored, then anyone who says, "I hate oranges, I won't sign off on this" would be heavily side eyed and would probably be eased out of their job sooner rather than later.

That is just how business works.

It would be dumb for Marvel to do a major event that has permanent changes for short-term reasons.

Wall Street is run by short term. The only thing that matters are your quarterly numbers. Is it a great strategy for corporations to mostly worry about their short term numbers? Not really IMO. Is it reality? Yes. Are short term decisions without materially worrying about their long range implications made all the time? Yes.

And does Disney really care? A resounding no. They couldn't care less what happens in the comics, just as Warner Bros. couldn't care less about DC. They just don't want the comics to lose money, they don't want anything that would cause a big #cancel outcry, and they do want to take advantage of any synergies they can.

One guy with a slideshow is not going to be enough to change the permanent status quo of a major franchise.

See, this is where I know we are speaking from two very different experiences, because decks are absolutely the distillation of how corporate decisions are made. I'm simplifying and leaving out a lot of nuance and steps, but a deck is the first stage and the final stage. Disney bought Fox because of a deck. Disney bought Lucasfilm because of a deck. Disney bought Marvel because of a deck.

[Kaitou D. Kid]

And hell, Mary Jane did slip into a flashback in a crucial moment in Zdarsky's Spectacular Spider-Man, during the climax of the Tinkerer's collaboration with alien robots that wanted to annihilate the human race, with Peter remembering what he had to fight for and using that as psychological reinforcement when he was in danger of losing himself mentally.



What possible stories could they tell with Peter that would really necessitate him not being married? The only ones I can think of are generally related to his dating/love/sex life, and in all honestly, while I could take or leave some of them, him playing the field is played out at this point.

Good point. Honestly, as long as you're doing a story set in 616, there is just no believable reason why Peter and MJ would break up. At least not at this point. It wasn't believable in '07 and it still wasn't after Spencer.

Really the only way you can separate them out of the blue is if you ignore continuity, which is an argument that frankly has nothing to do with Peter's love life. At that point, you're arguing for Marvel to reboot Spider-Man after every writer the way DC does... a weird argument given that Marvel always prided itself on its ongoing continuity, including in the Quesada era and current era.

[Lee]

Back when DC Comics were planning on marrying Batman and Catwoman, they had to get approval from Warner Bros/AT&T: https://epicstream.com/article/tom-k...r-a-generation

Disney is very strict about comics of their animation related properties: https://www.comicsbeat.com/big-hero-6-script-change/

Marvel Comics has much more autonomy, but if they wanted to make a big long-term status quo change to their flagship character, then it would have to go up the chain of approval.

[TinkerSpider]

Marvel Comics has much more autonomy, but if they wanted to make a big long-term status quo change to their flagship character, then it would have to go up the chain of approval.

I've repeatedly said Cebulski would probably need to go to Feige, one should always fill in one's boss on one's plans. And Feige might take it to Bergman and/or Chapek and/or whatever sr. execs need to be involved depending on the plans. But going to Feige or Bergman or Chapek for input is very different to "this policy is set in stone there is no one who would never ever never approve it, no one at Marvel, no one at Disney, never ever never" which has always been my point. Glad to see we are closer to agreeing.

[WebLurker]

Some of us are trying to argue that it's not the end of the world, because the marriage content is still coming and we're steadily making more and more progress with it, but it gets put down as not mattering all that much for the most absurd reasons.

Frankly, the editor-in-chief saying "sorry, not happening" kinda disproves there being progress. Where we're at is "616 Spider-Man cannot be married, but the occasional AU story is A-okay." That's literally where we were back in 2007 (maybe minus the brass that really hated it editorializing to us in the comics, but we are getting more Slott Spider-Man and Wells mystery box is a thing, so talk about your deja vu).

Not sure if you saw it, but the fan who asked the question at C2E2 is a regular at the Crawlspace. He wrote a follow up to the response.
https://www.spidermancrawlspace.com/...riage-at-c2e2/

I feel embarrassed to be a marriage fan right now. Fan entitlement always leads to toxic fandom. Always.

Back when DC Comics were planning on marrying Batman and Catwoman, they had to get approval from Warner Bros/AT&T: https://epicstream.com/article/tom-k...r-a-generation

Disney is very strict about comics of their animation related properties: https://www.comicsbeat.com/big-hero-6-script-change/

Marvel Comics has much more autonomy, but if they wanted to make a big long-term status quo change to their flagship character, then it would have to go up the chain of approval.

Maybe that was the source of Slott's infamous "the marriage will never come back and it would be impossible to happen" posts all those years ago? He didn't believe that the people who needed to sign off on it ever would if proposed and that all their successors would follow suite?

[Matt Rat]

Frankly, the editor-in-chief saying "sorry, not happening" kinda disproves there being progress

Cebulski is saying one thing, and the company is publishing another. Creators have lied before about these things at panels. Slott himself on this forum has said 'creators lie'. Quesada lied about not using magic to undo the marriage at one panel also in 2007, right before they did it.

Where we're at is "616 Spider-Man cannot be married, but the occasional AU story is A-okay."

Lost Hunt isn't an AU story.

[Lee]

I feel embarrassed to be a marriage fan right now. Fan entitlement always leads to toxic fandom. Always.

Sadly, that segment of the fan base didn't follow the Spider-Girl fandom's example.

A group of enthusiastic Spider-Girl fans spent years working hard to spread the word and increase sales of their favorite comic. They were smart, organized, ran a positive campaign, and put their money where their mouth was.

As Tom Brevoort once said (regarding Omega Flight): https://tombrevoort.com/2020/12/26/b...st-be-stopped/

Protestors need to take their cues from the SPIDER-GIRL fans. Now, those cats are organized, and intelligent about what they do, and as a result, they’ve saved that title from cancellation on multiple occasions. How do they do it? Simple–they realize what needs to be done to achieve their goal, and they work to get it done. They know that only an upturn in sales can prevent their preferred title from going under, and so they organize, get the word out, buy additional copies and get them into the hands of new readers, people who are most likely to actually be hooked and pick up subsequent issues. They contact the buyers for bookstore chains, and ask them to begin carrying SPIDER-GIRL, both in single issues and in collected form. And they don’t just whine about it, as most of these fan protestors do–they go out there and get the job done. I can tell you for certain, having seen it in action on multiple occasions, that every time those fans become active, we can track an actual increase in SPIDER-GIRL sales–it’s a significant enough increase to show up. And that’s what makes the difference–and what the fans who protested the end of Priest’s BLACK PANTHER or Dan Slott’s THING or any of a dozen other titles didn’t manage to do.

The Spider-Girl fans also organised a "Spider-Girl Media Blitz" campaign: https://www.spider-girl.com/

The idea was to encourage magazines/newspapers to write articles about the comic and its fascinating history while the "Spider-Man 2" movie was a hot topic. They put in a lot of hard work, and a handful of magazines did end up running articles.

They also bought multiple issues of Spider-Girl to donate to children's hospitals, youth groups etc, got an ad in Previews magazine, and so on.

Spider-Girl fans worked all angles.

Unfortunately, there was no such campaign for Renew Your Vows.

Maybe that was the source of Slott's infamous "the marriage will never come back and it would be impossible to happen" posts all those years ago? He didn't believe that the people who needed to sign off on it ever would if proposed and that all their successors would follow suite?

Yeah, he said as much over several posts in that thread.

Some people thanked him for the info, others asked questions about the hows and whys, others told him that he was wrong. The ones who told him he was wrong were all heavily invested in Peter and Mary Jane remarrying.