I have to applaud Lowe’s and Wells’s strategy: let’s deliberately thumb our noses at both Mary Jane and Ben Reilly fans simultaneously. I guess they really wanted to test Brevoort’s theory that anger sells comics.
So here’s a strategy: if people are done with this run, write a letter to spideyoffice@marvel.com and let them know why. Keep it unemotional as angry voices get dismissed.
Then don’t talk much about the book much. Negative word of mouth is still word of mouth.
Apathy is what truly kills a run.
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I'm sorry, am I not supposed to approve Janine's actions here? This feels far more cathartic than the contextless off-screen Norman beating they wanted me to enjoy.
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Personally I’d say no considering what a total tool she’s become in this story. She’s basically taken the fact that people aren’t exactly going to be the most welcome to someone convicted of murder and used it as an excuse to hurt others without bothering to even try any other solution than the violent one. The ultimate irony is, while she hates being treated as a villain, she chose to become one rather than prove them wrong. And before anyone says that she’s justified in that, just look at the people she’s against in this story, Spider-Man and the X-Men, individuals who have felt what it’s like to have the people against them and in the case of the X-Men, have those who want nothing more than to exterminate them. But in spite of that, they rose above that and are some of the world’s greatest heroes and those who the archives of history in the MU will remember as such.
She was convicted of killing a man who viciously abused her for years. It was an act of self-defense and her being incarcerated for it was a gross miscarriage of justice. So everybody judging her and having it out for her after being victimized by both her father and the justice system might make her a bit angry at the world. She's still pretty sympathetic in my eyes.
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I was referring more to ASM #18's events, I just... stopped thinking about Dark Web as a continuous story as it doesn't make sense.
And to be fair, if I were in Janine's shoes I wouldn't trust the imperialistic weirdo cult that just gave Madelyne a tap on the back and showed up to threaten her deranged partner either.
She was broken out of jail. She knows that. She knows law enforcement will be looking for her based on that alone. Yet she has done nothing about her situation. She hasn’t tried to find a sympathetic lawyer (and when she went to Mary Jane for help with blowing the whistle on Beyond, that she could have mentioned needing legal help as well; MJ took her to the Bugle and MJ could have easily hooked her up with a Bugle reporter to tell her story and get a sympathetic public ear, both for the earlier miscarriage of justice and the jail break).
But no, Janine went to one diner - without even trying to disguise herself - had one law-abiding citizen doing his civic duty by calling the police, and decided “I AM EEEEEVUL NOW.”
She was sympathetic, but now she’s eye-rolling ridiculous. C’mon, what did she expect? A red carpet for breaking out of jail? And then she didn’t even try to tell Ben the truth and break him out of his psychosis, or look for additional help for him. Again, MJ would have helped her like she did before. She could even have gone to Peter for help.
But noooooooooooo, LEt’s MaKE jaNInE EEEEvuL.
There is zero thought being put into the stories. The only thing that seems to be driving the factory mindlessly spitting out the widgets is “let’s create more costumes and wacky variations so we can sell more action figures.”
Last edited by TinkerSpider; 01-24-2023 at 09:55 PM.
Well, technically? Ben has his speech where he establishes he doesn't really know what he's doing but he does know Norman pranked him, Norman is unfazed despite having just shown regret over clonemancy, Ben blows up the glider, punches Norman some to little reaction and then we cut to Ben doing his best Akuma impression outside Oscorp in ASM #15. Didn't really feel like it happened, not personal enough.
I think it's implied Beyond achieved her release through legal means, then the act got wiped along with everything else. Agreed though.
It feels like such a backwards, out of date mentality, do figures even sell that much?
Last edited by Cloneurosis; 01-24-2023 at 10:08 PM.
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I mean, these are people who forgave Maddie in spite of her unleashing Hell onto New York and gave Maddie what she was after free of charge. If anything, rather than just lashing out at them, it would probably be a lot more reasonable to at least see if these people could help Ben with his problem before going off the rails. More so considering that once they calmed everything down, they’d have all the pieces in place for helping Ben between Peter who has his missing memories and 2 psychics who could link their minds to fix him. At this point, she and Ben are just being stupid for the sake of the plot to happen rather than because it makes sense. And that’s to say nothing of how stupid things got with the new pictures that have been released…
So we don't have room for Ben anymore, but you have room to add a weird cartoony spider-man rip off instead because he's funny?
Bleeding Cool called Rek-Rap a wanker, rofl.
Perfectly put. Rek-rap or whatever he’s called is pure cringe.
I really tried to give Wells a chance (just like I really tried to give Beyond a chance). I’m disappointed the run couldn’t meet the very low bar I set. I might stay on until the mystery of Spidey and his crater is revealed (which is quickly becoming this run’s Kindred, in the sense the more it gets dragged out the more I lose interest) but after that I can’t see myself sticking around.
Bleeding Cool is stating Ben should have been left alone
Kaine fans, count yourselves lucky, this could easily have been him if they wanted Ben to stay a hero. Just imagine if they had decided to keep Ben long-term as Spidey, married Peter off, Ben could have brought Kaine into Beyond and they did THIS to his memory.