I have no problem with him having kids (and when he does, I hope they give him more than one, one is such a cop out), but I'm also in no hurry. Just give him a few years alone with his wife first in my mind.
Ah right I rmember that hook. i meant to read Lost Years but it looks like I missed it somehow. Might not have been able to find it back in the day. I wish I could defend ol' Jessica, but I can't remember anything from that run except I liked it in general and thought the Mysterio story was especially good.
Romita said they didn't get Stan's permission, so if you want to believe his whole story, you should believe that too. But you've also got Conway bashing Gwen as terrible and boring every time he brings it up and saying that it was his idea and Stan approved it. My thought is that some people misremembered. And while Stan Lee had his own issues, many of them were later in life. As memory loss often works like that. People can remember stuff from fifty years ago easily but stuff they take in from the past ten years is easily forgotten. But anyway, I think it's most likely that the most commonalities suggest what happened. ie. Romita wanted to kill a character, it was Conway's idea to kill Gwen, and Stan didn't know about it.
Good Marvel characters- Bring Them Back!!!
Conway also got a lot of crap from people for decades so he might be a little bitter about all of this. Particularly after Stan metaphorically threw him under the bus.
I think, taking the Rashomon effect into account, that we will never fully know what happened, but I think you might be bringing your own assumptions into your thoughts on what happened. The truth is Romita said Gwen was his favorite, and he still agreed with killing her. And they still needed approval from the editor (Roy Thomas).
https://www.looper.com/1295560/spide...d-follow-suit/
LOOPER going in HARD, and basically expressing concisely how I feel. I honestly think the high of Spider-Verse right now is showing just how deep the gulf is between Marvel editorial’s mishandling and fans’ desires.
The more publications call them out, the more likely they’ll switch gears.
Stan was always notoriously full of s**t. He was half-creative genius and half-snake oil salesman. You should never take anything he said as 100% truth.
Honestly, it was always a large part of what made him such a loveable character! But also why he fell out of so many co-creatives (or, in Ditko's case, demanded full creative credit of Spidey until the 00's!).
"Has Sariel summoned you here, Azrael? Have you come to witness the miracle of your brethren arriving on Earth?"
"I WILL MIX THE ASHES OF YOUR BONES WITH SALT AND USE THEM TO ENSURE THE EARTH THE TEMPLARS TILLED NEVER BEARS FRUIT AGAIN!"
"*sigh* I hoped it was for the miracle."
Dan Watters' Azrael was incredible, a constant delight and perhaps too good for this world (but not the Forth). For the love of St. Dumas, DC, give us more!!!
Here's another interview. https://www.twomorrows.com/alterego/.../09romita.html
Romita believes it was Conway's idea to kill Aunt May but isn't sure. Both take credit for the choice of Gwen Stacy. So perhaps it was neither of them that suggested May and both agreed that Gwen should ultimately be the one. Or maybe they're both right and flip flopped on the idea at different times. ie: Conway thought to kill May, Romita half-heartedly suggested Gwen instead, Conway loved the idea and pushed for it, etc. Regardless, they were both in favor of the decision.Somebody - maybe it was Gerry Conway, who was writing the book then - suggested we should kill off Aunt May. Gil Kane was penciling Spider-Man then, but I was still supposed to keep an eye on it, and Gerry and I would talk over plots. I didn't feel Aunt May's death would make much of an impact. To do that, we had to kill off one of the main girls, and Gwen was the one Peter was in love with. Mary Jane wouldn't have meant as much; she was going with somebody else
Also, this is what Roy Thomas says in that same interview and Romita doesn't disagree:
So that's at least 2 people (including editor) corroborating that Stan did know.As editor-in-chief at the time, I know that Stan, at least verbally, "signed off" on the idea of Gwen's death at some early stage. Like I once said about you, Gerry, and me: None of our mothers raised any sons stupid enough to kill off Gwen Stacy while Stan Lee was out of town and present him with a fait accompli! [laughs]
In the interview you cited previously, Romita says Stan accused them of doing it "behind his back" and wanted her brought back (which I believe Conway has said was the reason for the Clone Saga.) Maybe Stan forgot he approved. Or maybe Stan just pivoted when readers got upset about it. Regardless, Stan never pressed them to use Gwen after that and did not use Gwen himself when he wrote his newspaper strip only a couple years later.
Last edited by Spider-Tiger; 06-02-2023 at 08:50 AM.
I find it hard to imagine Stan Lee knowingly approved when all of these guys and the man himself said that he based her on his wife more than any other character.
Good Marvel characters- Bring Them Back!!!
Well clearly Stan Lee can separate fiction and real life.