The Status Quo

[Kevinroc]

I feel like he still got over it wayyy to quickly. Especially just to jump to how cool they are at the start of Wells' run, it just didn't feel genuine.

Peter feels like a pushover lately. He barely wins fights, he forgives and gives people passes way too easily, he barely feels invested in his romantic relationships, the whole MJ/Paul thing, etc.

That's pretty much this run as a whole. Characters are forced into situations that they would never actually go along with. Everything is rushed to move the plot along.

[Astroman]

I feel like he still got over it wayyy to quickly. Especially just to jump to how cool they are at the start of Wells' run, it just didn't feel genuine.

Peter feels like a pushover lately. He barely wins fights, he forgives and gives people passes way too easily, he barely feels invested in his romantic relationships, the whole MJ/Paul thing, etc.

In some ways, if we suspend disbelief on how badly written the run has been, it almost seems like Peter is becoming more, and more, clinically depressed. It all just doesn't matter to him anymore. (My tongue is somewhat in cheek right now, but I'd give Wells a bit more respect if he was playing with that as a long game for his run).

[Hurricane Billy]

I feel like he still got over it wayyy to quickly. Especially just to jump to how cool they are at the start of Wells' run, it just didn't feel genuine.

Peter feels like a pushover lately. He barely wins fights, he forgives and gives people passes way too easily, he barely feels invested in his romantic relationships, the whole MJ/Paul thing, etc.

I can't speak too confidently on this, as I've only seen bits and chunks of the Wells run from social media and the issue previews, but it honestly feels to me like Wells could potentially get away with an end of series twist that the various Spider-Man-related comics that have come out lately in his run could be retconned out as being an extended non-sensical dream that Peter has been having and that he's still in the middle of that coma he was in during the Beyond event. Stuff like the names of Paul's kids changing abruptly mid-series or Peter claiming he sees MJ as a sister now only to double back around to seeing her in a romantic light or Peter and Felicia starting dating in a healthy way again, only for them to abruptly break up out of nowhere because "they're just going through the motions."

The most obvious evidence running against that is what happened with Kamala Khan and how that branched off to her resurrection storyline elsewhere. Well, that and the more obvious meta fact that it's next to impossible to imagine that a creative team working on Amazing Spider-Man would ever want to retcon out their own work and narrative with something as old as "It was all just a dream."

[Garlador]

I can't speak too confidently on this, as I've only seen bits and chunks of the Wells run from social media and the issue previews, but it honestly feels to me like Wells could potentially get away with an end of series twist that the various Spider-Man-related comics that have come out lately in his run could be retconned out as being an extended non-sensical dream that Peter has been having and that he's still in the middle of that coma he was in during the Beyond event. Stuff like the names of Paul's kids changing abruptly mid-series or Peter claiming he sees MJ as a sister now only to double back around to seeing her in a romantic light or Peter and Felicia starting dating in a healthy way again, only for them to abruptly break up out of nowhere because "they're just going through the motions."

The most obvious evidence running against that is what happened with Kamala Khan and how that branched off to her resurrection storyline elsewhere. Well, that and the more obvious meta fact that it's next to impossible to imagine that a creative team working on Amazing Spider-Man would ever want to retcon out their own work and narrative with something as old as "It was all just a dream."

If it was good enough for Stan Lee himself…

[Tuck]

Well, that and the more obvious meta fact that it's next to impossible to imagine that a creative team working on Amazing Spider-Man would ever want to retcon out their own work and narrative with something as old as "It was all just a dream."

No creator is going to end their run by saying that none of it counted.

(I know Wells has said he expects his run to be disregarded by later creators, but I think that's just more an acknowledgement of how comics work. And maybe his own approach to the run. That attitude does free him up to experiment as much as he wants . . . or is allowed.)

[Hurricane Billy]

If it was good enough for Stan Lee himself…

I mean, like Tuck already said, I doubt it'll actually happen that way.

But I hadn't realized that Stan Lee had reintegrated the marriage back into his newspaper comic in that way!

[godisawesome]

No creator is going to end their run by saying that none of it counted.

(I know Wells has said he expects his run to be disregarded by later creators, but I think that's just more an acknowledgement of how comics work. And maybe his own approach to the run. That attitude does free him up to experiment as much as he wants . . . or is allowed.)

I think it also frees him up/restricts him (depending on how you view it) to undercook and skip past most of the "how" and "why" in his storytelling in a way that discourages even an organic kind of "leaving his mark on the mythos."

His experimentation may have a great breadth, but almost no depth, even compared to "safer," non-experimental storytelling; I'd argue his execution becomes less ambitious, more rushed, and less impactful the more ambitious his concept is.

*That* is a unique approach to Spider-Man, and resembles more the "Superdickery" of DC's Silver Age than comic writing since the 80's, when "causality" was emphasized as part of the Bronze Age heralded, ironically, by how well it was working in Spider-Man.

It's kind of a "retrograde" view of how comics work, even compared to other OMD comics (though perhaps only in how "purified" it is on their goal), and I'd argue is singular for how remarkable unexperimental and unambitious it is in the technical areas that comics had been previously copying Spider-Man for.

[The_Sneezing_Stormtrooper]

In some ways, if we suspend disbelief on how badly written the run has been, it almost seems like Peter is becoming more, and more, clinically depressed. It all just doesn't matter to him anymore. (My tongue is somewhat in cheek right now, but I'd give Wells a bit more respect if he was playing with that as a long game for his run).

This is ironically the best defense of this run that I've seen on this forum lol

[Mister Mets]

But we've seen how Peter feels about Norman tons of times.

Even in Spencer's run he barely wanted to waste time humoring Sinless Norman. While Wells is writing it like they've always been way closer than they've ever been in the comics.

Although this does remind me of how Slott wrote him as being wayyyy too forgiving when it came to Otto post-Superior.

Wells has written an evolving relationship. It was different in the flashbacks and we see Peter's growth on something that makes him uncomfortable.

[TinkerSpider]

Wells has written an evolving relationship. It was different in the flashbacks and we see Peter's growth on something that makes him uncomfortable.

Peter shoving Norman into a wall at Aunt May’s (so much for keeping your secret identity from her, Pete) and then after throwing irrational, nonsensical tantrums at the FF and Cap, deciding in what would have been less than two hours later in real time that Norman is the only one he can trust is not an evolving relationship. On the contrary.

[Lifetap]

I think one of the bigger issues with the status quo right now is basically that there is not much going on in Peter's life that can be seen as any sort of positive.

We have Norman getting his sins back without anyone knowing which could potentially set up a run defining backstab in the near future, but I just don't see anything that would be interesting to do with it, but maybe I am missing something.

[Alan2099]

We have Norman getting his sins back without anyone knowing which could potentially set up a run defining backstab in the near future, but I just don't see anything that would be interesting to do with it, but maybe I am missing something.

Didn't like Norman supplying him with new tech I take it?

[Frontier]

Didn't like Norman supplying him with new tech I take it?

I keep forgetting he even has a new suit, to be honest.

[exile001]

No creator is going to end their run by saying that none of it counted.

Soule just did that* with his Daredevil run. It was a pretty clever twist.

*it was debatable how much was not real, but Zdarsky using Blindspot proves much of it is.

[Kevinroc]

No creator is going to end their run by saying that none of it counted.

That's how Fraction's Defenders ended.