Amazing spider-man #48 preview

[Kevinroc]

It does seem like it landed for some though, especially when there was another option to explore with his characters.

I definitely understand the appeal of Harry overcoming Norman's abuse. The audience is built to root for the people the protagonist cares about, and Peter cares about Harry.

But this franchise already has a character who overcame their abusive father and became a better person. And that character is MJ.

[Tendrin]

I definitely understand the appeal of Harry overcoming Norman's abuse. The audience is built to root for the people the protagonist cares about, and Peter cares about Harry.

But this franchise already has a character who overcame their abusive father and became a better person. And that character is MJ.

I wasn't aware that there 'could be only one'.

Anyway, Spencer's run spent too much time trying to assert Nick Spencer's preferred status quo for things and making extremely stupid decisions like Norman Osborne making a deal with Mephisto and Harry being a clone. Both of those things only served to undermine both characters, whose falls, faults and successes should belong to no one but themselves. The smarter play, if you absolutely have to involve Mephisto, would have been to suggest that he was the one who helped enhance the Goblin formula *after Norman's death* in a way that allowed him to resurrect, as well as the reason why some people get 'monstrous qualities' from it that did not appear earlier. Giving the Goblin Formula a supernatural push would explain a lot of the later weirdness from its disparate impact. Spencer's what happens when you let your desires status quo lead you by the nose instead of telling a good story that moves the character's forward. 75 issues to ultimately just retcon Sin's Past was stupid.

"In all things, your legacy will propel people towards me, Norman, so *thank you*."

And thanks, folks. Lemme tell you that PTSD is no joke.

[Kevinroc]

I wasn't aware that there 'could be only one'.

Anyway, Spencer's run spent too much time trying to assert Nick Spencer's preferred status quo for things and making extremely stupid decisions like Norman Osborne making a deal with Mephisto and Harry being a clone. Both of those things only served to undermine both characters, whose falls, faults and successes should belong to no one but themselves. The smarter play, if you absolutely have to involve Mephisto, would have been to suggest that he was the one who helped enhance the Goblin formula *after Norman's death* in a way that allowed him to resurrect, as well as the reason why some people get 'monstrous qualities' from it that did not appear earlier. Giving the Goblin Formula a supernatural push would explain a lot of the later weirdness from its disparate impact. Spencer's what happens when you let your desires status quo lead you by the nose instead of telling a good story that moves the character's forward. 75 issues to ultimately just retcon Sin's Past was stupid.

"In all things, your legacy will propel people towards me, Norman, so *thank you*."

And here's where you can see why people have some serious questions about the ending of Spencer's run and to what extent Marvel Editorial intervened. Because Norman making a secret deal with Mephisto has some nice parallels to Peter making his own deal with Mephisto. Except... oh, the comic itself never actually makes that connection.

I wonder why that is.

(And let's not undersell the importance of One More Day. OMD is the foundation of modern Spider-Man comics.)

[Tendrin]

And here's where you can see why people have some serious questions about the ending of Spencer's run and to what extent Marvel Editorial intervened. Because Norman making a secret deal with Mephisto has some nice parallels to Peter making his own deal with Mephisto. Except... oh, the comic itself never actually makes that connection.

I wonder why that is.

(And let's not undersell the importance of One More Day. OMD is the foundation of modern Spider-Man comics.)

Eh, that paralell is not good, IMO, and it makes Norman far less interesting for it. I am aware that people have questions about the end of Spencer's run, but it seems to me that the fault lies with Spencer for playing with this fire in the first place. He had to know.

[Kevinroc]

Eh, that paralell is not good, IMO, and it makes Norman far less interesting for it. I am aware that people have questions about the end of Spencer's run, but it seems to me that the fault lies with Spencer for playing with this fire in the first place. He had to know.

The question is why did Editorial let it get that far that Spencer could outright do the epilogue to OMD and play it as a scene from a horror story?

Dr. Strange outright approaches Mephisto to ask about Peter’s soul only for him to suddenly ask about Harry’s soul. I know we don’t know what exactly happened, but let’s not downplay this.

[TinkerSpider]

The question is why did Editorial let it get that far that Spencer could outright do the epilogue to OMD and play it as a scene from a horror story?

Dr. Strange outright approaches Mephisto to ask about Peter’s soul only for him to suddenly ask about Harry’s soul. I know we don’t know what exactly happened, but let’s not downplay this.

Cebulski outright said at C2E2 a few years ago that they had made “adjustments” to Spencer’s story. He says there was no arm twisting, but then they were working on replacing Spencer at least nine months if not more before his last issue was published - In ASM 75 Lowe said the writers’ room for Beyond had its first meeting (Cebulski was part of that too) in Dec 2020 but Spencer’s last issue didn’t see print until Sept 2021, and they would have had to hear pitches and get people’s schedules cleared long before that. They were brooming Spencer out - Rich Johnson is around here, maybe he can clarify if Spencer was fired because Marvel viewed his deal with Substack as violating his non-compete clause (which couldn’t take place now as the FTC has made non-compete clauses illegal) - and he had to have known it which a) impacts people’s work, there’s a reason why the term “lame duck” exists, also explains why he didn’t object to arm twisting because he had no power b) does a lot to explain that last stretch as his story was being “adjusted” by editorial.