Any direction to improve Amazing Spider-Man comic?

[primenumber101]

Have the OMD deal be revealed, but only to Peter. As a result, he becomes riddled with guilt and tries to be an even greater hero to make up for what he inadvertently did. He takes bigger risks than ever eventually getting temporarily crippled and nearly killed. He is then forced to take on the Iron Spider identity so he can use the suit until his body heals, which brings him into contact once more with his lost love. Mary Jane is there for him during his recovery but he can not bring himself to tell her what has caused his recklessness. In a long story arc involving many past supporting cast members, Peter and MJ slowly find their way back together. The arc ends when Peter uncovers and foils a plot by Mephisto to conquer Earth using Parker Industries, which was Mephisto's true plan all along. At least that is what I would do.

The icing on the cake. When Big Red is badly beating Spider-Man the demon lord offers Peter another deal to save himself and his loved ones if he becomes Mephisto's servant. Peter rejects the deal. Peter then pulls out a victory, thus fully redeeming himself -

"I'd rather die a hero than live as a stooge," Peter tells Mephisto.

No major events after he dons the Iron Spider suit until the battle with Mephisto, rather just good solid storytelling.

Very Interesting idea. I do thinking there might building up something since in Spider-Man/Deadpool, Mephisto had been mentioned three times in the series and
Peter seems haunted by his encounter with him,.

[Inversed]

I'm not completely familiar or a hundred percent certain about this, so if I'm wrong please correct me, but isn't Renew Your Vows just a universe where OMD never happened? So that's basically the closest thing to them fixing the retcon, which I think is probably the best thing they could do, instead of having to go back and reboot another 10 years of the regular ASM book.

[WebLurker]

I'm not completely familiar or a hundred percent certain about this, so if I'm wrong please correct me, but isn't Renew Your Vows just a universe where OMD never happened? So that's basically the closest thing to them fixing the retcon, which I think is probably the best thing they could do, instead of having to go back and reboot another 10 years of the regular ASM book.

Sort-of. OMD never did happen (both the original mini series and the regular series state that Aunt May died sometime prior and Peter didn't go off the deep end over it). However, the divergence point is a lot earlier than OMD itself. According to author Gerry Conway, by the time that the series starts, Peter and MJ have been married for about ten years, and Annie was born two years after their marriage. That means that pretty much all of the ASM stuff from the '90s onward didn't happen. (Conway has also suggested that the first Civil War was also a no-go). So, for all practical purposes, you stop reading ASM after the wedding and then switch to RYV.

(RYV's continuity is a little messy, since the original miniseries is assumed to have happened in broad strokes, but a lot of details are different. Case in point, the X-Men were killed off to a man in the miniseries, but in the ongoing they're going to guest-star in a few issues. The official explanation seems to be that the ongoing represents the original timeline of the RYV universe, where Regent tried to take over and was stopped by the Parkers. The incursions from Secret Wars that created Battleworld altered the timeline, so that Regent's rise to power and downfall still happened, but with differences. When Battleworld was taken apart and the multiverse fixed, the Secret Wars RYV timeline was erased and the original one was restored, which is where the ongoing series picks up. So, basically, we don't have the "original timeline" version of the RYV miniseries, since we can infer the details from the Secret Wars timeline mini.

Your head hurt yet?)

Also, since RYV is more like Spider-Man meets The Incredibles, with MJ and Annie joining Peter, I could see some fans wanting a series where Peter and MJ are married, but MJ is not a superhero, or one that includes more the pre-OMD continuity. (I've found that Ultimate Spider-Man is a "close enough" set-up if you want to see Peter and MJ in a committed relationship, personally.) That said, I do like that RYV is isolated from the main series, since, like you did point out, it won't be retconned down the line, since the marriage is baked into the premise. I still think OMD and the subsequent status quo was an asinine idea, but I'm more interested in RYV staying around. After all, I won't be buying ASM, so it's kind of irrelevant what it does.

[Shirayuki]

I feel that the main problem with the book now is that Spider-Man isn't doing Spider-Man things in favor of fighting global threats and stuff involving his company. He needs to go back to patrolling New York.

While I love Renew Your Vows, I don't think the lack of a marriage is a problem(though it would probably bring people to the book), and if they did I think it would be better to have that as one book and give Peter a solo one to go along with it.

[Inversed]

Sort-of. OMD never did happen (both the original mini series and the regular series state that Aunt May died sometime prior and Peter didn't go off the deep end over it). However, the divergence point is a lot earlier than OMD itself. According to author Gerry Conway, by the time that the series starts, Peter and MJ have been married for about ten years, and Annie was born two years after their marriage. That means that pretty much all of the ASM stuff from the '90s onward didn't happen. (Conway has also suggested that the first Civil War was also a no-go). So, for all practical purposes, you stop reading ASM after the wedding and then switch to RYV.

(RYV's continuity is a little messy, since the original miniseries is assumed to have happened in broad strokes, but a lot of details are different. Case in point, the X-Men were killed off to a man in the miniseries, but in the ongoing they're going to guest-star in a few issues. The official explanation seems to be that the ongoing represents the original timeline of the RYV universe, where Regent tried to take over and was stopped by the Parkers. The incursions from Secret Wars that created Battleworld altered the timeline, so that Regent's rise to power and downfall still happened, but with differences. When Battleworld was taken apart and the multiverse fixed, the Secret Wars RYV timeline was erased and the original one was restored, which is where the ongoing series picks up. So, basically, we don't have the "original timeline" version of the RYV miniseries, since we can infer the details from the Secret Wars timeline mini.

Your head hurt yet?)

Also, since RYV is more like Spider-Man meets The Incredibles, with MJ and Annie joining Peter, I could see some fans wanting a series where Peter and MJ are married, but MJ is not a superhero, or one that includes more the pre-OMD continuity. (I've found that Ultimate Spider-Man is a "close enough" set-up if you want to see Peter and MJ in a committed relationship, personally.) That said, I do like that RYV is isolated from the main series, since, like you did point out, it won't be retconned down the line, since the marriage is baked into the premise. I still think OMD and the subsequent status quo was an asinine idea, but I'm more interested in RYV staying around. After all, I won't be buying ASM, so it's kind of irrelevant what it does.

Yeah, I see what you're going for, that does make sense when you say it all like that (as best as you can when it's so confusing). I do know it originally started from a Battleworld mini-series, so that probably complicated things more. It's still a really cool sounding idea, and all the snippets I've read from the first 3 issues I really enjoyed, so I gotta go read it all.

I feel that the main problem with the book now is that Spider-Man isn't doing Spider-Man things in favor of fighting global threats and stuff involving his company. He needs to go back to patrolling New York.

While I love Renew Your Vows, I don't think the lack of a marriage is a problem(though it would probably bring people to the book), and if they did I think it would be better to have that as one book and give Peter a solo one to go along with it.

I actually like the idea of Peter travelling around the world with those global threats, probably because there's already so many people doing stuff in New York, including another Spider-Man, so I feel letting Peter do all this gives him something new and different to distinguish from the rest. Plus it lets Parker Industries stay relevant, which I still believe is a good concept.

[Hypestyle]

... I swear that if they do some storyline where crooked accountants pull an Enron and Parker industries comes crashing down, along with Peter's reputation... sigh, never mind..

[TheCape]

As much as i wish for OMD being erased and the marriage restored, i'm not naive enought to think than that would fix the book, so we would need more than that.

First Slott has to go, i know that he loves the charather, i respect him as a creator and as a writer, but he has overstayed his welcome, his work has run dry (Dan that Silver Sufer book looks like is doing pretty well, maybe you should focus all your attention in that one). Much like Micheline on AMS back in the 90s.

Put a writer that knows and respect the charather in the main Spider-Man book, PAD, Soule and Weisman are the better options, bring the supporting cast back, give Peter a new and stable job that isn't Parker Industries (not photographer either, that idea has run dry too), with more 2 to 3 issues storyarcs.

Also kill Harry or Norman, one of those 2 has to bite the dust, the dynamic just don't work when boths are alive.

[Celgress]

.....While I love Renew Your Vows, I don't think the lack of a marriage is a problem(though it would probably bring people to the book), and if they did I think it would be better to have that as one book and give Peter a solo one to go along with it.

I agree. The worst problem by far is the lack of classic setting, long time supporting characters and general tone aka everything that made Spider-Man well Spider-Man.

[Metamorphosis]

You can choose to cry about OMD forever, and chances are you probably will, but most fans have-

Yeah, just stop right there. You don't get to speak for "most fans".

Alternate universe or not, if the sales for RYV were through the roof, Marvel would take notice. But if it's just a good, solid seller, then they'll think that marriage fans are a niche audience.

If you could look outside your obvious bias, you'd realize that something like OMD was a rather pointless "hail mary"-type play for a series that didn't really need it at the time. The JMS / PAD / RAS runs were as strong as the main book and satellite titles had been in more than a decade.

And if they really wanted to match an unmarried Peter comic against a married one, they would've launched something like Renew Your Vows right alongside Brand New Day and let the fans actually decide which they wanted to buy. But they didn't. So it's not like there was much of a fan choice in the matter.

Marvel's whole line is performing somewhat poorly, so much so that an alt-U series like RYV as an ongoing isn't going to fare as well. They also waited over a year to launch the ongoing after Secret Wars, so they lost out on some momentum there.

We needn't play to overinflated sales stats wars, though. ASM is the only "in-universe" ongoing with Peter Parker, so of course that's going to come out on top.

Mark my words though, OMD will be undone someday.

[Shirayuki]

Yeah, just stop right there. You don't get to speak for "most fans".



If you could look outside your obvious bias, you'd realize that something like OMD was a rather pointless "hail mary"-type play for a series that didn't really need it at the time. The JMS / PAD / RAS runs were as strong as the main book and satellite titles had been in more than a decade.

And if they really wanted to match an unmarried Peter comic against a married one, they would've launched something like Renew Your Vows right alongside Brand New Day and let the fans actually decide which they wanted to buy. But they didn't. So it's not like there was much of a fan choice in the matter.

Marvel's whole line is performing somewhat poorly, so much so that an alt-U series like RYV as an ongoing isn't going to fare as well. They also waited over a year to launch the ongoing after Secret Wars, so they lost out on some momentum there.

We needn't play to overinflated sales stats wars, though. ASM is the only "in-universe" ongoing with Peter Parker, so of course that's going to come out on top.

Mark my words though, OMD will be undone someday.

OMD got a lot of new people including myself to check out the book so I wouldn't necessarily say it was pointless.

With Renew Your Vows I think the fact that fans are higher on it than the main ASM book is what Marvel would be looking at rather than sales if they wanted to bring the marriage back.

[primenumber101]

I agree. The worst problem by far is the lack of classic setting, long time supporting characters and general tone aka everything that made Spider-Man well Spider-Man.

I agree too. I think the biggest problem within current ASM is too much changed setting. I actually remember one of the retrospective video from YouTube said that strength of the story of Spider-Man comes from Peter Parker interacting with daily social life and people and tries to dealing with them while also dealing with super villains.

I think the reason why RYV is better received that current ASM, other than return of the marriage and being the brand new series, is that RYV also shows return of Spider-Man's basic setting, where Peter just dealing with everyday normal life in street setting while dealing with villains as well.

[Metamorphosis]

OMD got a lot of new people including myself to check out the book so I wouldn't necessarily say it was pointless.

That's fair, and perhaps pointless was a poor choice of words on my part.

So I view the move Marvel made as unnecessary, and when I go back and read the era that proceeded "OMD / BND", I personally find it better in just about every way to what has come after.

[John Ossie]

As much as i wish for OMD being erased and the marriage restored, i'm not naive enought to think than that would fix the book, so we would need more than that.

First Slott has to go, i know that he loves the charather, i respect him as a creator and as a writer, but he has overstayed his welcome, his work has run dry (Dan that Silver Sufer book looks like is doing pretty well, maybe you should focus all your attention in that one). Much like Micheline on AMS back in the 90s.

Put a writer that knows and respect the charather in the main Spider-Man book, PAD, Soule and Weisman are the better options, bring the supporting cast back, give Peter a new and stable job that isn't Parker Industries (not photographer either, that idea has run dry too), with more 2 to 3 issues storyarcs.

Also kill Harry or Norman, one of those 2 has to bite the dust, the dynamic just don't work when boths are alive.

I definitely agree that Dan Slott needs to go, I do personally feel that his best work has been done on ASM already and it's gotten stale, particularly post-Secret Wars. I too, would like to see OMD reversed or fixed or whatever you want to call it, and I also agree that there are things that need to be fixed outside of OMD.

[Sardorim]

Bring back Anya.

That is all.

[suemorphplus209]

Just get working in NYC, and keep the story arcs shorter. Get someone other than Slott if he can't keep them short.