Spidey Gets Infested

42 Comments

1. The last time they said something like “Talking about it for years to come” they gave use One More Day and One Moment In Time, and to their credit, folks have sure been talking about it years after the fact. (And that worries me even more).

2. @31

   And how would you know this? By spending all your time tracking them down so you can talk about it?

3. Looks interesting. I’m invested in Infested! ^_^

4. #31

   …Batman

5. @14

   You’re thinking too far back… I was talking about all the event hyping YOU GUYS are doing.

6. I challenge Mr Wacker to use the word ‘adumbrations’ once more in his lifetime! I’m still working on my first time.

7. If “Spider-Island” turns out to be everyone on Manhattan getting spider powers, it will be the stupidest thing Slott, Wacker and co. have ever done. Not because of the story itself, but because it means they let a far superior name for the event slip through their fingers–“Spider-Manhattan!”

8. SW: What is called event now used to be called “your hero’s next multi-ish adventure!” It’s just semantics (and it doesn’t bother me at all).

   It’s making Bizard blow a gasket that got me riled.

9. Plus, Fred has proof that I was responsible for the Bay of Pigs and the Gulf of Tonkin incident. The truth is out there!!

10. “Please don’t make it seem like everyone on this site is out to get you and Marvel.”

    If Steve did not play that, he would not have an excuse to bash this site and the moderators. Notice that he does not comment on the positive reviews and comments but attacks this site over the negative ones. Steve disrespecting of Kevin while he was only trying to have a conversation with him is proof positive of what he really thinks about the moderators and this site.

11. Well shoot, then I won’t tell you that I’m reading X-Men digitals right now, but hey… at least it’s still Marvel.

    Good point about undercutting the LCSs and other retailers, I for one would keep supporthing them both but I know not everyone would do the same and just go the cheaper route. I see 99 cent digital comics as just something I would pick up that I normally wouldn’t care for… all my Spidey and X-Men comics would still be the hardcopy purchases.

12. Ill pass it on, but I know there’s a lot of thought put into the digital side of the business…in particular we want to take care of our retail store partners and not undecut them.

    And, ye, passion is a good thing. I know when people are spending this much energy debating Spidey it means they aren’t spending that time thinking about other comics.

13. Fair enough, I guess I just turn a deaf ear to some of the more negative stuff said around here, but if I was someone who actually has something invested in the character and story, I may not as easily look it over. The site definitely gets passionate to say the least I guess, which I think is a good thing and shows just how much we all care about Spidey. Hopefully you mean entertaining as in ‘enjoyable to visit’ and not entertaining as in ‘what a joke’

    I’m off to read some digital comics now… SW, if you could somehow convince the powers to be at Marvel to synch up their Marvel digital comics subscription with the iPhone app, I’d greatly appreciate it. Also… 1.99 or more for a digital comic is pretty ridiculous… if they could knock the digital prices down to like .99 cents, like individual songs, I think there’d be a lot more splurging to buy comics that way, at least for me. Just my two cents on the digital comics age.

14. #25-I know ypuretrting to be even handed, but I don’t think this site is all negative by a long shot.

    Sometimes the moderators have some incorrect views on the relative success on the book…and are sometimes very indulgent of people who jump to some harsh conclusions about the creative team and the stories. It tends to read like truth to someone like Fred, but que sera.

    I love the site though overall though. It’s very entertaining.

15. Also just curious…which site has the “dishonest” opinions youn seem concerned about?

16. @Fred, I certainly respect your opinion and view point on the issues. It’s just that for Spidey’s sake, and his fans, I hope you get proven wrong. My intent was not to say that Dan Slott knows better than any of his fans, just that he has proven himself (at least in Marvel’s eyes) as a capable enough story teller to be trusted with Spidey’s flagship title. Everybody thinks they know what’s best for Spidey because we all care about him, unfortunately, not all of us can have a say in which direction the character goes. I don’t understand why the decline in readership should have an effect on the promotion of the book. If anything, the fact that the readership is declining means that they should try to promote it more. Not promoting a title that is struggling would just doom it to more failure by not getting it out to the public and reaching those who may in fact find these storylines interesting.

    @Steve – While I understand that you feel Spidey and your team is consistently attacked here, I don’t think it’s fair of you to make it seem like all this site does is bash Spider-Man. Again, that is just one reviewers opinion, and if you focused on reading some of the comments, you’d see that not everyone on this site agrees with those reviews you have a problem with. Not only that, there are other reviewers (shameless self plugging) who have favorable and optimistic things to say about Spider-Mans future, in and out of the Amazing title, yet you never want to comment on those. Please don’t make it seem like everyone on this site is out to get you and Marvel.

17. Honest doesn’t necessarily mean correct. Though I understand how some here may need the book to be doing horribly to fit their hypotheses.

18. “If nothing else Fred certainly believes what he reads here.”

    At least on this site, you get honest opinions and views.

19. If nothing else Fred certainly believes what he reads here.

    SW

20. “I think if you give Dan a chance to continue fleshing out his story we could see something cool come of it.”

    I respect your opinion but for me, i don’t see a pay off here at all. Just inconsistent writing and characterization from Slott.

    There’s a reason he’s writing these stories, and we’re all here just commenting on them on a message board like we know better.”

    All because a writer is on the book does not mean that he knows better than the audience. We do have a right to express our opinions on whether we like something or not that the writer has done with the book.

    “It’s a business and this is one of their prime titles.”

    A prime title that has lost half its readership. That’s why there are promoting the hell out of it with variants and events like never before. All books do it but i have not seen an real increase in readership when it happens with this book. It jumps up a little and then back down and the increased have been getting smaller and smaller.

21. @Rick Lee James… I actually agree and had posted a comment earlier about my theory on what is happening in Amazing Spider-Man and where it is going. I’ve been tempted to write an editorial about that theory. I don’t remember who pointed it out on the podcast while they were covering the OMIT stories, but you and they are right when you say that making a deal with Mephisto is letting the bad guy win and as long as this storyline continues, the bad guy will be continually triumphant. I think there are ways that they can write around this and make things right. I mean look at how many people they’ve been killing off and Spidey hasn’t shown one iota of regret for any of them it seems. That’s not the Spidey we know. I think there’s a lot more going on then we are giving them credit for. Yeah, the stories seem bad and Peter is acting out of character, but maybe that’s the point. Who knows.

    @Fred… I think you and several others continue to be too hard on Dan Slott. This is the end of his second story arc as the solo writer and they have been alright, at least in my opinion. Nothing to write home about, but decent stories that could have an impact later on down the line. I think if you give Dan a chance to continue fleshing out his story we could see something cool come of it. Let’s not discount the fact that he is writing possibly one of the most heavily scrutinized books in comics right now with out controversial pidey’s status quo is. There’s a reason he’s writing these stories, and we’re all here just commenting on them on a message board like we know better.

    And as far as how much Marvel is promoting this book. Why wouldn’t they? It’s a business and this is one of their prime titles. What do you expect them to do about it?

22. “Since this leads into Spider-Man #666 maybe they will actually deal with the Mephisto story of how Spider-Man could actually never make a deal with the devil because he is a Super Hero and not a pansy who needs his (mommy) aunt more than his wife. Maybe this will all be a trick of the devil and Brand New Day was all a bad illusion or dream. If only. ”

    Not going to happen, especially with the people in charged of Marvel right now. They are still looking for that elusive new market of readers that has not shown up yet. That’s why you see them promoting this book to the hill with variant covers and hyped up events to try cover up the fact that the book has lost half of its readership and is still losing readers. Even the variant covers and hyped up events are not attracting many readers to this book anymore.

    “With that said, Slott is doing a great job I think. It’s tough to be handed a stinking pile of crap and make it smell good but he seems to have done that with Big Time in my opinion.”

    I have to respectfully disagree with you there. I think Slott stuff is much worse. At least you can partially blame for how bad BND was for the rotating set of writers who could not even stick to their own continuity. Slott is doing this by himself now and he can’t even stick to some of the continuity he created for the book.

23. Looks like all the teams spider-man is on are down and out. I bet this ties into the image we saw earlier of Mary Jane with spider like powers.
    Looking forward to it.

24. Sorry, phone predictive text – should say Rick *blush*

25. Yeah Fuck, I agree. Slott’s knocking it out the park lately in my opinion. Good job to you too Wacker.

26. Since this leads into Spider-Man #666 maybe they will actually deal with the Mephisto story of how Spider-Man could actually never make a deal with the devil because he is a Super Hero and not a pansy who needs his (mommy) aunt more than his wife. Maybe this will all be a trick of the devil and Brand New Day was all a bad illusion or dream. If only.

    With that said, Slott is doing a great job I think. It’s tough to be handed a stinking pile of crap and make it smell good but he seems to have done that with Big Time in my opinion.

27. Do you remember Marvel ever hyping Spider-Man in the good old days?

28. I bet you don’t.

29. I certainly don’t remember Marvel ever hyping their stories in the past.

30. Enigma_20099, it’s hard to sell a comic if the tagline is, “Not as big or interesting as that last event!”

31. I’m beginning to see why people are usually lukewarm to these event thingies…

    And wasn’t the last event he was involved in considered the biggest?

32. Spider Island = Manhattan? Every normal person in Manhattan somehow gets Spidey powers?

33. What can we do to stop this travesty, though?

34. “I think we can all agree that this is going to be the worst thing since the last thing.”

    You got that right.

35. Ha

36. I think we can all agree that this is going to be the worst thing since the last thing.

37. I’d be lying if I said I cared. If this description were any more forced, they’d say “Get ready for an action-packed thrill ride!”

38. Spider Island? I am … what’s the opposite of “cautiously optimistic”? Pessimistically cautious?

39. I have a theory where the amazing storyline is going and this could fit into it pretty well. If he’s forced to create some spidey devices to help him without the spidey sense, perhaps his technology gets stolen and used to create this spider island. I may need to elaborate my theory in a separate post

40. Are we going to be “talking about it for years to come…” because it’s going to be so bad it’ll make the Clone Saga look like a classic? I know, I know, I’m a cynical old fool who yearns for the Roger Stern years, but you guys have to admit, since JMS left the writing chores to lesser talents, Spidey’s star is more than a little tarnished.

41. Hmmm seems to be a lot of Spider-men types there, more clone business?

42. Spider totem perhaps? I kinda hope so.