Legendary Spider-Man artist Todd McFarlane is drawing Spider-Man one more time, only this time it’s on home plate. McFarlane penciled this Spidey home plate and it will be auctioned to raise money for local Arizona charities.
The group organizing the auction is called DBacks Give Back which is associated with the Arizona Diamondbacks baseball team. Since McFarlane left Marvel in 1991 I have only seen him pencil Spider-Man one other time. That was for the Hero Initiative comic on the right. The current bid on the home plate is $825 and I couldn’t find when the auction ends.
Apple Podcasts
Google Podcasts
Spotify
Pandora
Amazon Music
iHeartRadio
Podbean
Amazon Alexa
Player.fm
Listen Notes
Stitcher
Big Al,
McFarlane was the first artist who seemed to turn heads of people I knew who didn’t give a rat’s butt about comics. I was down in Florida for vacation as a kid and I remember seeing people walk by a rack with ‘Spider-Man’ and just sort of stop and stare… Individuals who would normally just walk by and not even notice Spidey off to their left hand side would pause. You could almost see their thoughts: “Hmm. That’s an interesting interpretation of Spider-Man. Cool.”
When I was in middle school, kids who didn’t even read comics would look at his version of Venom and say that it was “cool.” They might not have known the character … but they knew they were looking at the work of a very special artist.
Artist: great
Writer: poor (he only had 15 issues to establish himself but compare those issues to Stan’s first 15 or Roger Sten’s or Micheline’s, there’s just no comparison)
I know he isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and as a technical artist his stuff is far from the best but I still think he draws one of the most recognisable Spider-Mans ever
You have incredible recall. But thanks, anyway. It reminds me of my youth.
He didn’t write any in Amazing, that was all David Micheline writing.
If I recall, his writing run consisted of:
– 5 part Torment story, which was really really bad. DOOM DOOM DOOM! and RISE ABOVE IT ALL! were just as bad as “crazytownbananapants”.
– 2 part Ghost Rider/Demogoblin story with the Christ child. Meh.
– 5 part Wolverine/Wendigo story. Cannibalism in Canada. Ugh.
– 2 part Morbius story
– final issue with X-Force, notable only for Juggernaut knocking over one of the twin towers and laughing as it crashes
His 5-part stories felt like 2-part stories that were realllllllly stretched out. None of the stories felt like “wow, this guy is a great writer, he really knows the character and can write a compelling story!”
But as you say, agree to disagree.
Hornacek, a.) His run was not that bad. We can agree to disagree. Call me when he you find McFarlane issue where “crazytown banana pants” was uttered. And b.) You’ll have to forgive me if I thought he did at least a few issues on the AMS run. I haven’t seriously examined those since I was in middle school, although I’ll flip through them when I go home for family gatherings around the holidays.
I thought his art, especially his Spider-man was too busy and too cartoony.
It’s not like he had this 100 issue run of stories. He only wrote 15 issues. And most of those were either boring or terrible. Torment was 80% DOOM’s.
” I just think he gets poo-pooed on a little too much for his Spidey writing.” (JMH). Agreed. 100%.
@5 Fair and valid points made. I agree he is far from a memorable writer, I just think he gets poo-pooed on a little too much for his Spidey writing. I mean there are clearly many, many other writers that go before him quality wise, but I feel he is leaps and bounds better than most of the Web of Spider-Man 129 issue run. Just my opinion. As a side note, I didn’t experience his run as it happened, I was only five and not reading comics yet, just looking at the purdy pictures. The fact I read those issues later, and during an overall down period of Spidey (the chapter one/next chapter stuff) might be why I don’t find his stories overly offensive.
Can’t come up with more superlatives for Todd as a Spidey artist and as a whole, as a businessman. But if you’re going to praise his writing, you must be wearing some pretty thick rose colored goggles. “Spider-Man” was basically Marvel placating him to stick around since he couldn’t get along with other writers and the entire series read like some kind of awkward writing exercise they make noobs do in one those Gotham writing courses.
But again, one of the best with pencils and ink and the fact that he’s doing this for charity is phenomenal.
I think that Todd was indulging his childhood dream with writing Spider-Man. To be honest, the reason why he wanted to write Spider-Man was to hone his skills for Spawn down the road. Although I wished that he would have used Silver Sable and the Black Widow in the first 5-issues of Spider-Man instead of the Lizard against Sabertooth and Mystique.
Always a favorite artist.
@4 – I was commenting on Douglas Ernst’s claim that MacFarlane knew how to write the Peter/MJ relationship and keep it fresh. He only wrote 15 issues and for most of those Peter and MJ weren’t together (they were married but he was off being Spider-Man – he was in Canada for 5 of those issues). I would say his writing of their relationship was average at best.
He is one of the best to draw the character but as a writer – meh.
To be fair, there are MUCH worse Spider-Man stories than his run on Spider-Man (okay, it’s a bit short to call it a run). Todd however is undoubtedly one of the best artists to draw Spidey, ever. My personal favorite Spidey artist is Mark Bagley, I’m not saying his Spidey is better than Todd’s. Just saying he’s my fave.
@2 “he was one guy who knew how to write a Peter/MJ relationship and keep it fresh.”
Do you mean during his Amazing issues? If so David Micheline wrote those issues.
If you mean his 15 issues of adjective-less Spider-Man issues that he wrote then … huh?
I still remember the first time I saw McFarlane’s Spidey as a kid. It blew me away. I’m sure my jaw dropped at its awesomeness. I had to have it, and I didn’t care how much of a chunk it took out of my $5 per week allowance. Those were the days… And looking back, he was one guy who knew how to write a Peter/MJ relationship and keep it fresh.
Imagine what sales would look like if McFarlane came back and was given total autonomy. A man can dream, can’t he?
Please comeback Mr. Todd, Spidey needs you now more than ever…really, he is the best spidey artist ever…