Underrated or Overrated: “Peter Parker, Paparazzi”

Welcome back to UNDERRATED OR OVERRATED, where I take a look at polarizing Spider-Man stories and decide if they either deserve the praise or scorn that different parts of the fandom tend to heap on them.

Today we will be examining Peter Parker, Paparazzi from AMAZING SPIDER-MAN vol. 1 #559-561 by Dan Slott and Marcos Martin from 2008.

When it comes to divisiveness in the Spider-Man fandom, is there any writer more polarizing than Dan Slott?

Fans either seem to consider him one of the best Spidey writers of all time or one of the worst. A highly creative talent who truly understands the character or a total hack who doesn’t understand the character in the slightest. There rarely ever seems to be a middle ground on Mr. Slott; you either love him or hate him. I’ll save my personal opinion on his writing until the end of the article. But with a writer so polarizing and the fact that he has an entire decade worth of Spider-Man comics to choose from, I figured reviewing one of his stories would be perfect for a series like this.

So we’re going to be taking a look at one of Slott’s earliest and most divisive works: Peter Parker, Paparazzi. To make matters even more interesting, the story in question takes place during Brand New Day; one of the most hotly debated eras in Spider-Man history.

Some consider Peter Parker, Paparazzi to be a fun tale reminiscent of the classic Stan Lee/Steve Ditko days, while others consider it to be an overly-nostalgic dud that misrepresents the character. Let’s dig in and decide for ourselves!

Our story begins with the wall-crawler himself in hot pursuit of a new antagonist called “Screwball”.

If you think Spidey’s description of Screwball makes the character sound lame, it’s because…she pretty much is. Screwball is merely one of many forgettable villains introduced during Brand New Day.

Regardless, the chase does not go well for Spidey.

It looks pretty bad when our supposed “hero” can’t even apprehend a publicity hound whose only real skill is parkour.

Either way, the situation resolves itself when Screwball turns herself over to the police to avoid the “Spider-Tracer Killer”.

Afterward, Peter Parker heads over to the Daily Bugle…I mean, the DB to cash his pictures into J. Jonah Jameson…I mean, Dexter Bennett.

During this period, the Daily Bugle was sold off to a weaselly millionaire named Dexter Bennett and transformed into a tabloid rag. Instead of being an interesting change, this ended up falling completely flat and fading into obscurity after less than three years. It’s easy to see why because Peter working for the tabloids full time doesn’t fit his character and Dexter Bennett cannot hold a candle to the charisma and entertainment of J. Jonah Jameson. Just one of many weak additions that didn’t stick from the Brand New Day era.

Moving on, Bennett decides to give Peter a special assignment…and by “special”, I mean he wants him to join the paparazzi and hound a popular film actor named Bobby Carr.

Despite going against Peter’s principles, he finds the offered two million dollars too enticing to ignore and accepts the assignment.

Finding the security to be too tight, Peter uses his powers to sneak in and catches Carr in the act…namely him being very rude to a waitress.

However, Carr spots Peter and sends his security team after him.

It’s a little difficult to root for our protagonist when he’s clearly in the wrong, but I think that’s the point, so I’ll reserve full judgement for later. But for now, I can’t say I’m too fond of Peter’s portrayal here.

While evading security, Peter ends up running into Harry Osborn and his then-girlfriend Lilly Hollister. Harry steps in to try and help Peter, but changes his mind after discovering his best friend has become a paparazzo.

Peter should probably take this as a sign that he has chosen a poor career path, but he doesn’t.

But as Peter exits the alley, a mysterious figure appears.

Meet our antagonist: Paper Doll. As you can see, she has quite the fixation on Bobby Carr.

Back at the DB, Bennett is ecstatic over Peter’s work.

Robbie Robertson tries to warn Peter about the questionable path his career is taking, but Peter is too enamored with his paycheck to listen.

Back at home, Peter finally has enough money to move out of his Aunt May’s house and get back on his feet…but May isn’t very pleased with this. Why? Because of the methods in which he is obtaining said money.

So Aunt May, Peter’s mother figure who has raised him since he was a small boy and always been there for him, is even trying to tell him that what he’s doing is wrong. Does this finally wake Peter up and make him take a hint? Nope.

Our issue ends further showcasing Paper Doll’s obsession with Bobby Carr and implying that she’ll got to great lengths in order to make him “hers”.

So far, we aren’t off to a particularly strong start. Peter is coming off as rather dense and unlikable so far and Paper Doll (what little we’ve seen of her) isn’t a particularly captivating villain at this point. Let’s see if things improve from here.

Part two opens with the waitress Carr mistreated last issue attempting to cash in on her “misfortune”. However, Paper Doll has other ideas.

Must be pretty horrifying, right? What did Paper Doll do to this woman? Strangle her? Crush her? Dismember her? I can only imagine what horrific murder methods this fiend used on this poor…

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!!!

Oh, I mean…how terrible!

Jokes aside, this looks absolutely ridiculous. Turning your victims into paper isn’t scary; it’s silly. It didn’t work for Freddy Kruger in A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 5 and it doesn’t work for Paper Doll here.

We then transition over to yet another paparazzo harassing Carr. Except this time, Carr isn’t having it.

But who should catch Carr in this moment of hostility? None other than our “hero”.

We are then treated to a twist: Carr’s manager is actually selling him out to Dexter Bennett!

DUN DUN…you know what, does anyone actually care?

Peter decides to stop by The Coffee Bean to chat with Harry, but Cornrows Junior wants nothing to do with him at this time.

Does this finally make Peter wise up and stop acting like a tool? Nope.

Back at the DB, Bennett continues to gush over Peter’s pictures.

But Robbie and Betty Brant are there to spoil Peter’s mood with this little bomb drop:

Does the fact that his pictures led to a murder finally shake Peter out of his cash-induced stupor? Nope.

Rightfully feeling guilty, Peter at least suits up and tries to protect who he thinks might be Paper Doll’s next target: the paparazzo Carr punched earlier.

Sure enough, Paper Doll is there to claim her next victim. But thankfully, Spider-Man finally does something heroic in this story and swings in to stop her.

Again, it’s really hard to take Paper Doll seriously when her design is so laughable.

They proceed to have an equally goofy-looking fight until Paper Doll retreats after Spidey convinces the paparazzo to drop his lawsuit.

Carr’s duplicitous manager, however, is not so lucky.

Oh no, not…what was his name again?

Part two ends with Carr driving up to his private mansion to visit his “secret girlfriend”.

His secret girlfriend in question:

Mary Jane Watson herself. This was actually her first appearance in the titles after One More Day controversially destroyed her relationship with Peter (among other things), so this was highly anticipated. What was not highly anticipated however was Mary Jane shacking up with another guy so soon after her marriage to Peter was erased. To reiterate, this was Mary Jane’s first appearance in the books after Marvel decided to destroy her relationship with Peter in One More Day…and she’s already hooked up with someone else. I find that slightly insulting to the fans who weren’t pleased with Marvel’s current direction of the Spider-Man franchise. But hey, maybe Mary Jane actually serves a purpose in this story and isn’t just here to tease fans. Let’s keep reading to find out.

Part three opens with a little exposition into Paper Doll’s background.

That’s about as deep as it gets for this character. She was in some kind of unspecified lab accident from her (I guess) neglectful parents and she became obsessed with Bobby Carr because she repeatedly watched his movies. Woo.

Aside from being a ridiculous-looking villain, Paper Doll is also a very dull and unremarkable one.

Anyway, Paper Doll can’t stand the idea of anyone being with Carr other than her and heads to his mansion to kill Mary Jane.

Meanwhile, Peter can’t quite seem to get a clear photo of Carr’s “mystery girl”.

Before Peter can find out that the love of his life has paired up with some two-bit celebrity, Paper Doll arrives.

Paper Doll attacks the couple and I can’t decide what’s funnier; Paper Doll’s design or Carr’s facial expression.

Paper Doll then turns her attention to Mary Jane after the latter comically hits the former over the head with a lamp.

Mary Jane ends up sealing herself inside Carr’s panic room.

Spidey finally arrives to save the day and receives some unexpected assistance from Mary Jane…but he still doesn’t know it’s her.

We do however get some more subtle teases about One More Day…or maybe they’re jabs knowing Marvel.

As the fight progresses…this happens:

The narration does little to change just how dumb that looks.

Spidey has finally had enough and decides to take the battle to the water where he can deprive Paper Doll of oxygen.

And in typical anti-climatic fashion, Spidey doesn’t even land the finishing blow.

Spidey then has a conversation with Carr that finally puts things into perspective for him. Oh and we get another One More Day tease.

Griping aside, I do appreciate that Dan Slott went out of his way to try and humanize Carr instead of making him a stereotypical jerk celebrity. It’s unfortunate that Fred Van Lente would later undo this by turning Carr into an idiot junkie, but that’s another story.

Back at the DB, Peter finally does what he should have done from the very beginning:

But we can’t conclude this arc without one last Mary Jane tease!

 

IN CONCLUSION:

Believe it or not, I do actually think Peter Parker becoming a paparazzo only to realize it’s wrong is a good idea…if it occurred in the 1960s when he was still a teenager. By this point in his career, Peter should be a mature adult easily able to tell that what he’s doing isn’t right. He goes from being a teacher to this? Add in the fact that everyone around Peter is telling him that he shouldn’t accept this job (including his mom and best friend) and it makes his lack of awareness all the more maddening. The ending where he finally realizes this isn’t satisfying because it should have been clear to him from the get-go–or at least after Paper Doll’s first murder victim.

Speaking of which, Paper Doll is a very lame villain. Other than her laughable design and powers, the character is incredibly dull and one-note. She’s basically just a psychotic celebrity stalker who never shuts up about how much she “loves” said celebrity. How riveting. It’s not surprising that Paper Doll hasn’t appeared since this story.

One thing I can fully commend in this arc though is Marcos Martin’s artwork. It’s colorful, exuberant and just a lot of fun to look at. Too bad the writing can’t match it–with the exception of the occasional humorous Spidey quip, but that isn’t enough to make up for the overall weak writing. This is far from Dan Slott’s worst story (see volumes 3 and 4 of AMAZING SPIDER-MAN for that “honor”), but it’s still a pretty weak outing in its own right.

 

VERDICT: Overrated