Some 10 years ago, the staff of Wizard magazine thought Spidey was broken and that he needed to be fixed (why, oh why do we keep hearing this?). They brought up everything they thought was wrong, addressed how they thought things should be, how they were, and gave them each a grade. You can read the scanned article in it's entirety here.Keep in mind that 1997 was only about a year or so after the Clone Saga, and many fans were still staying away in droves after that debacle. I agree with some things the article talks about, like death being permanent, but not much else. One of my favorite forum posters on the net, stillanerd, had this to say in regards to the article.
I've done a good job on keeping my word about not mentioning my distaste for the stories that we have now in Amazing Spider-Man since issue #546 came out. Having said that, it's hard not to read this article and not think about the current status quo of ASM. Everything in ASM is now "fixed" the way it "should" be in ASM but is the book really any better? In my humble opinion, eff no.
As stillanerd pointed out in his post, the elements mentioned in this Wizard article are just that, elements and they are some pretty old ones at that. By their logical (and the brain trust behind ASM), Spidey should never have deviated from any of these elements. On top of that, ASM can still have these elements and still end up sucking. Less focus on the elements, more focus on telling a good story that doesn't feel archaic because the writers are so caught up in maintaing said elements.
Comments
I still prefer nowdays issues to those published in the 90s.
SIGH; We still need to see Spider-Man as the combatant he should be, it sure doesn't come most issues that he battles & defeats enemies far more powerful than he is, but it's always to good to be seen
And yeah, I'm all for Spidey's potential being utilized as well, Spideyfan.