Comics Continuity #2 - Spider-Man

[Hermiod]

Inspired by the comics continuity Nazis thread, I've noticed another problem.

When Brand New Day first happened, there was a two page guide to the changes Mephisto had made. One of these was that while everyone remembers Spider-Man publicly unmasking, nobody remembers who it was under the mask.

However, in the last issue of Thunderbolts where they are fighting the Skrulls a Skrull uses powers similar to Trauma's to make Norman Osborn see visions of being attacked by multiple Spider-Men. These Spider-Men appear in the classic costume, the black costume and the red and gold "Iron Spider" costume Iron Man made for him.

This suggests that Spider-Man still had the same role in the Civil War that he'd had before Brand New Day. Iron Man had still tried to keep him close by giving him a new costume. In fact, if he still received the Iron Spider costume then a lot of the events (including The Other) leading up to that might still have happened as well, even if they were altered.

Isn't this a hole ? Shouldn't Stark be asking why he made a costume for Spider-Man when he doesn't remember who he is under the mask ?

Wasn't there supposed to be an issue of New Avengers explaining how Brand New Day and New Avengers fit together ?

[FPAlpha]

Oh man.. don't go there.

Brand New Day was the single most awful continuity reboot i have ever witnessed.

It is a complete mess, spits in the face of everybody and is being called brilliant by Marvel (and especially Quesada whom i've defended many times but not on this one).

Have also read Brand New Day #1 but since then not a single Spidey book except the Ultimate version.

[Hermiod]

I've struggled along. Some of the new villains are interesting (Eddie Brock as the Anti-Venom, Menace, Freak) and others aren't (No, Kraven's daughter is no more interesting that her father was).

I'm not against putting Spidey's powers back to normal at all (no more organic webbing, no more stingers, no more telepathy with spiders) either.

It's just that it would be nice if they decided what has stuck and what has not. Spidey clearly remembers being part of the Civil War, he clearly remembers switching sides. He still hid out occasionally with the other New Avengers at the Sanctum Sanctorum and later the apartment Iron Fist found for them.

The whole thing starts unravel if you look in to it too closely. If he remembers the Civil War does that mean Stark still took him to Washington ? What about Gabriel and Sarah Stacy ? They can't say that MJ and Peter never getting married would have had an effect on Gwen and Norman Osborn's "encounter".

[Ben Sisko3]

Lest we forget, Harry Osborn's being alive makes Liz Allen and Foggy Nelson look like adulterers.

Also...

...are we to assume that Wolverine and Daredevil's powers work on everyone else in the world except Spider-Man? Surely they'd be able to recognize him as Peter Parker. And what about SHIELD's psychics and spy satellites?

Has post-OMD Peter shown up at the Baxter Building yet? Because if so, isn't there a mandatory DNA scan set to make sure you're not a Skrull or Dire Wraith or something and match it against Reed's database?

All the other New Avengers know each other's identities. Why didn't Luke Cage beat Spider-Man into a coma before Secret Invasion? To suddenly forget who he is like that should set off some Skrully bells.

Did MJ and Aunt May live in Avengers Tower?

Does this retcon affect the dead? For instance, do George Stacy and Steve Rogers up in Heaven or wherever remember that Peter is Spider-Man? If they came back, what then?

ARGH!

[Stone_Cold_Sisko]

I'm laughing that they actually devote STORY TIME to FIXING CONTINUITY. No wonder people see superhero comics as geek-only bastions.

In fact, continuity stretches on too much that its impossible to take everything that happened in the books as literal and it really happened.

[Ben Sisko3]

Stone_Cold_Sisko wrote:

---

In fact, continuity stretches on too much that its impossible to take everything that happened in the books as literal and it really happened.

When did we stop talking about Spider-Man and start talking about the Bible?

[Norrin Radd]

Stone_Cold_Sisko wrote:

---

In fact, continuity stretches on too much that its impossible to take everything that happened in the books as literal and it really happened.

So true. Sorry for derailing this thread...but even ignoring all the chronological, character, and plot inconsistencies in the books, it gets to the point where it's blatantly inconceivable that so many batshit crazy things could be happening to these characters...superheroes or no.

Let's look at Spider-Man. What is he now...30? So in about 15 or so years since he's became a hero, let's look at all the events that have thus far occurred in his life. It's like the length of a novel and that's the mega-condensed version.

[Spaceman Spiff]

I think they're still trying to pass him off as 24/25, which is even crazier, given all that.

Like you say, that's the inherent problem with all ongoing books. If Tim Drake is only supposed to be sixteen/seventeen, but he became Robin at fourteen, then his last 2-3 years have been insane.

It's made even worse by the One Year Later event!

[TheArsenal]

It's worse for a character like Batman who is in far more books. A day in the DCU must be like 240 hours long.

And that's the very reason continuity needs to always be loose and not strictly adhered to. Time itself makes certain that it will always fall apart. While it is important to keep the big things straight, whether Lois and Clark are married, or whether Oracle can walk or not, comic book "reality" needs to be able to shift without comment, reboot, or revision.

[Thespeckledkiwi]

Hermiod wrote:

---

Isn't this a hole ? Shouldn't Stark be asking why he made a costume for Spider-Man when he doesn't remember who he is under the mask ?

Wasn't there supposed to be an issue of New Avengers explaining how Brand New Day and New Avengers fit together ?

Brand New Day is just a mess. I do like Anti-Venom very much but all in all, the whole thing is a complete and utter mess.

What I do know is that there are MULTIPLE Spider-Men running around, three of which have Tony Stark's Iron Spider costume. These are clones called MVP, named after a superhero that was killed during the training program.

[Thespeckledkiwi]

TheArsenal wrote:

---

It's worse for a character like Batman who is in far more books. A day in the DCU must be like 240 hours long.

Christ, I can't even start talking about DCU. Final Crisis makes my head hurt. I have no idea who half of the characters are half of the time and I don't know who is what. There is like 15 Flashes running around and...Blech.

Favorite still is Green Lantern and Green Lantern Corps. Good books there.

[TheArsenal]

Final Crisis, IMO, is poorly written and hard to follow without a full understanding of the DCU, and maybe not even then. Some of the tie-in books are a decent read, however. But as an event, particularly one which trumpets itself as the "Final" crisis, it is far from successful thus far.

[Thespeckledkiwi]

TheArsenal wrote:

---

Final Crisis, IMO, is poorly written and hard to follow without a full understanding of the DCU, and maybe not even then. Some of the tie-in books are a decent read, however. But as an event, particularly one which trumpets itself as the "Final" crisis, it is far from successful thus far.

I want to smash my head into a wall trying to read that -- crap.

I do like Secret Invasion though, a lot of the tie ins have been good for that and you don't need a strong following of the Marvel U to understand what has been going on.

[Mr Light]

I too love Secret Invasion and GL and GLC and hate Final Crisis; and until recently I was solely a DC fan! While I haven't read any Spidey lately (well I just started the JMS trades), this whole MJ redact is just utterly horrible to me.

Here's a fun way to look at it... each comic issue takes place roughly over 1-2 days. Therefore, Superman's 800 issues of continuity only equal 800-1600 days. That only equals 2-4 years. Don't they generally say that Superman et al have only been active for like 5-10 years?

I mean after all, how much time passes in each individual issue? Maybe 2 days, usually. How much time passes between issues? None. There's always a cliffhanger. Therefore the month between each publication doesn't count.

[Thespeckledkiwi]

They could have handled the entire situation a lot cleaner and a lot better than they did. They had a lot more opportunities to do so as well.