Superior Spider-Man Primer

If there was ever a litmus test for how entitled fans could get, Superior Spider-Man would be it. Fans were already upset about Peter and Mary Jane’s spiritual divorce in Brand New Day were even more upset when Dan Slott “killed off” Peter Parker and put Doctor Octopus in his place, thus Superior Spider-Man was born. I vividly remembered all the spoiled fans who rage quit on Spider-Man (or at least claimed to) because of this move. Writer Dan Slott, if I remember correctly, even got death threats from fans who were upset about this change.

It revealed the ugly side of a fanbase that is always lurking under the surface. It also revealed another thing: How fucking gullible these same fans are. The death of a major character and you think it’s permanent? If your that gullible I’ve got an island to for sale you might be interested in. What I mean to say is that over the past 20 years of comics the majority of character deaths were undone after a period of time. Around the time that Superior Spider-Man came out, Marvel had already “killed off” Captain America and the Human Torch and both characters came back from the dead. If you were one of those fans who thought Peter Parker was dead for good you are a fucking sucker.

This was back in a period when I was still quite active at a certain wiki page. I pointed this out, all be it in a more diplomatic way, and these dipshit fans ignored everything I said to just whine and complain. That kind of reaction is the main reason why I cannot stand fan collectives. They’re full of reactionary babies who are blind to history and how the comics business works. But I digress.

If you turned your nose up at Superior Spider-Man when it first came out, that was a huge loss on your part because it is a brilliant story.

There have been a plethora of stories in which a villain changes their stripes and becomes a hero. Those are a dime a dozen in comics. What’s rarer is the story where the villain not only changes his stripes but takes on the role of an already established hero. This is the avenue of study that Superior Spider-Man explores.

It’s been said that the best villains in fiction are the ones that think what they are doing is right and in Superior Spider-Man we see that very concept on display in big neon lights. Not only that, Dan Slott takes a villain who has always viewed himself a superior to his greatest foe and put him in said foe’s shoes. The series starts off with Doctor Octopus vowing not only to take Spider-Man’s place but become a superior version of that hero.

Even after being touched by every tragic memory that Peter Parker has ever experienced, Doctor Octopus still thinks he can do a better job than Parker ever did in the past. He approaches the job of a superhero with the same sort of fevered ego of a deranged super-criminal. It works at first and when Superior Spider-Man begins it seems that there is no wrong Otto Octavius can do. However, readers quickly see how Otto’s worst instincts begin setting himself for an eventual and ultimate failure, just in time for Peter Parker to come back and retake his body and his life in a triumphant return that everyone should have seen coming.

That said, Superior Spider-Man is, in my opinion, one of the best runs of Spider-Man in a long time because it takes a different direction and presents a hero in a very different light. It asks questions you could never pose if Peter Parker was the guy under the mask.

It gives us a Spider-Man that is willing to use lethal force. It gives us a Spider-Man who schemes and plots against friends and enemies alike. A Spider-Man who believes he is superior to everyone else. A Spider-Man who believes that ends justify the means. One that isn’t driven by loss and regret, but by the desire to be better than everyone else. A story that could only be told through the eyes of one of Spider-Man’s greatest enemies.

I appreciate the fact that this series was given time to breathe and come to its foregone conclusion. As I’ve said previously, a lot of Marvel books during this period of time were often cut short or had to rush stories to a conclusion for one reason or another. Certainly, there was going to be a point where Peter Parker would take back being Spider-Man, but Slott was given the time to tell the story he wanted to tell.

Still, Superior Spider-Man wasn’t just limited to this run, it would have reverberations throughout the life of Peter Parker and Spider-Man, at least for a little while, before the status quo was restored.