Hello boys and girls! I’m back for another post that has nothing to do with Daredevil annuals. At this point you’re probably wondering where you can turn to get your money back for this sham that is “Annuals month.” Well, annuals month has gone the way of Daredevil #116 and been pushed back a bit. That’s right, in case you didn’t know it, the new release date for Daredevil #116 is now March 4. But fret not, my friends, you can always go pick up Amazing Spider-Man #587 that’s on sale now, and features a major guest appearance by everybody’s favorite blind lawyer. I can’t believe I just encouraged people to go out and get ASM, but Matt’s in it so what are you going to do?
For a very small sneak peak, I refer you to the panel below in which Matt makes a dry joke. The client referred to is, of course, none other than Spidey himself.
Why do I have the impression that Dd is a sort of sandbox for Spidey writers? In this issue…
*Spoilers ahead*
…Spidey gets jailed (as Matt was) even he doesn’t get unmasked (right to privacy being respected? Naaah: IT’S MAGIC!!)…
…A friend of Spidey is in jail, and gets beaten by the rest of inmates (anybody remembering Foggy’s “death” here?)…
… Spidey is given a “reasonable doubt” advantage when another “Spiderman” (who happens to be… Iron Fist!!) appears in court. In the Spartacus gambit (the free web-comic which complements ASM 587) we see reference to the Bob Gale story where DD was sued and Spidey appeared in court as DD… Still the “Iron Fist as” thing is from DD.
On the whole, the story is better than the “back in black” story (which angsted Spidey with no discernible end, and, IMHO, made poor use of the Kingpin), but I have this overwhelming “dejà vu” feeling.
I think that Brubaker should sue Spidey writers for royalties!
Plus… 1) where is Foggy? isn’t he helping matt with this case? I honestly believe that, due to Matt’s mental state of late, it would be good to have the ever-reliable Nelson as a Back-up lawyer.
… 2) Does the Black Cat remember that Spidey is Peter PArker or is her mind Mephisto-Swiped as well?
… 3) We don’t get details about how much DD is stil pal of Spidey: sure he doesn’t remember who was the man under the mask, but… does he remember they were friends? Which parts of their buddy hero-relationship were Mephistoed and which not?
And lastly… All these Brand New day stories really required a Peter no longer married to MJ? I think that Peter could perfectly have these adventures as a married, separated or divorced man.
Yeah, I agree with a lot of what you’ve said. The strange DD-Spidey relationship always bugs me a little when I think of them appearing together after OMD. I guess we can safely assume that Matt didn’t see him unmask on TV (unless there was some miracle of biblical proportions we don’t know about), but how would you explain the fact that Peter knows that Matt is DD – presumably going back to before his identity was exposed – though Matt doesn’t know that Peter is Spidey? Back when continuity was simple and not bogged down with far-fetched comic book magic, Matt and Peter found out about each other at the same time, and I really liked that story. Now Matt was mind f**ked along with everyone else and it just irks me. Darn it. But I think they’re supposed to remember being friends. Or something.
The whole thing is just as pathetic as that free web-comic story.
Anyway, you’re right, Gloria. Though I wouldn’t say that DD’s book is used as a sandbox, but rather, that Spidey writers use ideas recycled from other comics, often from DD, confident in the fact that DD is not well known by most of Spider-man’s enormous readership.
Speaking of the number of readers, DD actually has more than half as many readers as ASM does. I think the ASM readership is currently about 50% larger than the DD readership which isn’t much considering it’s supposed to be the flagship title. Sure, it comes out three times a month but that still doesn’t translate into more readers, just the same readers buying the book more often. Considering it also has to pay extra for all the creative teams that have to switch off, the business side of OMD/BND is also beginning to look like a bad idea. (The first bad idea being the so-called creative side of things.)
Having said that, I don’t think the free issue was that bad. But my expectations were not very high on the other hand.