Let me just preface this: Marvel Comics are a group of capitalists whores. They are no longer the binding name holding together a universe full of wondrously imaginative characters stuck in real world situations. Instead, they are a clinically cold corporation, who throw creators on a fire of “intellectual properties,” and if the flame happens to catch, they wring the writers back with no abandon and completely douse out the creative flame while trying to wrangle it into their own capitalist grasps.

That being said, Ultimate Spider-Man is good. Quite good, actually. But for how long?

Whenever you see a good Marvel title, even one like the newest Spider-Man relaunch, the best handling of a Marvel flagship character since the initial Mark Waid/Ron Garney issues of Captain America, it won’t last. Marvel holds no commitment whatsoever to its readers, and worse of all, it holds no respect for them either. Trying to desperately coax in readers outside the direct market, Marvel decided to relaunch a few of their characters; the company was consciously creating a new universe for new, hopefully younger readers to get involved in. Brian Michael Bendis has had an adept ability with other people’s characters, even ones that seem only of commercial value (the Spawn spin-off, Sam & Twitch). Along for the ride is Mark Bagley, a veteran with almost one-hundred separate issues of various Spider-Man titles under his belt, a penciler deemed at birth to be drawing Spider-Man. Bagley, just like Todd McFarlane, is one of the few people who’ve drawn Spider-Man and are able to make the reader believe that this human is really this freakishly agile. But unlike McFarlane, Bagley does it with a distorted anatomy—shins that seem to be a foot around slim down to ankles that can only be a few inches in diameter. Bagley drew a special story of Superman, and all it did was show what assuredness he has drawing the thin body of Spider-Man.

And so, modern day concessions are made to Peter Parker’s origin—the spider that bites him in the hand is genetically altered. (I always thought I could do an anthropology thesis off the top of my head on the evolution of  super-power origins from Radioactivity to Spiritualism to Genetics, all as a societal downplaying of the Cold War—but I digress….) It then fleshes out other aspects, such as making Mary Jane a brainy pseudo-popular girl, and making Uncle Ben a science oriented hippie. Sam Raimi and all others working on the new Spider-Man movie should take notice—this is how an introduction story can be made with respect to the original story while making a path of its own. (It actually seems like the early synopsis for the movie, with Green Goblin looming over the story as the central villain and Doctor Octopus making a cameo.) But the biggest indicator on what Bendis can do is on the first page. He has one of his character relay a Greek myth. A Greek myth. He’s actually using literature in a Marvel comic! 

But—oh! I didn’t see it coming!—Marvel has started it grasps at the first sign of success. When the fresh reader friendly title started selling like a hooker at a comic convention, Marvel didn’t order a larger print run and refused to reprint the first issue. Marvel president Bill Jemas claimed he wanted to make the book a collectors item: “We know that if store owners feel a book will become collectible, they’ll order more of it.” A collector’s item. A book designed to be as accessible. It makes it big, and they want to sell it as a collectors item…. WERE THE ’90S A COMPLETE BLUR TO THESE PEOPLE!? WHY DON’T THEY JUST DO 30 ALTERNATIVE COVERS, AND A FEW CHROMIUM ONES TO BOOT? US MINDLESS CONSUMERS LIKE MULTIPLE SHINY OBJECTS IN OUR COMICS; IT’S THE ONLY REASON WE REALLY READ THESE THINGS….

But that statement caused an up-roar, and Marvel is now scheduled to release a reprinting of the first three issues, as they’ve done with a few of the Marvel Knights titles. All it took for Marvel was financial ruin to get them to listen, and realize that the Image system was wrong; a successful company does need writers. It didn’t realize it when Image’s audience grew-up. Or when DC books were suddenly cool. Now all they need to realize is fickle management for too long will put a company in its grave. Let’s hope they figure it out soon. I don’t want to see Microsoft’s Spider-Man vs. the 1-800-CALL-ATT-Man.