There's a villain new to cinema screens too, in the person of grizzled Michael Keaton's intimidating blue-collar Vulture. An incarnation of the Vulture appeared in one of the earliest US Spidey comics I ever read:
My first exposure to Web-Head was in the pages of the Power Comics of the mid-Sixties. I was particularly taken with his logo and that strikingly weird split-face effect Ditko employed:
My experience of the Ditko era was also largely informed by the Marvel Tales reprints of the late 60s
but in the "present day" of 1968-70, Ditko's idiosyncratic genius had been replaced by Johnny Romita and motorcyclin' Peter Parker was a more heroic and attractive lead, in adventures which were (despite this Mysterio cover) more "real-world" and gritty.
I don't know why but I owned far more Iron Man and Daredevil comics during the late 60s and really only got one issue of Spidey's mag in the 70s- introducing this lesser light, the Gibbon.
Of course, the various Spider-Man UK weeklies eventually brought me up to speed with the legendary Gerry Conway era that influenced both the Maguire and Garfield movies, especially the epoch-making Death of Gwen Stacy.
I bought virtually no Spidey comics in the 80s - not even in the Black Costume years- aside from the issue below of the "secondary" title because it introduced this iconic pair:
Toward the end of the 80s, I bought the odd Spidey annual , particularly the Evolutionary War storyline with Conway's' brazen pastiche of the New Gods:
I only realised recently that this was a pun on Revolutionary War. Duh.
The quirky cartooning of Erik Larsen caught my eye in the Extreeeemme!! era of the early Nineties:
But since the middle of that decade, writers and artists have been playing in the Lee/Ditko sandbox- either filling in "gaps" in Spidey's adventures:
or retelling them, in line with contemporary tastes:
Here, John Byrne changed Electro's appearance to no great effect. Other creators have produced homages to the Romita era- bringing us back, as I often do in this blog, to where we started:
The introduction in 2011 of the bi-racial and much younger Miles Morales seemed to finally break the period - piece deadlock that informed Spider-Man comics:
I was entertained by Homecoming and it was nice to see it in the Moray Playhouse, where I've seen most Marvel pictures. Tom Holland is charming but, ironically I feel his whole story was informed by that of Miles Morales, down to his goofy bestie, Ned, who strongly resembles Miles' "wingman". Ganke.
I was pleased to see that we weren't exposed to yet another re-telling of the origin and the tone was quite different to the doomy tragedy of the film's immediate predecessors. Holland actually convinces as a teenager where the more mature Garfield didn't. There was more humour, particularly in the "inspirational" Captain America vlogs and I loved hearing Save It For Later by the, ahem, English Beat.
I felt initially that Spidey's powers were too closely connected to the suit but the story arc eventually distances him from being an Iron Man spin-off. I also didn't mind the "goon" status of the Shocker and the Scorpion . It's a fresh take on what felt like a very old story and downplaying Peter's romantic life was a welcome change. If you prefer more angst in your superhero movies, this may not be for you.
Coming soon: Horror Double Bills and Space 1999
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