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A review by reneandreas
Marvel Masterworks: The Amazing Spider-Man, Vol. 1 by Stan Lee
3.0
This is a fun and interesting read if you’ve made Spider-Man a large part of your personality for the better part of 20 years. It’s always interesting to see how your favorite characters came about, and what kind of stories they were involved in.
The first issue of this collection of Spidey stories is Amazing Fantasy #15, the first appearance of the first Spider-Man. It tells the story all of us know by now: Peter Parker is a nerd who gets bullied sometimes and then is bitten by a radioactive spider that gives him the powers of a spider, such as his famous spider sense and the proportionate strength of a spider. With his new powers, he seeks fame in the pursuit of money until a crook pursuited by an officer runs past him and escapes. When asked why Peter didn’t stop the robber, he replies “that it’s not his problem and he’s got to look out for number one - himself!” The criminal then goes to commit more crimes in the same day, one ending with Uncle Ben’s death and Spider-Man learns the single greatest lesson of his life: “With great power, comes with great responsibility.”
The following issues of the then-new monthly series, The Amazing Spider-Man, sees Peter Parker try to juggle his teenage life with his superhero life, as well as try to make some money to help his Aunt May as a freelance photographer for the Daily Bugle and using science and smarts to defeat some of his villains, like the Vulture and the Lizard.
The issues reminded me of Saturday morning cartoons, as they loosely thread each issue into the next, and each new issue is a sort of villain of the week story, some of which are enjoyable, and some of which are less enjoyable.
In addition, the dialogue is a lot… to read. There’s so many words on each page and so many tiny panels that it gets annoying and starts to not be fun to read, but that’s a personal nitpick. I could definitely see how Spider-Man found his success at the time, as he’s an invert of what people associated with superheroes at the time, and understand that these stories were not made with the intention of being read one after the other, but that won’t stop me from complaining.
All in all, this book is great time capsule to see how comics were written in the 60s, and a great read for anyone curious, like me, to see how Peter Parker’s story began. I’ll definitely check out the following issues, but not any time soon. I need a break.
The first issue of this collection of Spidey stories is Amazing Fantasy #15, the first appearance of the first Spider-Man. It tells the story all of us know by now: Peter Parker is a nerd who gets bullied sometimes and then is bitten by a radioactive spider that gives him the powers of a spider, such as his famous spider sense and the proportionate strength of a spider. With his new powers, he seeks fame in the pursuit of money until a crook pursuited by an officer runs past him and escapes. When asked why Peter didn’t stop the robber, he replies “that it’s not his problem and he’s got to look out for number one - himself!” The criminal then goes to commit more crimes in the same day, one ending with Uncle Ben’s death and Spider-Man learns the single greatest lesson of his life: “With great power, comes with great responsibility.”
The following issues of the then-new monthly series, The Amazing Spider-Man, sees Peter Parker try to juggle his teenage life with his superhero life, as well as try to make some money to help his Aunt May as a freelance photographer for the Daily Bugle and using science and smarts to defeat some of his villains, like the Vulture and the Lizard.
The issues reminded me of Saturday morning cartoons, as they loosely thread each issue into the next, and each new issue is a sort of villain of the week story, some of which are enjoyable, and some of which are less enjoyable.
In addition, the dialogue is a lot… to read. There’s so many words on each page and so many tiny panels that it gets annoying and starts to not be fun to read, but that’s a personal nitpick. I could definitely see how Spider-Man found his success at the time, as he’s an invert of what people associated with superheroes at the time, and understand that these stories were not made with the intention of being read one after the other, but that won’t stop me from complaining.
All in all, this book is great time capsule to see how comics were written in the 60s, and a great read for anyone curious, like me, to see how Peter Parker’s story began. I’ll definitely check out the following issues, but not any time soon. I need a break.