Rekindled Spider-Man Interest
// November 19th, 2004 // 10 Comments » // Fun Whatnot, My Stuff
As a kid I was a big comic book fan. I read a whole pile of random stuff, but I eventually found myself most intrigued by Spider-Man. Something about his balance of troubled real life and super powered hero life kept my attention, like many others. Anyway, I went on to subscribe to “Amazing Spider-Man” for a bunch of years, and additionally sprinkled in a few years subscription of “Spectacular Spider-Man”, “Web of Spider-Man”, and “Spider-Man” Amazing has historically always been the core title for the series. The basic accepted mythology all stems from this title (currently all the way up to #513. I possess #330 consecutively through to #441. At that point the numbering started back at #1 through to #10 or so. At this point I had stopped reading, but hadn’t cancelled my subscription. So, I’m not certain where my numbers stop since I wasn’t paying real close attention at this point. Anyway, when they reached #58 this year, they should really go back to the old numbering with what should be #500. All confusing I realize, but you’ll just have to trust me or go look it up yourself.
A few years ago, just before the new movie came out, I began to start thinking about ol’ spidey again. I dusted off my old comics, read through a bunch, and decided to reup my subscription to Amazing. I read a few issues, but realized two things. First, I was a bit out of it, times had changed, the story had progressed and I was lost. Second, I wasn’t hugely fond of the artwork currently being presented. Ahh, but there was a glimmer of hope!
While trying to search down some back story info I discovered a fantastic website all about Spidey, and extremely thorough, SpiderFan.org. On their site they had an article about another comic, Spider-Girl. I bought an issue and was immediately hooked. Here was the great story telling and art I remembered from Marvel! I then found a paperback that compiled #1-5, unfortunately it isn’t the best quality and is a bit small. Oh well, my main desire is to read the stories, so I guess it’ll have to do.
At this point I was sucked back into the Marvel Universe and wanted to know what other new series were Spider-Man associated and good to read. I picked up a Spectacular and read an online version of Ultimate Spider-Man. Spectacular has an art style I really dislike, and the storyline didn’t seem to fit into any reality I was familiar with. I just couldn’t get accustomed, so I put it aside. The Ultimate series suffered similar confusion for me, but I could see that they had entirely rebuilt the storyline from the ground up here. It was in fact a retelling of the entire mythology, but with a more modern take. This seemed interesting, and the online reviews were very positive. I was able to pick up a great anthology starting from #1 through to #### in Barnes and Noble. I tore through this in 2 days! The writing, artwork, and remastering of this classic series was amazing. Highly suggested to anyone at all interested in Spider-Man. Now I need to try to get caught up to the current issue by buying as many of the trades as possible.
I then found “Marvel Masterworks: The Amazing Spider-Man, Volume 1″ which is a reprint of Amazing #1-10. It was a lot of fun to read these classics from the 60s. Of course I then had to buy Volumes 1, 2, 3, and 4, each containing 10 more issues in succession. This has me convinced that I need to somehow compile the entire Amazing series from #1 all the way up to modern day. Currently the Marvel Masterworks series for Amazing only brings me up through #60. That leaves a gap of 270 issues between there and where my consecutive issues begin. Additionally, there are another 65 or so after my collection ends. The short of it is I have a lot of collecting to do before I can complete this set. My main driving force is to be able to read the story, unabridged, from beginning to end.
The following are some additional compilations I have found that should help me along my way:
Amazing
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MM Vol 5 (41-50)
MM Vol 6 (51-60)
More ASM that might prove useful:
88-92
BO v3 [HC] (2:46-58 & 500)
v2:57-58 & 500-502
503-508
Spider-Girl
—————–
6-11
Ultimate
—————–
ULT HC V4 (40-45 & 47-53)
ULT HC V5 (46 & ULT6 1-7) + V10
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Others… But of WAY lower interest/priority…
PPSSM
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2:1-5
2:6-10
2:11-14
Other Others
—————–
Blue
The 
