I’ve been reading this volume of the first 18 issues and annual of Spider-Man (Amazing Fantasy 15, Amazing Spider-Man 1-17 and Annual 1) to my sons for the last few months. To call this tome magnificent would only be a mild overstatement. In fact I’d argue that few modern comics are even in the same continent, nevermind ballpark, of quality. This is because of the embracing of genre, the Marvel Method, and plain ole desperation.
Comics, like most print media, isn’t high art. It’s entertainment, and the best entertainment knows it has to earn your time. Literature you more or less are expected to wrestle with; the reward doesn’t come from whether or not you had fun, but whether or not you changed because of the encounter. Entertainment is meant to be easy and fun and light and thus must earn its bread from you. If entertainment isn’t fun that’s the fault of the creators. You must be sold on the idea that the entertainment is worth your time.
These 482 pages are entertainment at its best.
Each issue is clearly crafted to tell an entertaining tale filled with laughs, action, and grounded tragedy. Peter can never escape his bad luck, and even when he does it’s only as a wink, that eventually the universe will kick him again, so enjoy the good luck while it lasts! But none of this is really all that grave: there’s tons of little (and big) laughs and truly awesome imaginative fights amidst the constant rush to one up the thrills! You spent your cash, they’re gonna prove you should do it again! Even when the plot wasn’t the best it was always in favor of being excited! Action packed! And the consequences always hit just right, delivering genuine pathos.
The Marvel Method is the best way to make comics. Yup. I said it. I mean it. I’m not going to soften it. By turning the process of making a comic into a true collaborative effort, Marvel gained the ability to put out a ton of books quickly. The artists were able to invest more in their work, while the writer spent less time on the part of the process that wasn’t his business. And Ditko makes the most use of his freedom here, creating page layouts that really need to be studied to be believed.
But none of this would matter if not for the most important element of the whole thing: desperation. Marvel was sinking, and they knew that the basic function of a comic book is to get you to pick up the next one. So Stan and Steve put the most exciting ideas they could onto the page, while making sure that the readers believed they could one up the excitement the next time. Each issue is a blatant (but supremely competent) advertisement for the next issue. If there is any one thing I’d say is missing in most comics today, it’s that this reality isn’t acknowledged, and the stories are worse off for it.
These first 19 issues of Spider-Man are sequential storytelling at its finest. By leaning into the genre and what a comic book actually is, embracing the fully collaborative nature of the medium, and realizing it was sink or swim time, Stan and Steve revolutionized comics. I don’t know if anyone has attempted comics on this earnest a scale since. And that’s a damn shame.
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