Look folks, it’s no secret Spidey comics have been stupid for a long time, and it’s even less of a secret as to why. But Zdarsky has been hailed as some genius writer who’s saving Marvel, and Life Story particularly has been acclaimed as one of the modern classics. And I’ll give those folks this much: Life Story is certainly better than 90% of Post-OMD Spidey. And yes, I'm glad that someone with a whisper of a potential of talent wrote a book for Marvel. But that doesn’t mean it’s more than mediocre, nevermind a classic. This is not a case of people loving a work because it's good, but because the bar is so low at this point that anything not truly awful will be called amazing. I'm honestly scared of public taste as of this point.
Let’s get the good out of the way: Bagley is firing on all cylinders. His designs, layouts, action, expressions… this is honestly top notch. Bagley’s a classic Spidey artist for a reason, and he brings his trademark energy and emotion on a level I’ve not seen since Ultimate Spider-Man. Bagley takes the script and makes it pant with life. I felt the story all the way to my core because of Bagley's expressions and storytelling.
And yeah. The art’s pretty much it.
I’m going to cut to the chase: Chip Zdarsky ain’t a good comic writer. He could be! He’s got a good enough grasp of raw human emotion to where if he used a plot generator (and don’t pretend the greats didn’t) he could put in some true pathos for his plots. But Zdarsky is too obsessed with ruminating and big emotions to set them up properly. The fight with Norman at the end of issue one? It’s so badly set up it’s actually funny: Peter’s spider-sense would have seen the trap coming miles away, literally. Throwing in Miles at the end was boneheaded. And don’t get me started on Kraven and Venom’s total botching! I have no unearthly idea why people like this comic. Nothing is set up. Nothing is really paid off.
But the real fly in the ointment is Gwen Stacy. Zdarsky has a revolutionary idea with her… and then uses the decade time skip between each issue to resolve it, in a truly petty way. Instead of allowing the consequences to play out Gwen is swept under the rug, creating questions about Peter no one should be asking about their protagonist. The pettiness of the decision is impossible to ignore for me, it screams "I want my definitive take on the character and this plot point is something I want to get out of the way". The decision actually riles me up thinking about it, because that was the good idea, Chip, and you swept it under the rug. I don't like seeing a good idea put down, and Zdarsky puts this particular idea down with an electric chair execution, where the victim doesn't actually die in the first few seconds and is zapped to death in front of everyone, eyes rolled into the back of the head in a way that lets everyone else know they're still alive, thank you very much.
Yes, that happens a lot with electric chair executions.
Yes, death by firing squad is the most merciful way to execute someone, still.
A review says as much about the reviewer as it does about the work; a good review is ultimately about seeing the perspective of the reviewer meet the work and the perspective in it. And frankly I find myself disgusted by Zdarsky’s perspective. Part of it is that if there’s a petty line he can put in a character’s mouth he’ll do it. Part of it is that he can’t avoid stupid things like Peter wondering if his spider sense reacts to Osborn because he’s a capitalist… while somehow missing the ten pumpkin bombs seeded around the building.
But the greatest fuckup is that Zdarsky perpetuates the myth that Peter is made unhappy by the existence of Spider-Man, that his power is an influence that must be fought at all costs, as a vent for his guilt over Uncle Ben’s death.
Spider-Man elevates Peter Parker. That's a basic tenet of the character from the Lee/Ditko days, and it's one that modern writers have forgotten, much to their detriment. And yes, it appears to be an ideological failing on their part. Power does not corrupt, power magnifies, and whatever you got rattling on in your skull loses all illusions of privacy with it. And denying that, by using that tired leftist “Power is for me to endure so you won’t be corrupted by it” shit looks so bad on Peter Parker, so transparently contrived, that honestly I couldn’t recommend this comic to anyone.
This is a middling comic, and that’s all because of Bagley doing a wonderful job. But given how awful the rest of Marvel has been doing recently? Yeah, it's hard to remember that less smelly turds are still shit. The plotting simply isn't good. Zdarsky is so freaking excited to get to the ideas that made him feel something that he forgets that the math of the plot still has to add up. It doesn't. Nevermind that his "big feeling moment" is simply not. In the hands of a proper editor (aka NOT Nick Lowe) who would actually challenge and push, Zdarsky would actually be a pretty decent writer.
He doesn't.
So he's not even decent.
Jeez the main scene in comics has gotten bad.
