{"id":19739,"date":"2024-01-16T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-01-16T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/?p=19739"},"modified":"2022-07-06T16:21:51","modified_gmt":"2022-07-06T20:21:51","slug":"asm-025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/2024\/01\/16\/asm-025\/","title":{"rendered":"ASM 025"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Drawing those crazy tentacles seems like a nightmare. Well, here we go, the first Spider Slayer. We\u2019ve seen a whole lot of later models, but here\u2019s Ditko\u2019s original vision. And for once, I can say that definitively, because\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2026Steve gets a credit for the plot. One that isn\u2019t even snide or a backward complement, which is pretty unusual for Stan. Ditko\u2019s frustration at not getting plot credit has reached a point where Stan has to acknowledge it, even if he continues to think it\u2019s not a big deal and to refuse to give the other artists the same credit (Or pay any of them for writing). It\u2019s so weird, because Stan knows they\u2019re great artists and great storytellers. He\u2019d gush about them at any opportunity his whole life\u2026 while also completely disregarding the fact that they came up with the story in the same breath until it made Ditko and later Kirby angry enough to quit. Like the story wasn\u2019t important. Like he saw the value of the drawing and the value of his text but didn\u2019t see why what was actually happening on the page was so important. It\u2019s so bizarre. He was nothing if not a shrewd salesman, and knew very well the selling power of a Kirby or Ditko cover on a book. I think he really did love those guys and John Romita and Don Heck and Dick Ayers and all the rest, in his way. But the plot and who wrote it didn\u2019t matter. Wild. At any rate, we may not know when it started, but from here on out, we can say with confidence that Ditko is plotting the book alone and with no input from Stan until his departure. He\u2019d do his 20 pages, deliver them to Sol Brodsky, and the 2 creators behind Marvel\u2019s most beloved character didn\u2019t even speak. Stan would continue to tell people either that he told the artists the plot or that he and the artists came up with it together. Marie Severin is on the record saying sometimes Stan\u2019s input into a comic could be as little as a notecard in the artist\u2019s mailbox in the office that said \u201ca villain called The Rhino.\u201d What a wild situation the early days are\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Stan made sure to include a thought balloon last ish where Peter thought it was a good thing he went back to get his \u201cspider beam,\u201d but clearly, Ditko had other plans. It\u2019s funny to me how people tend to say the book got a lot more romance in it when Romita came on due to his background in romance comics. Meanwhile, Ditko\u2019s spinning up a love triangle not unlike the eventual, far more familiar Gwen\/Peter\/MJ one. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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There\u2019s an unnamed Norman Osborn yet again. I think Ditko is clearly building to him being Green Goblin. There\u2019s no other reason for this. But that\u2019s conjecture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Peter\u2019s goading works, and JJJ asks for a demo. Smythe unveils the most absurd part of his scheme: The robot \u201ccan sense the presence of\u201d spiders. To demonstrate, he has Peter hold a jar with a spider in it. The robot cuts loose with all those crazy coils, which surprises Smythe, who says it should\u2019ve only gone for the spider, but he can work out the bugs. Peter, meanwhile, discovers the coils are so strong he can\u2019t break them (What if he had?), and is certain it sensed the spider in him, and has stopped thinking this is funny. Betty says he got what he deserved and storms out as JJJ & Smythe discuss how JJJ can drive the robot by remote control. Smythe demonstrates how a press of a button on the back of the robot releases its target. That should come in handy! Outside the office, Betty is still furious, reminding Peter that Spider-Man saved her & Aunt May in ASM Annual 1<\/a> and doesn\u2019t deserve this. So now he\u2019s accidentally sicced the robot on himself and upset Betty. But she\u2019d be more upset if she were at school later to see Liz running to catch up to Peter\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Flash in panel 4 could almost be an Erik Larsen drawing. In short order, the robot, now showing JJJ\u2019s face on the screen as he takes the controls, homes in on the school, just as Peter\u2019s supposed to be fighting Flash. He ducks out a side door to get away from the robot as Liz is berating Flash for this, but then the boys see Peter running and they all take off after him. Peter uses them to his advantage, putting them between him and the robot, slowing it down and keeping it from seeing him. Peter manages to zoom around a corner and flip up onto a roof before anyone can see him, but the robot starts scaling the building.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Flash compels the gang to help him save Spider-Man, and Liz comes along to try to throw any further ire from Flash off Peter. Spider-Man makes his stand in the middle of the street, hoping to let people see him beat the robot, but as it shrugs off his webbing and nearly catches him in the coils, he begins to think he\u2019s in real trouble.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cA woman can talk for hours!\u201d A Stan Lee can, too. Good for Betty for trying so hard to help, tho. Flash\u2019s hair turns back to orange from yellow yet again on the next page, it\u2019s been swapping a lot this issue, as the gang decides they can\u2019t keep up with the fight and Flash turns his attention back to Peter. They decide to go to his house and bully him there. Liz says if they hurt him, she\u2019ll never talk to Flash again. Meanwhile, the robot\u2019s pursuing Spider-Man across the rooftops a lot more easily than it seems like it should, almost catching him a few times. And then something much more important than all that happens:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The oft-discussed Mary Jane Watson almost makes her debut! I wonder if Ditko would\u2019ve tried to keep her hidden forever, as some kind of running gag. This is, itself, pretty absurd, making sure that even her hair isn\u2019t visible. The girls take off, mad at Peter, each other, and the world. Flash\u2019s goons also decide to leave, but he chooses to wait under a tree \u2018til Peter comes home, so dedicated to revenge is he. Meanwhile, Spider-Man\u2019s put some distance between himself and the robot, but only for a moment. As JJJ re-engages, he starts making the same kind of terrible jokes Spidey loves, an irony that\u2019s not lost on him, and then he\u2019s finally all wound up like on the cover for a whole page. Try as he might, he can\u2019t break loose. But this comic\u2019s almost over, so\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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So many gags with Spider-Man\u2019s empty costume in the old days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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And we\u2019re out of another one. Wacky adventure. Stan can\u2019t resist putting it down a little in the letter col:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Just cannot let anyone get away with some of that writing credit.\u00a0 This month\u2019s first letter comes from Fabulous Flo Steinberg, Stan\u2019s personal assistant who, among other things, sent the letters off to print for the comics, apologizing for a letter running in both ASM 22<\/a> and 23<\/a>. The response is playful self-deprecation for the rest of the team. But Flo runs her actual address with the letter, like they do everyone else\u2019s. That\u2019s so insane. She\u2019s lucky no one did anything weird\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Drawing those crazy tentacles seems like a nightmare. Well, here we go, the first Spider Slayer. We\u2019ve seen a whole lot of later models, but here\u2019s Ditko\u2019s original vision. And for once,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19738,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[9,35,11,12,13,172,21,39,3,7,2,6,8],"class_list":["post-19739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-1960s","tag-amazing-spider-man","tag-aunt-may","tag-betty-brant","tag-flash-thompson","tag-j-jonah-jameson","tag-liz-allen","tag-mary-jane-watson","tag-norman-osborn","tag-spencer-smythe","tag-spider-slayer","tag-spider-man","tag-stan-lee","tag-steve-ditko"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19739"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19739\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19754,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19739\/revisions\/19754"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19738"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}