Spidey Meets Obama

So today I read Amazing Spider-Man #583, more commonly known as the Inauguration Special where Spider-Man meets Barack Obama. The artwork is fantastic. Todd Nauck is a brilliant artist, I've loved his work ever since the old Young Justice series. He's never let me down and I doubt he ever will.

The script by Zeb Wells, on the other hand... I understand this story was put together in about a week's time, but this guy does not write well under pressure. I was hoping for something more like the Colbert issue, but instead we got a plot that revolves around a famous Spider-Man villain written as a complete buffoon.

Neil Gaiman talks frequently about how newspaper articles about comics far too often use headlines ripped from the 1960s Batman TV show - Wham, Pow, Comics Aren't Just for Kids Anymore! For at least the last 20 years that we've had a lot of great comics for adults, and even those like Batman and Superman that were traditionally for kids have intelligent storylines now, able to hold up to other forms of literature.

The Obama story seems like it was meant to be an over-the-top old school crazy comedy, a deliberate pastiche of silver age comic adventures, but the script sadly isn't clever enough to pull that off. With only six pages to tell a story, you need a plot outlandish enough to be charming and jokes that are actually funny.

I can't help but feel that Marvel dropped the ball a bit on this one. I work in a bookstore. We're featuring this special issue on our Obama Inauguration display table, and we've had people calling or coming in to ask about it for the last couple of weeks. People will definitely be picking up this issue who don't usually buy comics, who probably haven't read a comic book since they were kids. They'll flip straight to the Obama story, ignore the rest of the comic--and instead of being turned on to how clever and intelligent modern comics can be, they'll assume they're just as ridiculous and cheesy as Adam West in a grey leotard.

- JC

(I didn't read the book, but "Barasket Oballma" cracked my ass up. - RD)