Amazing Spider-Man #49

[cyberghostface]

Vampires have taken over New York. White Rabbit has been turned and one of her associates asks Spidey for help; the only way she can be cured is if the vampire that bit her is staked through the heart.

Comments

[nyadnar17]

Everybody be talking real crazy to Pete until they catch him on a bad day.

[numeronone]

Once again, Zeb Wells cannot write Spider-Man succeeding at anything in his own book. Even when it's trying to keep one guy alive for another minute.

[deh_tommy]

Spider-Man, Spider-Man
Nothing can ever go to plan
Can’t he save a single guy?
When’s the last time he won a fight?
Poor dude, that Zeb Wells’ Spider-Man!

Even though nothing’s his fault
He still lost everything to Paul
Gobby’s too good to be true
No really, what did Peter do?
That’s life for Zeb Wells’ Spider-Man!

[numeronone]

Dreamwidth, give us that like button already!

[scorntx]

*applause*

[zachbeacon]

Genuinely unclear if this is a situation where everything plays out the same without the hero ...

...or if this is like the Amazing Spider-Man movies where everyone would be better off if Peter Parker didn't exist.

[blues32]

...sooo why isn't White Rabbit getting staked here?

[superfangirl1]

I am guessing the guy that got staked, was the person who turn White Rabbit in a vampire? And when he died White Rabbit was turn back into a human?

[shakalooloo]

Has the 'kill the head vampire to cure the thralls' method always been a thing in the Marvel Universe? Seems that it would have made Blade's job a whole lot easier if that were the case.

[cainofdreaming]

Nah. I mean, Xarrus' little tantrum back when would have lost him half the kingdom when he beheaded his daddy if it had.

[zachbeacon]

Vampire rules in the Marvel Universe are all over the place but I don't think so. It mean, how many times have Dracula and Lilith died?

(Honestly a little fuzzy on how the vampires returned after Strange got rid of them all in, what, the 80s)

[deh_tommy]

When the spell was broken, they all regenerated. It wasn’t a “no more mutants” kind of spell where it permanently wiped them out so much as it was a metaphysical wall that had actively suppressed them.

[beyondthefringe]

The good: a writer who actually treats vampires as -actual freaking people- instead of mindless ravening hordes to be exterminated with prejudice. I'm sorry, it's always been a peeve of mine when vampires get treated like cannon fodder, and no one remembers they were totally people with lives and feelings and stuff. And this event is already presenting them as massive faceless crowds to be staked and beheaded... so examining them as people caught up in something awful and beyond their control is good.

The meh: White Rabbit as a vampire could have been a gamechanger for a previously C-list joke villain. At the very least, we could have worked with this for a while longer.

The bad: NOT A SINGLE FUCKING BUNNICULA JOKE? Oh, COME ON. She's a RABBIT. And a VAMPIRE. It was RIGHT THERE. Someone dropped the ball.

[deh_tommy]

To be fair, how vampirism works in MARVEL is a bit of case by case basis because vampires are either typically hypnotically enthralled to the person who bit them or don’t have the willpower to defy the instinctual bloodlust. For example, it took a *lot* of conditioning to bring Jubilee back to her senses.

[cainofdreaming]

There's literally only one vampire who hasn't gone slurp-happy for human blood (and I think even King lapsed once since the Montesi Formula was repealed). So, yeah, it's kind of rare.

[zachbeacon]

Dear Marvel,

Stop trying to make White Rabbit happen.

Thank you.

(I continue to be amazed at how much of modern Spider-Man is just reusing DeMatteis material that Marvel refuses to collect)

[deh_tommy]

I like the White Rabbit…

[zachbeacon]

I like a good joke villain (and even have a WR gag in mind if I ever get the opportunity)

I just don't think every silly villain needs to be reimagined as a serious threat. It is one thing for The Spot to realize his true potential. It is another for legitimate villains like the Lincolns to take in the Paris Hilton of crime.

[shakalooloo]

They're just using whatever they've got to give Spider-Man a rogues' gallery that isn't a total sausage-fest. The ones created during Brand New Day didn't exactly take off.

[zachbeacon]

Counterpoint: Mad Jack (also a DeMatteis character) should have had her spot on the all female Sinister Six. The team needed a Mysterio with Goblin gear more than it needed a trust fund kid in a playboy costume.