One Perfect Moment: Pete, MJ and the Silver Surfer

[skalja]

Silver Surfer: Requiem was a 2007 "What If?" style miniseries by JMS and Esad Ribic, in which the Surfer discovers he'is dying and sets about putting his affairs in order. I cannot recommend the full issue or entire series enough, whether or not you're a Silver Surfer fan.

In the second issue, Surfer is coming to terms with his death and mulling over one last good deed he might do for his adopted home of Earth before he goes back to Zenn-La to die. After running into Spider-Man, he asks him for his perspective as a human (telling him only that he's leaving Earth for good, not that he's dying). Spider-Man tries to brainstorm, but he can't think of any single deed that will have the kind of lasting beneficial impact Surfer is looking for, due to all of the political and economic factors, and the nature of human society itself. Stumped, he ends up in a discussion with Surfer about the way Surfer perceives the universe, and Surfer offers to give Spidey a temporary boost of the power cosmic and let him find out what it's like for himself. Spider-Man declines, but asks, "[W]ould you mind letting someone else experience this?"













"Assuming, of course, that the effort doesn't kill him first."






One perfect moment for the Silver Surfer's endless compassion; one perfect moment for Peter Parker's integrity and insight; one perfect moment for Mary Jane Watson, his inspiration.

Comments

[fredneil.livejournal.com]

Michelle, Carlie, Norah and Lily were all created after the retcon to add more love interests for Peter; I haven't heard anyone say they like Michelle/Peter, to be honest with you, since most folks I've talked to either find her really annoying or a racist stereotype, or both.

Well, if those are the three choices, I'd pick Michelle. At least when she's not being annoying. (About her being a racist stereotype, I'd say she's just this side of being a stereotype, but she's close. She's got "fiery," but not "sexpot" or "sassy." Unless I've missed those. ) Granted, she's annoying most of the time, but there were a couple of moments when I liked her. The fact that most of the plots she was involved in seem to be taken from 80s teen movies doesn't help, though.

[skalja]

Well, there's more than one stereotype and more than one way that stereotypes can be presented. She fits the "bitchy, emasculating, overemotional Latina" stereotype to a tee. Really the only non-stereotypical thing about her is that she's a lawyer ... but a corrupt one. Particularly you put her in context with Norah "Hipster racism is hilarious!" Winters, her brother Vincent "corrupt cop" Gonzalez, and the Hollisters (er, 'nuff said), the racial politics of BND are extremely skeevy (and I'm not even getting into the near-absence of the Robertsons and Glory Grant, Joe Kelly trying to write "street," or Roger Sterns' not very funny joke about Muslims).

[fredneil.livejournal.com]

Ok, "bitchy" and "emasculating" don't come to mind when I think of Latina sterotypes, but I guess it's a fair call to see them as such. Overemotional, yeah, but remember, I'm a Gwen Stacy fan. I just figured Peter liked them overemotional. It's momentarily interesting to note that neither Michelle nor Vincent are obviously Latin names. Still, when you've got people debating over how much of a stereotype a character is, you're probably going in the wrong direction with that character. (I had forgotten she was a lawyer. In fact, I really can't see any of these people holding adult jobs. Or being adults, for that matter. When Norah was making racial cracks to Michelle, it didn't sound to me as much like racism as it did the way high school students trash talk toward each other. Oh, she's not supposed to be a high school student? Whoops.)

Let me guess how Robbie got written out. Spider-Man is supposed to be "about youth," and they already had too many old people that were prominent in the story with JJJ, Aunt May and Mr. Aunt May,never mind that Robbie should be an important part of Peter's world; the rational older father-figure who's friendly toward Peter. (It strikes me that George Stacy played the same role, which brings up a question: Did they ever make it explicit that Robbie knows that Peter is Spider-Man?)

[skalja]

Hahaha, yeah, childish sniping is what passes for character interaction in BND. Re: Norah's racism, I'm not talking just about what she said to Michelle - as her tendency to make "ironic" racist jokes all the time, i.e. hipster racism.

I wouldn't be surprised if you're correct about Robbie's disappearance! As far as knowing Peter's secret goes, no, they never did, but during the Civil War arc Robbie made a few comments for which the only plausible explanation is that he knew beforehand. (I'm thinking particularly of his speech to JJJ about how Jonah had been in denial because there was no other way he couldn't know who Spidey was.)

I miss George Stacy, and his friendship with Robbie. I think I miss George more than Gwen, actually.

[fredneil.livejournal.com]

Ok, I've got a few problems with that article. The idea that "hipsters" are all white and never associate with any other ethnic groups except as hired help is just incorrect, at least as far as what I've seen in New York goes and "middle class white people with trust funds?"

But the basic point is valid, that "It's just a joke, I'm not really a racist" doesn't mean much to the person the joke's about. I suppose if Norah's in her early twenties, she might not have figured that out yet. It actually might make for a decent story where she does figure it out, but I don't see that happening.

To go on a tangent from this tangent for a minute: I'm reminded an ancdote about Genya Ravan when she produced the Dead Boys. Being good punks, they were all wearing swastikas, this being 1977 and them being from Ohio,they didn't know more about swastikas than that punk rockers wore them. That didn't go over well with Ravan (born in Poland around 1940. See where this is going?), and she...explained...what swastikas meant.

George was a great character, though underused, which I guess is understandable, since aside from Gwen, there wasn't any reason for him to have any interaction with Peter. I can imagine him becoming something of a confessor to Peter, but Stan Lee decided to go a different way. Unlike with Gwen, I'd actually like to see George in the occasional flashback. But then we'd probably find out that Gabriel and Sarah are really his children. (though on that subject, I refuse to believe they're anything other than clones until they explain why Gabriel looked like Peter.)

[skalja]

Well, perhaps her local hipster demographics are different than yours? Speaking as a PoC whose tastes verge towards hipster-ish, the hipster culture strikes me as very, very white - I mean, it's a lot easier to claim that "jokingly" using racial slurs is okay if it's "ironic" when the worst slur someone could use against your race is "honky." Not to mention all the cultural appropriation - most recently, Native American headdresses. But anyway, it sounds like we agree in principle!

I would love to see a Norah story where she learns better, but as you said, it seems unlikely. What makes it even worse is that for a while she was dating Randy Robertson - you know, the guy who was introduced as a civil rights activist? Of course they have stopped dating without any fanfare, so he's completely absent from her storyline in American Son, etc.

In a way I think George made things too easy for Peter, at least by the standards of the day. If you've got a father figure who knows your secret and is on your side, you're not alone against the world anymore. So I get it, but I still wish we'd had more of him. And as far as George being a confessor goes, you should definitely check out Paul Tobin's run on Marvel Adventures Spider-Man - #53-61 of "Marvel Adventures: Spider-Man," then #1-present of "Spider-Man" under the Marvel Adventures imprint. Yeah, I'm confused too. Anyway, that's exactly the role he plays in that series; it's a very interesting relationship because George is both his confessor and someone who comes to him for help.

One story in my "Pipe Dreams: Getting to Write Spider-Man!" mental folder is a flashback story called "Sunday in the Park with George." Yes, I would totally go there.

Re: Gabriel, in fairness, Peter is a brown-eyed guy with short-cropped brown hair and a muscular but average build -- that's not exactly distinctive. I fanwank it as Peter and Gabriel looking vaguely similar but Mike Deodato not being great with faces (which, much as he's improved since the Sins Past era, is kinda true).