Customer Reviews

Amazing Spider-Man: Brand New Day, Vol. 1

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Brand New Day is a great example of the worst that comics have to offer long time readers. This TPB presents that first storyline in a retcon that has removed 20+ years of Amazing Spider-Man history.

The title is Brand New Day...but there's really nothing NEW about it. The reading is painful and reeks of "forced nostalgia". There's probably more character growth in an issue of ARCHIE than in this entire collection.

While the artwork is passable to decent, if you're looking for a fun read...avoid this at all costs.

Instead of reading this lousy TPB, pick up some of Marvel's ESSENTIAL AMAZING SPIDER-MAN. These classic reprints of 60's-70's-80's stories show a character with morals and who understands that "with great power comes great responsibility"...plus the stories were done right the first time and we didn't need a Brand New Day to recycle them.

This book is a perfect place to start if your just starting, or haven't followed the series for the last 10 yrs or so.

But for spidey fans like me who have been faithful to the books, and read through the good and the bad stories without doubt that there is a deeper meaning behind it that well get reveiled later on. All of a sudden it all makes since, and we go back to the bad arc and find all the hidden details and find out the story wasn't as bad as you originally thought.

Until "One More Day".

Don't get me wrong it wasn't god awful like most people might say or review, and I throughly enjoyed J. Michael Straczynski story line from start to finish (Coming Home - One More Day #30-545) It just pissed me off to the point where I swore to never support another spidey book after "OMD" again. If you like to read my opinions on "OMD" how it should have ended and continued into this book read my review on "One More Day".

It is a revamped of all the spider-man books over the last 20 some odd yrs Peter is back working at the Daily Bugle as a photographer (never became a Teacher). No longer married to Mary Jane. Harry Osborn alive and has been Peters best buddy the whole time. Everyones forgotten who spider-man is, and among other things.

Over all, I have read into some of the issues in the "Brand New Day" storyarc. It is pretty good and worth reading, but would have otherwise been better on its own away from the events of the marvel universe.

Without getting into what lead to the events of Brand New Day, this trade, on its own is really good Spidey stuff. Plain and simple. The writers and artists involed truely hit the nail on the head as to what Spidey should be about. I really enjoyed it. I also really appreciated the extra material that shed a ton of light that went into this new world of Spidey. I look forward to reading the next volume of Brand New Day.

This Brand Nwe Day arc is just great, the art is excellent (Steve Mcniven and Phil Jimenez definetly rocks), the story introduce a lot of new and inrteresting villians and heroes, the new spiderman status quo is relly interesting, if you love spiderman this book is a must have, and if you think that you are a little bit lost in all spiderman's old storys then this book is the perfect start.

Bunch of different Spidey versions out there already, what with Ultimate, Marvel Adventures, Amazing Spider-Girl, and even Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane. And guess what? They've just rebooted the Peter Parker of Marvel's mainstream continuity. Been said that the thinking behind this shake-up is that Spidey's colorful but perhaps too dense history had been putting off potential readers. So why not have a fresh start? That's just what the Marvel think tank did.

Thing is, I was actually cool with Spidey the way he was - married to M.J. and hanging out with the New Avengers, and with Aunt May clued in to his superhero alter ego. But, yes, the Back in Black arc was not good. And then the horrific ONE MORE DAY came along, and, man, that was some hellacious outcry that tore thru Marveldom. I know, because I was one of those waving a pitchfork and a torch. In ONE MORE DAY Peter and Mary Jane make a deal with Mephisto to save Peter's Aunt May, who had been fatally shot. So Aunt May gets a new lease on life, but, in exchange, Mephisto strips away the love of Peter's life. In consequence, Peter's story (and history) is ret-conned. Which brings us now to BRAND NEW DAY.

In this spanking new and rebooted reality, Pete is once again broke as hell, dateless, and has moved back in with Aunt May in Forest Hills, Queens. Mary Jane Watson is no longer in the picture and, in fact, has never been married to Peter. Formerly deceased Harry Osbourne is alive and well and is again hanging out with Pete. No one knows that Peter is Spider-Man, not Daredevil or Wolverine or Cap or the Avengers. The world is vaguely aware that Peter went public months ago during the Civil War event, but they're having a hard time recalling details (because I guess Tivo was on the fritz that day). Meanwhile, the Superhuman Registration Act has had Peter hesitant to step out as Spidey for months now. But, of course, it's inevitable that his bump of responsibility will force him to once again don his wallcrawler duds.

There's only one Spider-Man title now, which tracks Peter's place in Marvel's mainstream continuity. However AMAZING SPIDER-MAN now publishes three times a month, thanks to a brain trust of writers and artists who rotate per story arc. Writer Dan Slott is a great choice to launch Brand New Day. What's instantly noticeable is the sense of fun which permeates the stories. Slott is capable as a storyteller, but his calling card is his humor (his She-Hulk stories rock!). Slott returns Peter to his lovable loser days and dips him deep in that old Parker luck (which is mostly not good luck). The story opens up with Peter picking up a cake (lemon) for his Aunt May's birthday, but from the get-go, the premonition is that that cake won't even come close to getting to Aunt May intact. Worse things later happen to Pete (including, yes, getting mugged). Then it's Marc Guggenheim's turn with the writing. He manages to maintain that touch of lightheartedness and levity.

Peter gets a larger supporting cast, which now integrates the staff at the Daily Bugle. This new reality shoves Pete back to his photography gig for the Bugle, except that the newspaper establishment now runs under new management, although J.Jonah Jameson's gruff and ornery presence is still felt. So far though, none of the new cast members are making me stand up and take notice. Except for the mysterious Jackpot, New York's newest registered superheroine. She's a redhead and likes to call Spidey "Tiger," so right away the webslinger has his suspicions. From the rogue gallery front, we're introduced to new villains, the most ominous being the shadowy Mr. Negative, the most lame being the Spider-Mugger. The rest of these new bads aren't impressive, although I got a kick out of that one villain who's also a gynormous Spidey fan.

Oh, there's also a serial killer running around planting Spidey tracers on his victims. What's up with that? You won't find out in these pages.

This trade collection, THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN: BRAND NEW DAY, Vol. 1, starts off with SPIDER-MAN: SWING SHIFT which features Spidey's return after a months-long absence in this new status quo, followed by AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #546-551, and culminating with a short story reprinted from VENOM SUPER-SPECIAL #1 (Don Slott's very first Spidey story). Also included is the pretty interesting 5-paged Spider-Man Manifesto by Spidey Executive Editor Tom Brefoort, in which he lays down his thoughts on what makes Spidey so popular and iconic. The superb visuals are provided by Phil Jimenez (who flaunts that George Perez style), Steve McNiven, and Salvador Larroca, three talented artists who make Spidey look very, very good.

This is a Peter Parker who's still beset with problems, yet he seems somehow more innocent and hopeful. Honestly, I was all set to slam Brand New Day. But now, after what I've read so far, I'm more willing to give this reboot a chance, to see if this brain trust is actually going somewhere with it. So far, Brand New Day hasn't bowled me over. But it's nice. By no means are these the best Spidey stories I've read, but I do relish the energy, the jaunty tone and the sense of freshness. Lessee if that lasts.

But I'm still mad at ONE MORE DAY.

Amazing Spider-Man is a title that's been pretty polarized for a while now. Either the fans have been displeased with its direction, or its EIC has been displeased with it. What the latter of those two did was create Brand New Day, and make ASM a 3-times a month comic.

In premise, the changes made to Spider-Man's status quo was pretty ludicrous; having the devil just magically wipe away 30 years of continuity just so it can once again appear as though Peter Parker is just some young, happening bachelor... It just struck me as overly pointless, and poorly conceived.

That aside, I went into BND with an open mind, and even a hope, to thoroughly enjoy these new style Spider-Man stories. Has that been the case? Sometimes yes, sometimes no.

Truthfully, there have been some REALLY good issues of ASM, and some REALLY good arcs. With great writing and art to boot. Unfortunately, between those great stories, there always seems to be 3-4 clunkers that seem to do little but serve as filler until the next great Spider-Man story. This is made worse, I think, by having way too many artistic hands in the pot; one week, it's John Romita Jr., the next Marcos Martin, the next Mike Mckone.

Now, I like all of those guys' art, but go back and forth between the three...plus more fill in artists...its simply jarring. Made even worse by the fact the writers rotate just as often. Creating an even more turbulent style and level of quality for the book.

All in all, the good stories out number the bad. And all in all, its been a fun ride. But, I really can't help but think, that Spider-Man would have been much better served with 3 separate titles, with 3 separate, equally talented, creative teams, who could tell their own stories completely, without having to rotate every other week.

Oh, well, maybe I'm being picky. Or maybe Marvel just tried a little too hard to make Spider-Man comics interesting again.

At first I was pissed at One More Day. Spidey made a deal with the devil to save his aunt over his marriage. That's the dumbest thing of all. I mean come on is Aunt May immortal? You know it would just be like the writers to kill her a year or so from now from old age just to give Peter misery.

But I didn't want to bring a bad taste in everybody mouth by bring up that which should never be mentioned again. No! Brand New Day is marvel's brand new chance and they are doing some wonderful things with the character. I am impressed to the say the least.

BND takes us back to good old spidey adventures where the character wasn't whipped! To bad Spidey can't take lessons from the Flash, he actually manages being married pretty well to a non-superpowered person.

There is one story I can't wait for ... Since Harry is alive again thanks to that ... damn deal! Norman Osborn & Harry Osborn "Nuff said"

The Spider-Man in these stories has a secret identity, his classic spider powers, webshooters, a big supporting cast, and, unlike Superman, he doesn't always get things right.

This is the Spider-Man that I remember: the one who cracks jokes while he's fighting bad guys, the one who has to watch out for the cops, and the one who's always getting on J. Jonah Jameson's nerves.

In the recent past, Spider-Man's supporting cast dwindled down to just his Aunt May and Mary Jane. Everybody knew he was Peter Parker. His powers came from a magic totem. He could shoot organic spikes from his wrists. And sometimes he had a suit of armor with three mechanical arms.

With this volume, we get a clean slate and Spider-Man is back to his regular iconic self. Some people might not like HOW the slate got cleaned. But the HOW and WHY aren't really a part of these stories. These stories are about Spider-Man starting a new chapter while returning to the roots of his character.

The art by Steve McNiven is up there with his work on Civil War and MK4. The other art in this collection, by Phil Jimenez, Salvador Larroca, and Mark Bagley, is extremely good too.

If you like Spider-Man for Spider-Man's sake (and don't miss the wrist spikes), you should give this collection a try.

While not horrible, the new direction that Marvel has taken Spider-man is ridiculous. The whole point of the Ultimate universe was to give a reboot for new fans and update the comics for a more "modern day" origin story. Given that they have the Ultimate universe, it is hard to see why Marvel felt it necessary to reboot Spider-man in such a horrible fashion. With the Other it seemed like they were finally giving some much needed depth to the character after the whole clone saga debaucle, but here the powers that be seem to feel that they did not want a grown up, mature Peter Parker. Rather than deal with the fall out from the Civil war, they have taken a cowards way out and merely transposed our hero into what I can only assume is an alternate universe.

If you're a Spider-man fan, pick up the New Avengers which actually have a decent take on him in the cannon universe. Pass Amazing by until they actually close this story line and bring him back into the fold.

Things have changed. With One More Day leaving a bad taste in every comic fan's mouth (regardless of whether you are a Spidey fan or not, the idea of One More Day alone will coax a groan out of you), Marvel embarks on a new direction with one of their flagship titles. With Brand New Day, we get a re-booted Spider-Man in what seems to be a self-contained universe where things have noticably changed. Peter Parker is younger and a photographer yet again, and Harry Osborne is back as well. Mary Jane may be gone (although there are shots aplenty of red-headed girls in many of the frames contained in this hardcover collection), but Spidey still has plenty of problems to deal with; including a new, psychotic villain called Jackpot. Brand New Day would otherwise be a disaster were it not for the revolving writing team of Dan Slott (She-Hulk, Avengers: The Initiative) and Marc Guggenheim (Wolverine, Blade, The Flash) who manage to make Spidey the most likeable he's been in years. Add to this some fantastic artwork from Steve McNiven (Civil War), Phil Jimenez (Infinite Crisis), and Salvador Larroca (X-Men); and you get something really special here. No matter what damage One More Day may have done, Brand New Day is nevertheless enjoyable for what it is, and the spectacular artwork featured here is worth the price of admission alone.