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It's been over a year now since Kevin Smith's Spider-Man\Black Cat
mini-series had an new issue on the comic shelves and the title still
hasn't finished its publishing run. It was an enjoyable read, got good
reviews, good press (mainstream press even) and was supposed to launch a
Kevin Smith run on Amazing Spider-Man and a Black Cat ongoing series. So
what went wrong?
Kevin Smith is a talented writer, without a doubt, but his commitment to
finishing comic projects is severely lacking. What particularly peeves me
about this case is that Marvel and Smith championed this title at the
launch of the first Spider-Man movie, saying it was THE title for anyone
interested in Spider-Man after the movie to pick up. There was even plans
for a quick trade to come out to make it even more appealing for new
readers. Out of all the Spidey titles Marvel had going, this was the main
one they championed to the public. But, if you were one of these new
readers, you would've picked up this series and because of its great
quality, be hooked, only to be severly dissapointed when its publishing
schedule falls behind and then stops altogether. Hey, I'm a long time fan
and I'm annoyed!
I guess if the writer was anyone other than Kevin Smith, Marvel would've
just found someone else to finish the series. Or even better, asked Kevin
to choose someone to script the final issues over his plot. But, because
Kevin's a Hollywood hotshot and the Editor in Chief's friend, I guess
that's not an option for Marvel.
Kevin has made updates and excuses for this delay and lack of progress. But
to me it all seems pretty hollow. I'm no expert on Kevin or his life, but
this sort of thing just seems disrespectful of this title's fans. I mean
the comics medium have attracted other 'Hollywood' writers, but none them
have acted like this. None of them have championed publicly a comic book in
the wake of one of the biggest movies ever and then failed to deliver. Bob
Gale, Joss Wheadon and JMS are all busy guys from TV\Movie world and all of
them have delivered. JMS got behind on his schedule once, but made up for
later by producing more issues. I don't mean this as a personal attack at
Kevin. But, I guess I am a fan of this book and I feel that I've been let
down by Kevin.
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