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.