Marvel recently tried their hand at a new volume of Marvel Team-Up series last year. While it started off well with Spider-Man and Ms. Marvel teaming up the series quietly disappeared after Marvel Team-Up #6 released in September 2019. The series just never got the traction that it needed to be the instant success out of the gate. A big problem for a Marvel Team-Up series in the current market is that it is not unique. Not only has Marvel saturated the market with various team books but readers are now used to the Marvel Universe being extremely connected with heroes guest spotting in each other’s solo titles regularly. But while there might not be much of a market for a Marvel Team-Up series this is the perfect time to bring back a new Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends comic book.
Spider-Man is by far the most popular character that Marvel has. We see that across the media as there has been a new Spider-Man cartoon and movies available on a consistent basis. And when it comes to the comics the Spider-Man franchise has never been more popular. Not only is the core Amazing Spider-Man series consistently one of the top selling monthly comic but the entire franchise’s comic sells very well. That is impressive given how many Spider-Man Family titles there are in the market. On top of Amazing Spider-Man we have Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Ghost-Spider, Spider-Woman, Black Cat, and Venom as ongoings in the last year. That is on top of various mini-series featuring the Spider-Man Family.
A big part of the success of the franchise in the modern era is the expansion of the characters related to Peter Parker’s Spider-Man. Thanks to the original Spider-Verse event back in 2014 we’ve seen Marvel dedicate more time in expanding on the Spider-Man Family. The Spider-Verse event opened things up for more Spider-related characters to be in the mix.
This all makes now the time for Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends to return. While Marvel Team-Up featured a wide variety of heroes in the Marvel Universe it was largely another Spider-Man comic book. The series normally featured Spider-Man teaming up with various heroes. Now with other popular characters like Miles Morales, Spider-Gwen, Jessica Drew’s Spider-Woman, Venom, and Black Cat this is a good time to have Peter Parker’s Spider-Man further share the spotlight with his Spider-Man Family. Marvel can easily have Peter rotate out with Miles, Gwen, Jessica, Eddie, and Felicia as to who the lead in a story is.
What would be key to the success of Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends is the story it tells. Spider-Verse showed there can be a big Spider-Man driven event. With a new Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends we can see that be built once again. Marvel after all has the perfect set up thanks to how the most recent volume of Superior Spider-Man ended.
In Superior Spider-Man #12 we saw the return of Doctor Otto Octavius in his original form after making a deal with Mephisto in order to save the world from an alternate universe Norman Osborn. While the deal with Mephisto gave Doc Ock his original form back free of his previous injuries and disease it came with a huge rule. In exchange for his original form Doc Ock lost all memories and powers he had since taking over Peter Parker’s body back in 2013’s Amazing Spider-Man #700. That means right now the original Doc Ock who was arguably Spider-Man’s greatest villain was back.
Now with Doc Ock back this is the perfect time to a modern day version of the iconic Master Planner storyline from the early Amazing Spider-Man days. Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends can serve as the series to build a new event around Doc Ock being the Master Planner once again. By telling various mini-arcs that are one or two issues that feature one of the Spider-Man Family characters teaming with other Marvel heroes it can slowly be shown that Doc Ock is behind all these villain attacks. Without knowing Spider-Man, Ghost-Spider, Venom, Black Cat, and Spider-Woman can be playing into a greater chess match Doc Ock is having with all of them. By doing so in various stories that are one to two issues we can get a Master Planner event that can be built as a big event that takes place in Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends.
With the Spider-Man franchise never being more popular than it is right now this is the perfect time to pull the trigger on a new Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends series. All of the characters related to Spider-Man have shown to have great popularity that a big event can be built by this new series. And given the current status quo of Doctor Otto Octavius there is a ton of potential for this Spider-Man event to match the level of Spider-Verse.
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