Posted in: Comics | Tagged: comicon, Marvel Comics, san diego, sdcc, spider-man, superior spider-man

"Emma Frost In Aunt May's Body" – The Superior Spider-Man Panel (SLOTT UPDATE)

Jacob Dadon writes for Bleeding Cool: 

Sandwiched between a smattering of DC related panels like some kind of nefarious meat substitute, the Superior Spider-Man Panel (strangely not just called the Superior Spider-Panel) was filled to bursting with Marvel talent. The completely packed table included Nick Spencer (writer, Superior Foes of Spider-Man), Christos Gage (co-writer, Superior Spider-Man), Chris Yost (writer, Scarlet Spider, Superior Spider-Man Team Up), Humberto Ramos (artist, Superior Spider-Man), Chris Samnee (artist, Daredevil),  Kevin Shinnick (writer, Superior Carnage), a surprise appearance by James Robinson (co-writer, Spider-Man: Family Business), Editor Steve Wacker, a telephoned-in Dan Slott (writer, Superior Spider-Man) and all moderated by the always reliable Arune Singh.

The panel started with three rather unrelated trailers, showcasing Agents of SHIELD on ABC, Avengers Assemble on Disney XD, and the motion comic trailer for Infinity. Once those were out of the way, the panel started pitting the audience against one another, asking who liked Doc Ock in his new role as Spider-Man and who wanted Peter back. Surprisingly, it was a pretty even split.

First up was the overview of the main Spidey series, Superior Spider-Man. After showing off a rather nice looking JG Jones variant cover to issue #17, focus was shifted to October's solicited issue #20. Touted as the most important issue of the year and something that sets up the next 18-24 issues of the series, the panel compared it to the same affect ASM #698 had on the series.

Moving on to the sister titles, Yost claims Superior Team Up will ratchet up the things that worked best about his Avenging Spider-Man, while also promising to deliver on the Sinister Six threads he wove through the book.

Superior Carnage has a number of preview pages shown, and Wacker claims that it'll pick up some plotlines from Jonathan Hickman's Fantastic Four run.

The October issue of Daredevil is discussed, the only one of the bunch being touted as a Halloween special. Samnee claims it's one of the few times he was allowed to design the cover before getting the script, and now Waid is wracking his brain to make a team-up with the Legion of Monsters work.

Scarlet Spider is brought up to some well deserved applause, and Wacker and Yost muse on how surprised they are by the issue #23 on the slide and thank the fans for supporting the title thus far. Yost claims that the recent upswing in Kaine's life is most definitely not going to last, and things are going dark(er) soon, with Kraven finally making his presence known.

Cullen Bunn's Venom series makes an appearance, and the panel stays mum on the new female sidekick. However, they do proceed to ask the audience how they felt about a face-off between Superior Spider-Man and Venom.

November bring the beginning of the next Superior Spider-Man arc, Darkest Hours, promising a confrontation between Doc Ock's Spider-Man and Flash Thompson's Venom. Wacker claims that they took careful measures to keep the two characters separate from one another, even with both of them on Avengers teams, in order to lead up to this. Slott is then telephoned in and mocked by Wacker for essentially repeating what he just said.

When asked if he's happy to be back on the book, Ramos claims how ecstatic he is to be back and mentions how Slott's plotting style (the doesn't write full scripts, but rather plots, which get filled in later, aka the Marvel Method) really helps bring his and other artist's creativity to the forefront.

The regular panel closes out with a quick discussion of Family Business. Robinson says Waid invited him, and that because he grew up in a time and area where he could get runs from different writers and eras easily, he brought that sensibility to the book and made it very much an international espionage story. In an odd comment describing the character dynamic of the book, Wacker seems to insinuate that it's not Peter under the mask, though I could be misconstruing his comments. Still, the focus of the series is to bring in new readers without the continuity baggage, and more graphic novels are promised down the line.

Wacker starts off the Q&A by asking the question on everyone's mind – When's Pete coming back?

As many people guessed, Ramos says the new Superior costume is very much based on the old unused movie design by Alex Ross.

Will Kaine vs. Ock happen? Yes, next month in Superior Team Up, says Yost. And yes, Ock does remember what Kaine did that one time and it WILL come up.

The upcoming annual is brought up, and Slott yells not to miss it, as it leads into some important plot points in the main title.

Perhaps the most interesting comment from the Q&A comes when someone asks about the Green Goblin's plans, and Slott implies that it might not be Norman under the mask. He also claims that the Goblin is incredibly important to the rest of the year's events.

Closing out the event, the panel is asked which characters they would like to see swap bodies, as Pete and Otto did. None of the answers come close to Singh's quick and surgical "Emma Frost in Aunt May's body", which silences the others rather quickly.

UPDATE: Dan Slott tweets "Actually, don't know if anyone heard it but my answer to the question was Squirrel Girl in Doctor Doom's body. ;-)"

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