Posted in: Comics, Comics Publishers, Current News, Marvel Comics, Spider-Man | Tagged: 85th anniversary, priest
Rewriting Spider-Man's Old Stories To Include Mobile Phones (Spoilers)
Today's Marvel 85th Anniversary Special in the 85th century, with stories of the Marvel's Heroic Age from future AI, including Spider-Man
Article Summary
- Marvel's 85th Anniversary Special in the 85th century features Spider-Man's 70s stories reimagined with mobile phones.
- Spider-Man drives the Spider-Mobile while using a modern phone, intertwining classic plots with new technology.
- Peter Parker's lock screen shows Gwen Stacy, reflecting emotional continuity despite the updated setting.
- The issue explores Marvel's sliding timescale, shifting eras for iconic events and characters to modern timelines.
Today's Marvel 85th Anniversary Special is set in the 85th century, with stories of the past, of Marvel's Heroic Age written by future AI extrapolating from past objects. So the reliability of these may be a little up in the air, you might not want to rely on their canonicity, even as they reference past events. But we see Spider-Man story from Priest and Carlo Pagulayan at a time when he was being sponsored to drive the Spider-Mobile, in the early seventies. But that wasn't the only mobile he was sporting in the story.
Sorry, you call them cell phones in America, right? And that's a 1973 reference to the death of Gwen Stacy, something clearly very recent for Spider-Man. And a modern mobile phone… with a reference to a famous photographer who died in 1984.
Not just mobile phones but streaming videos too. At a time when Spider-Man was a suspect in the death of Gwen Stacy's father.
And while Spider-Man is driving his Mobile, when also using his mobile (well, he's wanted for murder, I guess using your phone while driving is a couple of degrees down from that)…
She was going to marry Doctor Octopus. It was that kind of comic… but let's take a look at that mobile phone screen.
Gwen Stacy, still on his lock screen. Man…
See, this is the thing with the Marvel sliding timescale. When you read your comics twenty years ago, or now, some things stay the same and some things have to shift. Originally Reed Richards and Ben Grimm fought in World War II. Then Korea. Then Vietnam. Then Desert Storm. And now a fictitous East Asian war, which also pulled in Nick Fury, Frank Castle and the like.
You used to be able to use Franklin Richard as a guide, but given the amount of time travelling and ageing up that needed, that's no longer useful. But usually ten to fifteen years since the FF flight is about right. Until you realise, that means that the Fantastic Four's flight to the stars now took place in 2010. And everything has happened in those few years since. Spider-Man never swung off the Twin Towers… and Doctor Doom never wept at their collapse.
Or if you really don't like this? The 85th century AI just made it all up and got confused… I bet that will be editor Tom Brevoort's take. And he is already doing quite well in this comic…
MARVEL 85TH ANN SPECIAL
MARVEL COMICS
JUN240856
(W) Ryan North, Various (A) Carlo Pagulayan, Various (CA) Kaare Andrews
CELEBRATE MARVEL'S 50,000TH COMIC-BOOK RELEASE!
In the far future of the year 50,000, the exploits of the heroes of the Marvel Age are the stuff of legend, half remembered but still celebrated! Come with us now on a tour of the greatest museum in all the cosmos, in which the few surviving relics of those bygone days have been assembled. Each piece tells a unique story – about the Contest of Champions and how it wrought an end to the Age of Heroes, about the greatest triumph of Ms. Marvel and the final, secret exploit of Excalibur! And more! Marvel's greatest storytellers gather to commemorate the whole of Marvel history in a once-in-a-lifetime celebration!
Rated T+In Shops: Aug 28, 2024
SRP: $7.99
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