Comics / Comic Reviews / Marvel Comics

Jeph Loeb & Tim Sale's Spider-Man: Blue


By Leroy Douresseaux
February 15, 2004 - 13:26

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Marvel has listed a trade paperback version of the hit mini-series, SPIDER-MAN: BLUE, in the February 2004 solicitations for April shipping. However, fans of the series would do well to seek out the beautiful hard cover collection of the series that Marvel published about the middle of 2003. It’s beautifully manufactured with a gorgeous dust jacket.

As for the series itself – I’m not a fan. The story by the incomparably overrated Jeph Loeb retells the early days of the romance between Peter Parker/Spider-Man and Gwen Stacy, a kind of love triangle. Although competently written, Blue was structurally lazy, being nothing more than middle section of some longer story; it literally has no beginning and no end. In fact, it reeks of the teen/twenty-something TV melodrama “Smallville,” and just reeks in general.

Tim Sale is actually a very good illustrator of superhero comics, but has spent much of his career aping Matt Wagner, Frank Miller, and Miller via Jim Lee. In Blue, his very well drawn art shows shades of Spider-Man maestro Steve Ditko and some John Romita (another important Spider-Man artist). With this successful amalgamation of two great styles, Sale officially replaces Ron Frenz as the super Super-Adaptoid of comic book artists.

Although I favor the production values of the Spider-Man: Blue hardcover, I dismiss the content, but fans are getting a great deal in the hard cover.
[DRECK, DULL, READABLE, PRETTY GOOD, EXCELLENT]

Leroy Douresseaux is a comic book writer and critic based in Louisiana.

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12

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