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Erin Anna Leach
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 21 February 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 746
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| Posted: 30 October 2014 at 9:13am | IP Logged | 1
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Superman was eternally 29. Batman around the same, and the rest in that neighborhood or younger
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When I was a kid reading comics, I thought they were younger than that. I figured Superman, Batman, at around 25, and the rest a year or two younger. Spiderman I figured was 18 as he was in college. Reed Richards was an old man that I figured to be 30 something, and Ben Grimm to be 28.
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Stephen Robinson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 5835
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| Posted: 30 October 2014 at 11:47am | IP Logged | 2
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My issue with aging Spider-Man is that it "de-uniques" him. A
teenage superhero -- who's not a sidekick and who makes his
share of mistakes as kids do -- is unique. If he's a 30-yr-old
PHD, he's a grown man and the only thing special about him is
that he has spider powers and he cracks jokes. The latter just
seems to make him immature.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132297
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| Posted: 30 October 2014 at 12:48pm | IP Logged | 3
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A teenage superhero -- who's not a sidekick and who makes his share of mistakes as kids do -- is unique.•• Pretty much Ditko's main objection to the aging of Peter Parker.
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Brad Danson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 02 May 2007
Posts: 1440
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| Posted: 30 October 2014 at 12:56pm | IP Logged | 4
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As a kid, my brother had a book of Superman reprints, mostly by Curt Swan. I thought Superman looked really old...which is probably why he never appealed to me until the Crisis reboot.
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Stephen Robinson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 5835
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| Posted: 30 October 2014 at 1:26pm | IP Logged | 5
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What I liked about JB's Superman was that he felt like a 29-year-old but
without resorting to the "kewl" crutch of pop culture references and fads
that would instantly date the character.
Yes, the Superman of the Silver Age offen felt older than he was
(perhaps a danger of middle-aged men writing 20something characters
) but contextually, he was clearly young -- his job, his bachelor status,
even his living in an apartment. That's not what men in their 40s or
even their 30s did at the time.
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Brian O'Neill
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 13 November 2013
Location: United States
Posts: 1964
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| Posted: 30 October 2014 at 3:05pm | IP Logged | 6
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Superman and Batman weren't "29" until E. Nelson Bridwell decreed they were, if not while writing Mort Weisinger's letter columns in the '60s, then definitely in the '70s(in articles in the old AMAZING WORLD OF DC COMICS, and repeated in letter columns by Bridwell and Bob Rozakis for years thereafter). I assumed that the characters had their ages 'rolled back', much as Marvel did with Peter Parker, not as an in-story 'event', but just an editorial decision. The '60s versions of the characters looked a bit older than 29, anyway(due to the 'Superman receding hairline', which disappeared around the time Al Plastino stopped inking Swan's pencils.)
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Taavi Suhonen
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 27 April 2004
Location: Finland
Posts: 1544
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| Posted: 31 October 2014 at 2:54am | IP Logged | 7
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Well, that's an unexpected title for the sequel to 12 Years a Slave.
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Wally Coppage
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 11 October 2014
Posts: 12
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| Posted: 31 October 2014 at 6:41am | IP Logged | 8
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Curt Swan's Superman got to the point where he looked like he was about to start collection social security by the time the next annual was scheduled to come out. It was absurd and I blame this sort of lame evolution of the character to be a major part of the reason DC was eclipsed by the far more "with it" Marvel Comics.
How hard is it to mandate a 7 or 10 year rule, make it a rule that nobody can supersede, and move the F on? Some people obviously can't grasp this stuff, so they should put a summary/info page at the beginning of every issue. Yeah, yeah, it might not be all that artistic to do so, but it would solve a ton of problems.
Marvel and DC should flat out make up their minds how old they want these characters to be, pick a specific age, and go with that. I'm tired of these editors and creators thinking they can change the age of characters as iconic as Superman or Spider-Man on a whim. So what if YOU think Superman is 29? Do YOU own the character? You should stick with what the original creative team intended OR what the company mandates. I'm sick to the brim with this back and forth crap.
Edited by Wally Coppage on 31 October 2014 at 6:43am
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Eric Jansen
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 27 October 2013
Location: United States
Posts: 2292
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| Posted: 31 October 2014 at 6:49am | IP Logged | 9
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I started reading SUPERMAN when I was 9 in 1975 and he immediately became my favorite. I remember being very surprised when I first read that he was supposed to be 29. He looked 40, acted 40, and I thought he WAS 40--and I was fine with that! In fact, when I read he was 29, I remember thinking it was a typo and they meant 39. (Yeah, he could be 39.)
I was also fine with Spider-Man being in college and in his 20's. Kids always read "up" and I had no problem reading stories about heroes who were older than me.
I also don't remember any fellow comic readers at school having any age issues either. In fact, the only ones we might have had problems with were the kid super-heroes.
Now that I'm in my 40's, it seems weird to read about significantly YOUNGER characters! A 25-year-old Superman is not interesting to me (at least the way they're handling him). If they ARE trying to cater to "middle-aged fanboys," you would think they would AGE the characters, not de-age them.
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Eric Jansen
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 27 October 2013
Location: United States
Posts: 2292
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| Posted: 31 October 2014 at 6:56am | IP Logged | 10
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And just because they SAY it's been 13 years since he became Spider-Man, making him 28 now, doesn't mean they're writing him like a 28-year-old. Any stories I've looked at the last few years (especially since the Devil made him forget his marriage to Mary Jane) have him acting and living younger and younger.
If you're going to write and draw a 25-year-old Peter Parker and Spider-Man, why SAY he's 28?
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Wally Coppage
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 11 October 2014
Posts: 12
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| Posted: 31 October 2014 at 7:13am | IP Logged | 11
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The whole point of the 13 year rule -- as extended from the 7 year rule -- is to give the past some breathing room since everything is getting more and more compressed as real world time passes. This is presumptuous. Since only about 10% of everything they've published since 1961 is worth a good goddamn, it's a colossal insult to us lifers to make room form the majority of mediocre crap, for instance, that they've been shitting out since Quesada waddled over to suck the joy and life out of Marvel's publishing line. Beyond their collections division, that basically focus only on the good stuff, virtually everything Marvel and DC does, and has done, royally chaps my ass.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132297
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| Posted: 31 October 2014 at 7:49am | IP Logged | 12
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Spider-Man has appeared in something on the order of a thousand* comic books since he made his first appearance in AMAZING FANTASY 15. If we assume that each of those appearances averages out to about one day of Peter Parker's life, we're still looking at less than three years -- and that's assuming we want to bother ourselves with those kinds of calculations.Which, of course, we shouldn't. ___________ * Arbitrary number. Feel free to count up the real total.
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