By Sean ¨More Superhuman Than Human¨ Torrie

... and if all costumes are going to be sicker in the future, why do we set any comics in the present? - ed.

I can barely stand Spider-Man. -Just-Barely-.

When the original comic came about it was perfect. In some regard it still is. Spider-man, the way I see it, is the reason comics in this era exist the way that they do. Stan Lee created a hero that was human; he wasn’t normal human, he had powers nothing in this world should actually have, but he had human problems – and he wasn’t a grownup saving the world, he was a little boy.

Screw Bucky Barnes and what ever angst his character developed in the post-Winter-Soldier era. Spider-man had no one to protect him. No super soldier, no Atlantean King, he had is dead parents and uncle to support him. He also had an aging aunt, but she was no more than a home and a grandmother figure to promote his guilt. His guilt about absolutely everything that he couldn’t prevent – because as human as he was: he wasn’t. The kind of quality that only -ONLY- a New York Jew could create. I say that, knowing I have more close Jewish friends than anyone in their right mind should (I have been a best man/groomsman at 2 Jewish weddings and I adore those families ruthlessly).

Spider-man has the perfect qualities of someone who, in real life, found himself with entirely too much responsibility. As the infamous, almost righteous, quote is said: “With great power comes great responsibility.” That’s Spider-Man, and Stan Lee. If anyone tells you otherwise then send them to me. He is the brilliant person who was alive in the 60′s (1962 to be precise). There’s a reason THE RAMONES’ cover of his cartoon theme song is still one of their best known tracks: the punks-of-origin were the nerds who needed Spidey in order to better understand who they were themselves. Spider-Man and Holden Caulfield were the prototype punks.

Greater intelligence is a curse worse than being simpleminded. Of course the average person doesn’t understand that, because they get what it’s like to be a child: and the childlike simplicity of a simple person is comprehendible. Something greater than your intellect is not. That’s just why ‘No Child Left Behind’ is such a miserable failure.

Spider-Man knew he had a job no one else could handle, because of his powers. Thus: he was the exception to all other rules. A bright person’s gift that no one understands is his intelligence: he has a responsibility to help people understand what’s wrong and fix it. He suffers for it, because he has to help the simpler-minded grasp it. Spider-Man was the brilliant person of the 60′s because his gift wasn’t so substantial that he could be Captain Marvel (click this link at your own risk, you may just get lost in the black hole that is Wikipedia’s vast knowledge on the Marvel Universe) and surf the cosmos correcting things. He had to be home by dark, dude. His aunt might get pissed.

Picured: Normal girl problems for your average teen.

Spider-Man was the teen with normal teen girl problems, and job problems, and family problems, and school grades to keep up. His biggest problems were that his closest friends became his biggest problem-villains. That’s my problem. He still is.

Spider-Man was so good at being every teen that he still is. It ruined something about him when he got married; this is why Marvel didn’t get him a divorce, he got a cosmic annulment. Since then he’s the every-teen that teens are expected to model themselves from: a single 20 something. Congrats Spidey, you’re Captain America from the ’40s now. You’ve come a long way, baby.

Meanwhile, and in the same era of writing (post 2003), Captain America has died and been resurrected

This guy bursts into horrifically painful flames whenever he touches oxygen. STFU Spider-Man.

with horrifying visions of the future haunting him, Iron Man is a guilt-ridden alcoholic who has been responsible for the murders of least 3 close friends, and god damned Wolverine is a 120 year old with 2 illegitimate children, the longest dissociative fugue in history, and leader of a wet-works team that has travelled through time. Peter Parker, my friend, you are old freaking news.

Comics, as a genre, have maintained what it was that Spider-Man set in motion: they are an art form that says to the different-person “You aren’t alone. Wait some time, someone will understand who you are.” With that regard, Spider-Man is still just that, but in an era where everyone is misunderstood, and everyone has an explanation (excuse). He is the unilateral statement of that idea, to all comers looking for an existential belly-rub.

I can barely stand Spider-Man because, as a culture with the internet and psychology-mainstream-ideas, post-goth/metal/punk/ and what ever kind of cross-dressing techno-tranny Hip-Hop seems to be evolving into: he is bland. Boring people I know have more complexity than he does. Awwe. Your girlfriend left you. Is it because you didn’t spend enough time together? Maybe because you lied? OH NO! You are about to lose your parent figure, might this cause separation anxieties? Are you growing up, Peter? Gosh.

No, I have a fucking pimple and Junior prom is tonight. Dick.

The only person Thanos ever loved was the physical embodiment of death for your universe, because his birth-defect made him shunned by his godlike beautiful-people. Get the hell over yourself, Pete. Ok, ok. Cry for a half an hour, and mention you’re glad your mask prevents other people from seeing that you’re crying because it’d make you feel guilty that they wouldn’t be able to rely on you. Fantomex shot a child in the head at point-blank range and out of guilt cloned him and raised him in an artificial pocket-universe. Do your guilt complexes feel lightened, Pete?

I can barely stand Spider-Man because its only 40 years of history that make him more complex than the Twilight series. It’s because he’s been so damned popular for so damned long that he’s a more likely costume on an uncreative Halloween than any child might otherwise ask for at random. That you can make an atrocity like “Spider-Man 3″ and in under a decade reboot the series without major complaints outright pisses me off (make no mistake: I will still be seeing this reboot out of militant brand-loyalty).

It’s all these reasons that I can barely stand him that make him so important. He has carried the grander company of his own franchise for so long, he helps guarantee that Marvel will continue to deliver so much of the mind-blowing writing that they have the last decade (we don’t need to count anything not-X-Men between Infinity Crusade and Infinity Abyss) because his story, now, appeals to so many people. I can’t stand him because he will no longer help the confused teen. He doesn’t stand out; he’s bland compared to the other characters, and kept that way for the sake of his own structural integrity.

The most recent Avengers Academy had one of the most powerful coming-out stories I’ve ever read. X-23 is the most abused child in history. Both of the Richards kids are the prototypical children that have to hold themselves back in order to not frighten their  own parents! Moon Night is the present physical embodiment of the Freudian Id-Ego-Superego – AND PART OF IT IS A VOICE IN HIS HEAD THAT IS SPIDER-MAN!

I can barely stand Spider-Man because he is too human. Too blandly, and normally human, the sort of thing people refused to admit to being 40 years ago, that has become so permissible now.

You want I should take on some more modern issues?

Do I expect the superhuman of everyone? Hell no. If that were the case, we’d joke about the moon colony on a daily basis, because it would have developed its own sub-culture by now. They’d need their own damned comics to cope with every day life. I just expect the most out of the people I interact with, because I have come to demand the same of myself – it’s my responsibility. Like Spider-Man.

You can also catch this sumbitch at "Unemployed Geniuses"

"My mommy says I can´t go over your house acuz it smells like a yeast infection."

Oh Bill Cosby. You have made a whole new type of child abuse possible. Thank you for that. I know you didn’t do it on purpose, but I don’t think Enrico Fermi had a cold war in mind when he built that nuclear reactor.

Now, I’ll be the first guy to say that I’m not a fan of Michelle Bachmann… No. No, that’s a lie. I’ll be one of many to say it. I’ll also say I think she might be crazy. Not fun-crazy either: “Did you invite her?” “No of course I didn´t, but she found out about the party so I had to say she could come.” crazy. So when I saw this video, in which a representative of the local Gay/Straight alliance gave Bachmann some hell, I said “Hell yea LGBT girls with silly dress code!” In two minutes they present a really solid problem with Bachmann’s philosophy, one that I hadn’t come up with myself. And I’m brilliant. It’s just straight up impressive seeing them get up the balls (take that how ever you want, just don’t get all emo on me) to put that woman on the spot in the middle of people clearly into what she’s got to say.

So when I hear there’s a video of an even younger kid putting her in her place I say to myself, “There’s no way this is going to make me think poorly of the opposite opinion.”

First: it took me like 10 viewings to get the volume up to a level I could both hear and wasn’t at risk of blowing my speakers. Second: that little boy is so damned uncomfortable saying what he’s been told to say that it took me 10 viewings to get the volume up to a level I could both hear and wasn’t at risk of blowing my speakers!

Honey, and I call you honey to be offensive, I know ‘kids say the darnedest things’ but it really doesn’t count when you force them to say it to try to create some measure of value to your impeccably biased opinion. Did you not watch this before posting it? Is that what you did? That feels like what you did. It feels like you got your adrenaline up after putting that ‘crazy conservative in her place’ and just went right to the interwebs with it! No way someone’s gonna see this and think about calling Child Protective Services on the lesbian making her child say things he’s uncomfortable with in public.

This is exploitation on a “Black Samurai” level. Except of course Black Samurai was hysterical because it was god-awful and made up of adults willingly participating. This is god-awful and has a child whispering at the “show me on the doll” volume. Bachmann takes this  one with a stride and tact I NEVER WANTED TO SEE HER HAVE! Good job proving the opposite of your opinion there, Rosie O’Donnell, because mommy might need fixing if she’s forcing her children to advocate for her before they’re old enough to comprehend what he’s doing.

I was tossing around my level of irritation with those videos for a few weeks until I stumbled on this one today:

Thank you, Huffington Post, for posting… this ‘article‘ here. I’m glad AOL dropped cash for this level of quality.

You know what’s real screwed up here? This little girl is making a really, frighteningly articulate argument. Then dad’s gotta cut in with his Munchausen’s-by-Proxy-two-cents “Boys can buy pink stuff too, right?”

Are you fucking kidding me, bro?

Pop. Are you… actually listening to what your daughter’s saying here? I know you want to make a statement about your own personal agendas, but your kid is saying, with the exception of the actual words “There are no strong concepts of female role models for my age group.” Did you catch that? Or did you just catch a soundbyte that appeals to your philosophies and move on with your day?

Buy this kid a Ms. Marvel and Spider-Woman action figure and show her that the female characters can be way, way cooler than their male counterparts and skip your dramatic “that’s a good question” closer. You prick.

Pictured: a better role model than Barbie

I think you might also be missing the undertone that, perhaps, your daughter might not be playing for the team you expect her to be playing for in 15 years. Short haircut. Flannel. Not flannel “grunge is back” either. I suggest you give her some nice strong characters to model herself from, so she can develop a concept of positive interactions with others who fulfill social constructs, and she doesn’t become the type of angst-ridden mom that forces her uncomfortable child into a bookstore to attempt a political statement.