Back in the year 2000, Spiderman had been a character in
comics for almost 40 years and people, including the hero’s writers, began to
notice that the character was aging. He was still “the most relatable hero in
comics” and yes, the children who read the comics back in the day have grown up
with him, but writers wanted to attract the attention of kids and teenagers of
today. One way to do this would be to reboot the character. Problem is, 40
years of the character has sparked a lot of fans and to suddenly change that
character and revert him back to his teenage years would be almost insulting to
the readers. So Marvel found a way to successfully reboot the superhero while
still maintaining him at his current age: create a new universe, separate from
the main Marvel world, titled the Ultimate Universe, thus creating “Ultimate
Spiderman”.
Ultimate took a fresh,
modern take on the classic character, reverting him back to his origins and
redefining other key characters such as MJ, Harry Osborn and many others. But
while Spiderman remained the same wisecracking, pure-hearted superhero, most of
the changes revolve around Spidey’s villains. Electro is now completely made of
electricity, Green Goblin is transformed into a hulk/demon-like monster and
Venom’s entire origin relates to Peter’s parents and is not from outer space.
New villains and new characters allowed for fresh takes on classic storylines
from throughout Spiderman’s history including famous story arcs like The Venom
Saga, The Sinister Six and even The Clone Saga. This new universe opened many
opportunities for artist Mark Bagley and writer Brian Michael Bendis. Ultimate
Spiderman lasted 11 years, ending in June of last year and released 160 issues.
Overall, if you are a fan of Spidey and haven’t read the Ultimate books, I
recommend you start. It gives you a look back at his origins along with many
new twists and turns that keep it different from anything we’ve seen from the
character before. Check it out, it’s “Ultimate”.
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