Turn Off the Dark sheds some light on Spider-Man

    I finally got around to seeing Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, and I left there thinking the following about it:

• The story needed work.
• The musical numbers were a little longer than I'm used to ( I don't like musicals)
• Most importantly...none of that matters because it was still amazing!!!

    Before I continue, I have to let you know that I pretty much grew up reading The Amazing Spider-Man, Web of Spider-Man, and Spectacular Spider-Man.  I got into Spidey watching a Saturday morning cartoon entitled Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, which introduced me to the Marvel Universe.  It was through Spider-man I met the X-men, The Hulk, and The Punisher as well as some really epic stories that helped shaped my young mind and know the difference between right and wrong.  Watching Peter Parker struggle through college, with money, maintaining a relationship and marriage was a good introduction to what life would be like as an adult.  Towards the early 90's when all the good artists were leaving Marvel to go elsewhere, and I started growing up and being interested in other things I stopped reading about Spidey. 

    Fast forward some years later, I see a news article that Spider-Man has unmasked!  This was like real news, in the comic book world a hero revealing his identity has unmasked.  I had to know what was going on and rushed to the nearest comic shop to catch up with my old friend.  I find out about Marvels Civil War story line and am immediately hooked back into comics.  Being an adult with a job I subscribe to all things Spider-man and find out while I was growing up so was he.  He acquired some new abilities, marriage is solid, and he's got some new friends too. 

   Then something odd happened, in 2007 I was fallowing a storyline that had Spidey in a real bad place. He was on the run, only his wife and Aunt by his side and not many others he could trust. Something happened...all of the sudden...Marvel gets bought by Disney and some genius decided to hit rewind on Spider-Man and erase the last 30 or so years.   As far as I was concerned they killed my hero and I was done with comics.

   This past weekend, my girlfriend picked up tickets for the musical because we had been planning to see one for a while.  I was already expecting it to be lousy, even when it began I was thinking "This is dumb..." until MJ says to Peter Parker "See ya later Tiger".  I got hit in the gut with nostalgia almost immediately but calmed down since I am not a big fan of musicals to begin with.  Once the action started and a real life Spider-Man swung towards me I was as gitty as the kid that watched the Saturday morning cartoons again.  he was all over the place, all at once, and I was amazed.  The music even stuck with me afterwards.  The following day I was on line looking for trades of the Spidey stories I remember most and re-reading the stuff I already had.  I think it is safe to say I loved the show and would highly recommend it to anyone who was pissed about the Brand New Day story line that I feel killed my old friend.  It takes about ten guys to portray our "Friendly Neighborhood Spider -Man" and they show you that when its over and you come back to your present age but its good to feel like a kid every now and then.

Catch it if you can

'Nuff said!