Ranking the Spiders in Edge of Spider-Verse

Edge of Spider-Verse is a Marvel Comic Series based on a bunch of different incarnations of Spider-Man. Here I have compiled a list of the Spider-heroes ranked on who deserves to be Spider-Man the most. The main criteria I based this list off were: powers, costume, and the alter-ego beneath the mask.

5. SP//dr

Peni Parker, a young Japanese girl with no powers and no parents. The destiny is strong in this one. Her father (presumably Peter Parker) was the SP//dr until he died. Aunt May and Uncle Ben adopt Peni and tell her that she is the only one that can control the SP//dr because of psychic spider-powers. I would argue that the SP//dr is a lot closer to being an Iron Man than a Spider-Man. It is a suit of armor that is controlled by a spider that is controlled by Peni.

The design of the SP//dr is visually cool to look at but it could have been anyone.

The Universe is similar in a lot of ways to the regular Marvel Universe with a battle between Spider-Droid (I can't keep typing SP//dr) and Mysterio and a Marvel Team-Up with a very cool looking Daredevil. 

The Universe would be cool to explore further but Peni Parker sucks. She was chosen by destiny to control a robot. Why can't they just build a different crime-fighting robot and have anyone but a Japanese school-girl pilot it? Peni makes absolutely no choices in her life, people tell her to be Spider-Man and she does it. Her villains could tell her to throw herself off a bridge and she would do it. I am not saying it was a bad story, it was really good, but Peni is the worst of the Spiders introduced in Edge of Spider-Verse.

4. I Walked with a Spider

What I like about Patton Parnell is that he is an active character. He accomplishes his goals as soon as they become goals. He gets stuff done. What I don't like about Patton is that he is a psycho. Put that guy down.

He gets bitten by a spider and becomes an evil Spider-Man. He keeps his prey preserved in webbing around his basement and eats them when he is hungry. The guy is a freak and is the furthest a Spider can be from being a hero.

But he makes his own choices and actually has powers, so that puts him ahead of Peni.

3. Spider-Man Noir

Spider-Man Noir is such a cool guy. It looks like he put close to zero effort into his costume and that fits his personality. It's dark and that allows him to not draw attention to himself (cougheveryotherSpider-Mancough) and he has a pistol holster. The Peter Parker of Spider-Man Noir is no Super Genius and he still has more sense than most. By having a gun he makes his job that much easier. Why walk up to a Super Villain and punch him when you can just shoot him?

Spidey-Noir still has a hero's heart and cares about his family and doing the right thing. He knows he has to show responsibility without having to take responsibility for everything. 

2. Gwen Stacey: Spider-Woman

 While Spider-Gwen is not the highest ranked Spider in this list, her story has easily been the highlight of Spider-Verse.

Spider-Gwen got bitten by the spider that normally bites Peter Parker. Insecure about being a whiny-bitch, Peter Parker turns himself into The Lizard. Spider-Gwen kills Lizard-Parker and learns a valuable lesson in responsibility, which is... don't kill people? I guess. Overall I like Spider-Gwen's transition from using her powers for fame to using them for heroics. By her killing Lizard-Parker it gives her a much more active role compared to the traditional story. You feel for Gwen because she made the mistake, she didn't let the mistake happen, and she struggles to deal with it. It's awesome.

Spider-Gwen's costume is also amazing. It is a derivative of the traditional Spider-Man costume but it has so much that is unique. The black and white separate her from most other Spiders. Her costume isn't sexualised, you can tell she has boobs but the attention is never drawn to them.

Gwen is truly deserving of being a Spider-Man and her recently announced ongoing series is proof that a lot of people feel the same way.

1. Aaron Aikman: The Spider-Man

Aaron Aikman is a self-made Spider-Man. In every other universe Peter Parker is the Spider-Man. If you were in a comic book and you were named Peter Parker (or a derivative) you could bet that you would be Spider-Man or at least be related to one. Aaron Aikman goes against destiny and makes himself Spider-Man. Aikman is a geneticist that was researching the healing properties of insect DNA and injected himself with some science magic and gained spider-powers. He also invented his own web-shooters, spider-stinger and rocket boots. In the three years Aikman has been Spider-Man he has been continuously refining his armor, weapons and accessories.

The Spider-Man lives in a futuristic version of the 1960's. This can be seen in the style of dress as well as The Spider-Man's Beatles do. The villains in this issue have never been seen as Spider-Man villains in other universes before either. The world is brand new with the only link to other Marvel Universes being that there is a Spider-Man.

Aikman is more deserving of the Spider-Mantle than any other Spider-Man in Edge of Spider-Verse. He continuously tried to better the way he combats crime as well as not just being handed the Spider-Man title from destiny. 

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Superior Spider-Man Discussion

What day is it? The 17th of April? No. No. Get excited. It's fucking Spider-Man day.

Why is it Spider-Man day? Because the second Amazing Spider-Man movie comes out today? Yeah, I guess so. But also. Wrong. Today the final issue of Superior Spider-Man comes out. Man am I pumped. I'm going to buy this bad boy first thing in the morning.

This blog is going to be broken up into two sections. This section, which is sort of an intro-y section and the next section, which is me going on about how great Superior Spider-Man is.

To say I was excited would be a statement.

Dan Slott didn't get me into Spider-Man, that honor goes to Brian Michael Bendis with his Ultimate Spider-Man. But when Peter Parker died I swapped right on over to Amazing with his Big Time run. It was amazing. There was enough of a backlog for me to read up to #698 to get current on Spider-Man and then disaster struck. Peter Parker was dying. For me, Peter Parker was dying again. And I relate to Peter Parker, because everyone does, that's his character. A relatable guy with spider-powers. I just stopped reading Ultimate because Peter Parker was dead and now I had to stop reading Amazing because Peter Parker was dead. And Dr.Octopus was taking over. That fat guy with the stilts for hands. But fuck me swinging. Web swinging. Spider-Ock was awesome. He was a completely different Spider-Man to Peter and he kept it fresh.

It wouldn't be a Spider-Man Day without some music.

Spiderpus would kickass, take names then kick some more ass. He was organised. He protected the whole city, albeit in a totalitarian fashion, but he set out to do what he believed needed to be done to preserve Peter's legacy. And he made friends and enemies and he started having sex with a midget. Spiderpus was very open-minded, and that is what I expect from a super-hero. I think her name was Anne-Marie, which is more creative than Mary Jane. Just.

And he gave himself more powers. He redesigned the spider-suit to give him like, extra vision powers and he had octopus tentacles come out of his back. And he had henchmen and spider-bots and giant spider-bots. He launched an assault on Shadowland, the most powerful organised crime land in the Universe and he barely broke a sweat. He saved lives using synergy and proactivity. He even started a Spider-Man Incorporated.

I know it sounds like I'm taking the piss out of the comic. I am a little bit. But I love it. It is the first series that I have read the entirety of it's run as it came out. As amazing as Amazing Spider-Man was this series is more amazing (can't think of a better word). If you haven't read this series because it has a fat octopus-man in the body of a skinny spider-man then you are doing yourself a huge injustice. As it stands this is one of my favourite comic book series of all time.

It is also the only comic I have ever gotten signed by it's writer. Thank you Dan Slott for making this.

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Follow me on Twitter if you want to talk Spider-Man- @KrisCreedYo

Captain America: Winter Soldier Aussie Thoughts

G'day mate. You've been hurt before. It's ok now. The first Captain America movie was beloved by a lot of people. Those people were Americans. Some other people may have liked it but it was Captain Stars & Stripes the Amazing Patriot VS Nazis. The movie was probably fine I, like all my friends, fell asleep watching it. I still went on movie discussion forums and all I saw was praise for the first Captain America movie. I have since chalked this up to patriotism.

So when the reviews for the second Captain America movie started rolling in positively I had to critically think whether it was going to be a good movie or not. The positive reviews could have been American propaganda for all I knew and expected. Surprisingly though, Winter Soldier was amazing.

The movie expands on the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Not everything is as it seems, which is great for a 70's style action spy thriller modern superhero movie epic. There is corruption within SHIELD and Captain America doesn't know who he can trust, so he trusts the first person he meets after being told not to trust anyone and also he trusts the person he ran past at the beginning of the movie. It is still really cool though.

Comic elements are made more apparent in this movie than the previous Iron Mans and Captain America. Not everything is cemented in reality, thus making the movie a lot more fun than previous movies. The Triskelion from the Ultimate Comics makes an appearance and is moved to Washington DC from New York. Everything makes sense in this movie. Corruption. Super Villains.

This movie could have easily been Agents of SHIELD: The Movie. The plot is SHIELD centric, the villains are villains of SHIELD more than Captain America, though the titular villain does have a lot in common with Cap.

This photo would have worked better in my Zombie Apocalypse/Captain America blog

The casting was perfect. Chris Evans nailed Captain America moreso than the previous movies. Scarlett Johanson provided more depth to the Black Widow. Samuel L Jackson showed Nick Fury as more than the all-knowing badass that he has been depicted as. GHB had an amazing cameo as Batroc the Leaper. Holy Fuck The Winter Soldier was a beast, he was the Terminator mixed with Robocop mixed with Captain America, massive beast. Cobie Smulders was a badass, that Falcon guy was a badass, the badass guy who fought the Falcon was a badass. Any one of these characters could have been swapped with John McClane and the movie would make perfect sense. That is how badass everyone is.

The theme of the movie, Surveillance VS Freedom Cage Match XXX, correlated a lot with what is happening in the real world. It shows insight into Big Brothering the world and whistleblowing. Americans may take more from this movie than the rest of the world but the message is internationally relevant.

With this movie Marvel has expanded the Earth elements of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The world is now being lifted from realism into something a lot more fun. Intrigue, superpowers, super villains. This movie has it all.

If you are wondering whether to see this or the Lego Movie, do yourself a favour and see this one first.

The Rise and Fall of Flappy Bird

The most downloaded mobile game of February 2014 was Flappy Bird. The game was published by .Gear Studios and made by Dong Nguyen. The game was, at most, a fad. Everyone was playing it either to see how bad it was for themselves or the get a new high score, or both.

On the 10th of February creator Dong Nguyen took the game off iTunes and the Google Play Store.

Reports have claimed that Flappy Birds was making $50k on average a day from ad-revenue. Anyone would be ecstatic to be making that much money a day. So why did Dong Nguyen take his game off the market?

Nguyen's Twitter feed suggest he did not take the game down for legal reasons. Some digging around suggests he took the game down due to its addictive nature.

But taking the game offline has not stopped people from finding ways to play it. There are many clones of the game such as Clumsy Bird, Flappy Bird World and Angry Flappy Bird. For people who will accept nothing but the original they can buy an iPhone with the game preloaded on it currently as low as $500AU for an iPhone 3GS.

The moral of the story is that these addicts are going to get their fix, because they are addicts. By removing the game Nguyen is not stopping people from being addicted. The only difference is that now he does not get any extra income from downloads. Nguyen has stated that he likes his life simple and does not need all the money.

What I foresee happening is that the app is only the beginning. By not letting the fad run its course the game will gain a cult-like following. Nguyen stopped the Flappy Bird train while it was at its peak of momentum, the game was only ever going to fade into obscurity over time. By removing the game people will only feel nostalgia for when it was simple to download Flappy Bird.

Within the next 2 years there will either be a Flappy Bird Documentary or a Flappy Bird Movie.

I, for one, hope its a movie.

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Follow me on Twitter @KrisCreedYo