Ignoring Felicia's character assassination Why did Silk get ongoing series and not Black Cat

I've heard many people say that Cindy improved dramatically once she was out of Slott's clutches and I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt that she has become a good character but Silk was given an ongoing and it was revived after Secret Wars and given an absurd ammount of promotion between Spider-Verse, the Spider-Women crossover and the Spider-Fly effect for a character that let's be honest no one asked for, came out of nowhere and had a lot of creepy sexual stuff in her contrived beginning.

Why should characters like Felicia be derailed for no other reason than to accomadate Silk first as a potential love interest for Peter then as a new solo character in desperate need of a rogues gallery when characters like Felicia have long established histories and are very popular have never really been granted more than infrequent mini-series? I mean isn't that unwarranted creative enslavement for Felicia to have been put in the situation she's still in?

I'm not saying I want Felicia to have her own title I never have certainly not in her current state and we need half of the spin offs and satellites currently in print to be cancelled anyway but the question remains.

@knightwriteri:

Who knows, there might be a revenue participation program at Marvel for creators to receive royalties when their creations are used. It might not be right across the board, but there might be some incentives in place negotiated through contracts.

So it may even depend on what contracts were signed at the time of Black Cat's creation by Keith Pollard & Marv Wolfman, or contracts that were negotiated in the years since the work has been completed.

In Slott's case, he simply wants a piece of the monetary action. If he has struck a deal, then the more his creations are used, the more royalties he recieves.

I absolutely agree about Slott he told someone who accused him of being in it for the money to go fuck himself a couple years back but if you actually examine the overall pattern of Slott's run it's always been to destroy, exile or twist beyond recognition every preexisting element of Peter's world brick by brick and replace it all with a royalty check producing monument to his own glory. This is why he's so protective of his love interests because he wanted Carlie and later Silk to be put in Mary Jane's spot as Peter's wife so he'd make money off of them for years/decades and why maintaining his directions and legacy are so important. His retirement plan is dependant on eliminating as much of previous writers work as possible and becoming the sole defining voice on the character for all future writers to follow.

It's true creating the dominant love interest in a comic book franchise is as much a financial victory for writers as a creative one royalty checks are by their very nature a motivator to replace the most important and reccuring character niches in a narrative and it becomes difficult for the less talented opportunist not to annoy the readers with endless mary/gary stu shilling in the desperate hopes we'll embrace them.

But because the motive is easy money they can never match characters that were crafted from a more creative spirit.

Maybe nobody had a plan for a Black Cat series, it could be that simple.

Sacasa loved Black Cat and used her post OMD you're telling me he didn't pitch a Black Cat series?

I highly doubt an absence of direction or plans was the motive given that Slott wanted to kill Felicia off in Ends of The Earth but wasn't allowed and had to use Sable instead. The guy clearly doesn't like Black Cat for the same reason he doesn't like Mary Jane she's a strong and popular preexisting character. What Slott did with her in Superior and ASM vol 3 was a blatant attempt to alienate the character from the audience so there would be no distractions from Silk. Observe how closely timed it is to the events in Superior #31 and ASM vol 3 #1-3 where Slott exiled MJ for the same reason to clear the runway for Peter/Cindy which never even went anywhere because even editorial realized fans wouldn't embrace a relationship built on sex pheremones.

And while I'm at it what an absolute hypocrite Slott years back he vetoed Peter/Carol Danvers because it was against the spirit of spiderman apparently for him to date someone with powers and would make him Peter Parker less of the time yet he eliminated Peter for 30+ issues when made Octavius Spider-Man and he was totally fine with the idea of Peter being in a relationship with his own super duper spider powered creation Silk calling her The Spider Bride no less.

• But because the motive is easy money they can never match characters that were crafted from a more creative spirit.

How incredibly true.

@knightwriteri: Yes, that is exactly what I am telling you.

I don't think Slott hates Black Cat, he has used her in his Spider-Man run, including her being a main character in the Big Time story arc. Why would Slott want to alienate Black Cat so she does not steal focus, when he could just not use her? I don't think that is the reason.

Are we just going to ignore all the times Slott has used strong, popular pre-existing characters?

Slott might have changed his mind about the Superhero dating thing, but I get your point.

@kcomicfan: Slott Made Black Cat light an apartment on fire with hostages inside that she tied up and left there. Black Cat would never do something like this yet there we are...reading a few pages of her doing this to Aunt May and her new Husband.

Slott knows full well Felicia would'nt do these things, he even has Spidey say as much in the stories (and so did Conway during "Spiral"), he's just of the opinion Felicia decided she had way too many bad days and snapped. Is it b.s? Of course it is, some CBR pundits have even speculated it has a lot to do with her bad luck powers "corrupting her", there's always an "out" for actions like this, but Marvel want to keep pressing fans buttons by not putting their finger on the pulse of what they want.

So? That does not prove that he hates Black Cat.

@kcomicfan: Well it's showing he can't write characters well. Everyone in his run is so out of character its not even funny. Felicia is just one of many he can't seem to understand and can't write.

I disagree. Firstly, as I said above Slott wrote Felicia really well in the Big Time story arc. Secondly, hardly anybody in Slott's run is written out of character. And finally there are many characters that Slott understands and can write, and Felicia is one of them.

She was the one he wanted to kill in Ends of the Earth originally, not Sable.

are people just trying to find reasons to hate slott? he propelled spiderman forward in ways no one has since peter had 'the other' powers. people were saying that he hated peter for some reason, and now peter seems to be in every single comic book. i am waiting for him to somehow show up in the superman/woderwoman comic book. sometimes things are just the way they are. felicia has always towed the line between hero and villain. let's see where he goes with this story line.

Do we know that Slott wanted to kill Felicia just because he hates her?

The pattern always seems to hold that marvel staff that oppose MJ take a rather dim view to Felicia because the treatment of Felicia has always been directly related to Peter's marital status that is if Peter's married to MJ it's totally cool for Black Cat to be portrayed as a strong character and partner for Spider-Man (plus her moral alignment was still quite gray but far whiter during most of the marriage than before and after) in fact the more positive the portrayal the better because it leaves some asking why Peter's not with Cat instead of his wife but Editorial never has wanted Peter with Black Cat they hate her for the same reason as Mary Jane the inability to accept strong non disposable love interest so the tolerance they manifest towards her only exist when Peter isn't free to date before the marriage and after she's pretty much been in the center of Marvel's shooting gallery.

Note the damage inflicted on her character from the OMD/OMIT mind wipe itself and the ongoing reductive flanderization/oversexualization that's plagued her for much of her history but never as significantly as BND-Now The very best the reader could have hoped for before Superior is the occasional team up and anonymous mask sex. Now she has to routinely try to kill anyone in a spider themed costume.

How did Sable die? She was drowned just like Black Cat was twice in her early appearances.

Not really. He's "propelled him forwards" through unnatural and underhanded means that go against his credo of responsibility.

And Slott makes it pretty easy for people to find reasons to hate him...dodgy understanding of the characters, mistreatment of them, portrayal of Peter as a man-baby, woefully and objectively bad writing, storylines that have virtually no real pay-off, the fact he's a prick online etc. I could go on, but if you're blind to all of that, there's no hope for you.

^^This^^

Hey I liked Horizon Labs initially Big Time had a lot of promise five years ago I praised Dan for salvaging the title but Slott is Slott the title briefly improved because we had one bad writer (that hadn't yet become creatively exhausted) working in a singular direction not a half dozen each with their own.

And I was a very forgiving reader before Superior #9 but I realized I wasn't doing the character any favors you praise garbage you get garbage that's how it goes. And when I approached him online with a borderline masochistic level of politeness over Superior he mocked and bullied me online and of course accused me of being Douglas Ernst because for years Slott has tried and failed to psychologicaly insulate himself from perceiving his run for what it is by attempting to persuade himself and others that there are only three or four people on this earth that aren't fond of his work and they have nothing better to do with their lives than set up hundreds of dummy acconts to troll him.

@knightwriteri: Wow...that sounds like a guy you do not wanna talk to. Who is Douglas Ernst?

Also, its said that the Editors have also had enough with Slott and have shared their frustrations on twitter. Rumors state they will be replacing Slott with Bendis

But to just kill off female characters like that just makes Slott another 'Stuffed in fridge' writer which people are tired of. I'm glad that Black Cat was not chosen to die since she is such a big part of the Spiderman Stories...at least she was.

And yeah, I am kinda bitter they give the newly created character her own comic book and not choose any other Spiderman Character. Cloak and Dagger, Green Goblin, Black Cat, we have tooooons and they choose Slott's new creation.

In my opinion, Nick Lowe should have made Slott use Jessica Drew(616) instead of allowing him to upstage him with the creation of Silk, which is a direct copy of Bendis UU Spider-Woman. This way we could have finally seen Jessica and Peter working together against The Black Cat and Electro. It could have gotten the readers to get to know Spider-Woman and prepare them for her upcoming series. It would had made an excellent platform for Nick Lowe to use to introduce Jessica Drew to The Amazing Spider-Man readers who might not have followed up on her adventures.

What might had been cool to also see is Felicia Hardy and Jessica Drew working together as Partners in their new Hardy & Drew Private Investigations, Inc.

@itsaworld: Douglas Ernst is a conservative blogger who post articles on politics and pop culture especially with Marvel and DC he's been critical of Slott since Ends of The Earth and Slott is obsessed with him.

He's a writer, works for a newspaper and has a very interesting blog on all sorts of topics. My favorite topic is his very astute and on point critique of Spider-Man books.

https://douglasernstblog.com/2016/04/13/dan-slotts-peter-parker-im-an-idiot-fans-wonder-when-recurring-theme-will-end/

@zariusii: there is no way that you can say that Peter is going against his credo of responsibility. Every comic is loaded with it. I can't respond to your "underhanded" comment. I have no idea what that means.

^^^^^ THIS ^^^^^

• He's "propelled him forwards" through unnatural and underhanded means that go against his credo of responsibility.

The whole Doc Ock mind-swap nonsense was just one unnatural and underhanded, i.e. (sly and deceptive) manner in which to undermine Spider-Man's uniqueness as a formidable, resourceful and independent super-hero.

In just a short eight months, Pete's a CEO of an international company founded by Doc Ock. That's another unnatural and underhanded, i.e. (dishonest and sneaky) way to further diminish Pete's credibility of any remnants of responsibility. Pete is such a genius, but he has a lab full of scientists and technicians doing all the work for him. Why does he need a cast of underlings to help him get out of sticky situations?

ASM #4 featured the time a child had to clue Spider-Man in on how to stop a terrorist attack.

Peter Parker can run calculations in his head that would allow him to enter earth's atmosphere as a human meteor, but he doesn't know how to convert kilometers to miles???

Spider-Man is an idiot and Doc Ock as the Living Brain is one smart robot. YAWN! More proof Spider-Man is an ineffectual fool under Slott's tenure.

This list can go on and on revealing flaws in Spider-Man's character (because there are many) but with me, more than anything, is Slott's campy immature writing style. The stories lack plausibility and they lack a mastery of writing techniques. It's all very humdrum, cheap and dumb.

The problem is that you have it backwards. Cindy Moon wasn't just introduced to ASM for story reasons, she was introduced soley because they wanted to give her a solo series. So even though I like her solo series, I acknowledge that her creation was just to have a more diverse line up of books. Luckily her story has been fun to read.

They should have used Jessica Drew instead of creating another Spider-Woman character whose character powers are based on Ultimate Spider-Woman. This way, fans would have been better acquainted with Jessica Drew going forward in her solo series. If Nick Lowe wanted to have as many readers to support Spider-Woman's solo series, he should not have approved on the go ahead for Silk. One Spider-Woman is enough, which is Jessica Drew.

To be fair, the Silk book is pretty good. It seems the character is much better with a different writer.

Let's not have this conversation again. I think it's better that Jessica Drew has little to do with Spider-Man/Peter Parker. Also there's a million spider-people, its clear Marvel doesn't know how many spider-men and women to have.

That's for sure. It's strange that Slott created her, and made her so unlikeable in ASM. In her solo series however, she's a lot more developed and interesting to read. I'm sure many people didn't jump on to her solo after Slott's version leaving a poor taste in their mouth, can't say I blame them though.

Black Cat isn't that interesting or a good character for an ongoing series, she's pretty unoriginal in what to do with hero without it ripping of standard Street Level context and Catwoman. It would be another street level superheroine title with barely enough presnetation to outsell c list titles, Silk is easier because she's new take on the spider girl image and is asian and spunky. Plus Spider people are generally more exciting to watch fight than normal street level badasses.

@slimebeherit said:

@darthfury78 said:

@slimebeherit said:

The problem is that you have it backwards. Cindy Moon wasn't just introduced to ASM for story reasons, she was introduced soley because they wanted to give her a solo series. So even though I like her solo series, I acknowledge that her creation was just to have a more diverse line up of books. Luckily her story has been fun to read.

They should have used Jessica Drew instead of creating another Spider-Woman character whose character powers are based on Ultimate Spider-Woman. This way, fans would have been better acquainted with Jessica Drew going forward in her solo series. If Nick Lowe wanted to have as many readers to support Spider-Woman's solo series, he should not have approved on the go ahead for Silk. One Spider-Woman is enough, which is Jessica Drew.

Let's not have this conversation again. I think it's better that Jessica Drew has little to do with Spider-Man/Peter Parker. Also there's a million spider-people, its clear Marvel doesn't know how many spider-men and women to have.

All I was saying is that Jessica Drew could fit into Spider-Man's world long before Slott took over the book. It was Nick Lowe's idea to have Jessica in Peter's world. Yet, he allows Slott to create a character who took the thunder away from Jessica Drew with a creation that is based on Ultimate Universe Spider-Woman, which he should have rejected. Spider-Woman(616) could have been featured in the first 6 issues of ASM vol. 3 instead of Silk. This might have introduced Jessica to the ASM audience who might not have followed her adventures in the past.

@darthfury78: This only makes me like Silk even more. Cindy took the bullet so that Jessica Drew may live on and not be bogged down by Spider-Man/Peter Parker problems. Good job Silk!

It stinks and annoys me to this day. It was crap when it was started and is crap now. That whole "Oh Felicia is my favourite character" crap spat out by them showed me that they know it's a bad idea and yet are doing it anyway.

Hopefully it will soon be dropped and forgotten about and Felicia can be back to normal.

Is the book selling in the same manner as ASM? Are the ASM supporting either Silk or Spider-Woman? Spider-Woman and Captain Marvel are part of the Spider-Man office. The creation of new characters based on generic ones is not an original concept. Besides that, Silk never liked Peter to begin with in contrast to Jessica Drew.

@darthfury78: It will never sell in the same manner as ASM. Well Silk is basically dealing with all of Spider-Mans supporting characters, so yeah, it is. So are you gonna start arguing that Captain Marvels book needs Peter/SP now? Silks creation was one of the greatest examples of a shoehorned character I've read in recent history, but that doesn't prevent me from enjoying the character. Yeah, it's a bit of a stretch to say that Jessica likes Peter.

Anyways congratulations and derailing yet another topic to your Spider-Woman x Spider-Man fanfic. See, you next time Jessica Drew is mentioned in anything...wait a minute this was a Silk thread...please stop.

The Felicia character Assassination is still continuing in the Miles story I see :(

I actually like the current Felicia Hardy. At least she's not doing the same old thing that reminds me too much of Catwoman. If that story about her dying is true than imo this is a better fate for her character. If writers can't do much with someone resulting in them killing them off then well something needs to change for them. I know unpopular opinion, but the evil Black Cat is cool to me.

I think it's entirely possible Felicia's fate after "Ends of the Earth" could well have been the same as Sables, with Julia Carpenter assuring Peter she was alive and her story was not over, and that she had a different sort of destiny. We'll never know what Felicia's real fate would have been since Mephisto altered reality and everyone's personalities.

There's nothing too wrong with Felicia's turn in concept, more in execution. It goes against her established history and changing it up just because you're tired of "routine" is not the best motivation. Selina became a queenpin herself, but lost no traits that made her likeable.

Well I suppose her Heroes For Hire phase could have been more acceptable by everyone. I just think if her relationship with Peter goes nowhere they should not be together. Heck I'm enjoying Cindy and Felicia's role as mentor and student more than Felicia trying to kill Peter. She should be more about ruling her gang than petty revenge.

Cause Marvel's all about diversity now. How often do you see a female chinese super hero have there own title in marvel comics?

Especially since Silk's powers are based on an existing character: Ultimate Universe Spider-Woman. Not so original.

@speckoh said:

Yeah, Marvel's trying a little too hard on being diverse. But just to let you know, Silk is Korean American.