Spider-Man's Greatest Comic is Still The Death Of Gwen Stacy
Spider-Man's greatest comic book moment was the death of Gwen Stacy. In 1973, comic book readers were shaken when Spider-Man's world changed forever in Marvel Comics. Peter Parker had always struggled to balance his private life and his superhero secret identity, but for a while things had seemed to be picking up. In large part that was because artist John Romita, Sr. had joined Amazing Spider-Man, and his experience with romance comics means he rendered the characters very differently. As Sean Howe notes in Marvel Comics: The Untold Story, his Peter Parker was stronger and more confident-looking, while his girlfriend Gwen Stacy became even prettier; as he notes, «She and Mary Jane began competing for Peter's attentions like they were go-go versions of Betty and Veronica.»
And then, in June 1973, Gwen Stacy died. Spider-Man's nemesis the Green Goblin had learned his secret identity, and targeted the people he loved in a way to get at Peter Parker. This culminated in a catastrophic confrontation on the Brooklyn Bridge, and Gwen was knocked off. Spider-Man made a desperate attempt to save the woman he loved, but he was unsuccessful. «The Night Gwen Stacy Died,» a story told in Amazing Spider-Man #121-122, has gone down as one of the most influential comic book stories in history. It's generally seen as the end of the classic Silver Age of comics, and the beginning of the darker, grittier Bronze Age. But why was it so influential?
Related: Marvel's Weirdest Spider-Hero Needs To Be In Across The Spider-Verse
It's because Spider-Man is, at heart, an everyman hero. When Stan Lee and Steve Ditko created Peter Parker, they based him on the kind of people they believed were reading comic books in the first place; a bit of a
Read more on screenrant.com
