Broken Frontier

Transplant Peter Parker’s story into another time and would you still get the familiar tale you know and love? Perhaps. Perhaps not.

Noir has its roots in the "hardboiled" school of crime and detective fiction often found in the pulp magazines as well as movies based upon that fiction and style. Film added an extra layer; as noir fiction played on the light and dark in the human soul, movies gave the characters literal light and dark – playing with shadows and light. What makes a good person? Is it possible to be both "bad" and "good" at the same time? Where are the lines that people will not cross and where are the lines they will? This is what noir explores and this is what Marvel Comics is now attempting with a limited series of "noir" stories taking familiar characters and dumping them into an entirely different landscape. It is not such a new idea – DC had been doing it for years with their "Elseworlds" stories – but the key all lies in the execution.

1933 and Daily Bugle photographer Ben Urich meets Socialist crusader May Parker and May’s young nephew, Peter. The family has been shadowed by tragedy since May’s husband Ben was mysteriously killed – although it is no mystery to the Parker family. New York is a corrupt place and no one is more corrupt than mob boss Norman "The Goblin" Osborn. Peter wants justice and Urich hopes to protect Parker from the Goblin’s men but has he only given the boy the tools that will put him in harm’s way? And how can he hope to protect someone else when his own heavy secrets may end up putting himself six feet under.

Like I said, the key to noir lies in the execution. Writers David Hine and Fabrice Sapolsky really do have the laundry list of noir staples: A crusading newspaper, a generally good guy with an Achilles heel, injustice, a seemingly untouchable mob boss with a corrupt city government in the palm of his hand, and a time period when there was immense suffering. But just because they have all the pieces does not mean that they fit together correctly. For one thing, I’m not sure that noir itself works well for a character like Spider-Man. Peter Parker has always been Marvel’s "loveable loser" – the guy that bad stuff always happens to but somehow he manages to keep his wit and good humor and always bounces back. Here Peter is darker, edgier, less witty, and a lot less "loveable loser". The other problem comes with the writers trying to shoehorn some of Marvel’s famous villains into more real-world roles. For example, Kraven the Hunter becomes Kraven – former circus animal trainer. It comes across feeling forced and a bit silly inside a story that is otherwise rather grounded, dark, and bleak. I will, however, give Hine and Sapolsky credit for including some very real-world elements from the time period which really serve to give the tale as a whole a sense of time and place. 1933 was still close to the start of the Great Depression and transforming the Parker family into Socialist radicals with a faintly Communist air (before Communism was considered "all bad") who operate a soup kitchen and homeless shelter is a brilliant touch. Also, having Urich assigned to photograph and catalogue the hunger and the low conditions people suffered with at the time period gives the tale some heart and soul.

The biggest problem with this comic is with the art by Carmine Di Giandomenico. Di Giandomenico has a unique style and it is, overall, quite good, but it just feels all wrong for the story. His backgrounds are wonderful here but the rough edges, slightly elongated figures, and thick, heavy lines combined with the bright colors look entirely too modern for this story. It is too bright, too colorful and not quite shadowed enough to fit the story. This is not a slam against his work, in a modern set story it would be perfectly fine but the tone is just not right for a 1930’s noir tale.

Spider-Man: Noir is an interesting experiment but the noir style fits awkwardly on a character like Spider-Man and there is something that still feels "pain-by-numbers" about the story as a whole. On top of all that, the $3.99 price tag seems a bit too steep for something that may turn out to be nothing more than an interesting experiment.