Chris Wallace said:
In order to accept your argument we'd have to believe that 3 years of (predominantly) bad writing overrides 40+ years worth of history, & that the way he's been written of late is the norm. I think I speak for everyone who's opposed to the unmasking when I say that doesn't wash. And this is why your arguments are so easily dismissed. It makes no sense. It's like somebody telling me that he wanted to rape my wife & kill my two kids & I told him the best time to catch them-because somebody told me that morally, it was the right thing to do. Especially if I'd already lost a kid or had a girl raped.
Whether it's crappy writing is quite subjective. Sins Past and The Other are probably two most horrible stories to come out in that time period, everything else, in my opinion, has been from pretty good to excellent stories.
All anyone asked for were valid points as to why he's not out of character and I've given them. So, I'll run down them again, also just to spite the person who said, arguement over.
When Tony passed the idea passed Peter about taking the mask off he didn't exactly say, "Oh, Tony that's a great idea...lets roll with that". He THOUGHT ABOUT IT. In fact, while thinking about it he didn't even want to do it. Now I would agree he was out of character if he blindly told Tony, at that exact moment, that he would have done it.
Much like with the new suit that Tony gave him. Peter didn't say, "Oh, this is a GREAT idea Tony, lets roll with it". Peter was rather indifferent about it, considering that he was used to doing his own thing with the cloth suit, but he gave the new one a try...and liked it. I'd consider that out of character if he blindly leapt into the suit without any kind of thought of his own.
Lets now factor into the fold that Spider-Man is apart of the Avengers, one of the worlds most elite team of superheroes in the world. His wife and aunt are now living, rent free, in a lush apartment that they could probably have only dreamed to have been in. Peter Parker is wearing a piece of multi-million dollar piece of equipment given to him by Tony Stark. As a sign of good faith, and to give Peter Parker a front, pre unmasking, to be seen with Stark all the time, he gives Peter a job as his assistant. Free place to live, free kick ass super costume, and a sweet ass job of pretty much doing nothing.
Peter Parker will feel like he owes so much to Tony at this point. Everyone is talking about him being in character and everything...well, the Peter Parker we all know is going to definitely feel like he's in debt to Stark.
Now, The New Warriors, amateurly dive into a fight with dangerous supervillains which causes 600 lives to be lost, and a lot of those lives are children. Now, how would news of something like that affect Peter? While he knows that he's not responsible, knowing that heroes, much like how he used to be in his early years caused this, he's going to have someway to relate to that tragedy.
The Superhuman Registration Act becomes law and the heroes are beginning to get ripped right down the middle. Some are for it, some are against it, some are still not sure what the hell is really going on with it. Peter knows that he's going to have to register with the government and give them his identity. While it would remain secret from the public there are going to be a lot more people who know about it than there was before.
As I said, Tony passes it by him. Peter is now quite conflicted, as anybody would be. A man who has given you so much in so little time is asking you to do the one thing that you thought you'd never have to do, or even wanted to do, ever in your life. There is no doubt in my mind that all his tragedies and all his villains and everything that says he shouldn't do it has popped into his brain.
I believe shinlyle said that the "in character" Peter Parker would have taken his family and have run away. So, it's in Peter Parker's character to just run away from the problem that faces him? So, Peter Parker is a big freakin' coward, huh? I don't remember Peter's character having anything about cowardice.
In comes Aunt May....now suddenly she's out of character too...go figure. The motherly facet of Peter Parker's life. She does exactly what any mother figure would have done in that situation and calmed him down and showed him what was truly important on the inside. That his family was proud of him and they would stand by his decision, and she wanted him to do it. She knows that her nephew, almost son really, is no coward. He was not going to run. And I doubt Peter was going to tell Tony "No" after all that he's done for Peter.
So, he goes out there, sucks it up, and goes through with it. He's not HAPPY about it. Afterward he's puking his guts out and telling Stark that if his family gets hurt that Tony is going to be held responsible. In the limo, after the identity revelation when he's on the phone with Reed Richards and MJ/Aunt May, he's just so numb with the decision that he's made. While his family supports him and Reed Richards supports him it's kind of not really the thing he wanted to hear just then.
While I'll agree that his secret identity is important to him, which was touched on during this whole thing, Peter Parker, nor Aunt May, were written out of character. As I said, people are going to be angry with Peter's decision to unmask, and as I pointed out...that's sort of the point of it all to me. Just like in certain television shows when a character makes a decision or does something crazy, but NOT OUT OF CHARACTER, you say, "You idiot! Why in the hell did you do that?!" How about in your real life, day to day. While you stay true to yourself and who you are sometimes you make a decision based on everything surrounding you, with pressure on your shoulders and you make a dumb decision...and then later you are kicking yourself in the head because Hindsight is 20/20.
And being a COMIC BOOK READER sitting on your couch or chair or whatever way you read your comics, and already being upset with the state of Spider-Man because of a couple really horrible storylines, it's really easy to just say "Oh, he's out of character because 5 years ago he was claiming how important his identity was to him". Now, not Marvel or even myself are saying that his identity isn't important to him. I feel it is and I'm sure Marvel and Quesada and JMS knew it was important to him as well. But under the circumstances of the storyline, the registration act, the death of 600 innocent people due to a bad decision by some other superheroes, and the unbelievable hospitality of Tony Stark...it was simply just boiling up to it. In Peter Parker's shoes, and why I support the decision and enjoy the stories, I would have done the same exact thing. We know Tony Stark is kind of playing him to get the registration act to work, Peter doesn't know that. The writers were pushing it to have Tony do these things, and it's easy for a comic reader, as I've said, to sit judging those decisions.
The unmasking was a stunt to sell books? NOOOO, REALLY?!?! Every shocking thing is to sell books. What do you want them to do...NOT sell comic books? Or bring new interest into the characters? You just want Spider-Man to stay a borefest all the time? Because, no offense here, but if Peter Parker would have said, "Tony, I can't reveal my identity"...that's not as exciting as Peter Parker taking off his mask himself and revealing himself to the entire world. After Aunt May and MJ say they support him in doing it he's just going to go against what the two women in his life have approved him to do? When has he ever done that before? Wouldn't have been very much in character for Peter Parker to have told his Aunt May that she was nuts and needed to get her head checked, though he could have made a joke about it, heh.
I'm giving you all valid reasons, I can't help it that you don't AGREE with these reasons as I've said for the, what feels like, one hundredth time. All I'm getting back is "Yes he is mischaracterized!" "He WOULDN'T do that!" "In Amazing Spider-Man # blah blah blah he said it was important to him!". Yeah, and it still was important to him. But Peter Parker puts people ahead of himself. And a part of the reason, I feel he did this, are for those 600 innocent people that had to die because heroes weren't acting professionally, which once...he himself...was in that type of situation early on in his superhero career. He was taking one for the team.
And, to me, the whole fun of this story is to see the effects of this decision. And maybe Peter Parker will be kicking himself by the end of it and maybe by the end of it he won't. We'll have to see how it all plays out and that's what the fun of it is for me. It's a hell of a lot more exciting than, "Oh, Peter said no...he's sided with Captain America...and...well....um....he's anti-registration...and...ummm....he's fighting Iron Man....and...um....the other registration heroes....and Aunt May and Mary Jane have to now live in crap and not go ANYWHERE AT ALL ANYWAY because the registration heroes will use them against him. But that's more exciting, right?"
Though I guess according to farmernudie I'm still into one of those four categorized choices that he magically had to come up with to justify him being a much better Spider-Man fan than everybody else who doesn't share his opinion.
In comic book time, he hasn't even been on the "New" Avengers for, what, maybe 6 months or so? BULL****. Iron Man did NOTHING for Peter. He was ALREADY a New Avenger when his house burned down. He could have been living in the Tower before, without IM to personally show up at his house... he just didn't know the benefits of his team status at that time. And as far as the suit goes... that is the dumbest excuse for siding with Tony. Because Tony said, oh here's a gift, now Peter feels OBLIGATED to him? WEAK! Any MAN, not male, or boy... any MAN would give up his life for his family, not for an acquaintance. Peter has shown himself numerous times to put his FAMILY first.
I kid.
