Peter Parker: Being Rich Doesn't Mean Unrelatable

Dan Slott has been working with Peter Parker and the Spider-Man mythos as a whole for a long time now. He's brought us Spider-Island, Superior Spider-Man, Spider-Verse, brought Miguel O'Hara back to the front lines and so much more. It's my favorite Spider-Man run ever. Not everyone agrees. Some people have gone so far as to send him death threats because they didn't like his work. One change that got people really hot under the collar was turning Peter into a multi-billionaire. I'm here to tell you, that might be the greatest change to Peter's character ever.

For as long as I can remember Peter Parker struggled in every aspect of life. He was always on the verge of being evicted from his home. He swore he was in love with Mary Jane, but they never seemed to workout. No matter how much some people swear by this relationship as one of the greatest in comics, it wasn't good for either of them. You want a great relationship in comics? Go look at Ralph and Sue Dibny. Peter didn't have many friends because he wasn't exactly popular. Often people remember Peter as this lovable high school or college kid but he's well beyond high school and he dropped out of college sooner after that. Instead he's resorted to hustling selfies as Spider-Man to the Daily Bugle for just enough money to pay the rent and get a 24 case of ramen.

Instead Dan Slott transitioned Peter to a new lifestyle. Starting with Superior Spider-Man Doc Oct saw how Peter was living and was disgusted, asking Peter "Damn Spider, you live like this?" He finished Peter's college degree with ease, because he's as much a genius as Peter. He started a small startup with Peter's old friends using the funds from Aunt May's retirement. While you may expect Doc Oct to create some crazy weapons and make millions, deep down he knew what Peter was about and the first thing he did was create new prosthetics that helped people like Aunt May suffering from their current ones or others that needed entirely new limbs. He took the company global, putting Peter on the main stage, more than he or Spider-Man had been before.

When Peter returned, he didn't go back to living in a studio apartment. He doubled down, but stayed focused on creating technology that could help people and giving away a ton of money for people that need it more. He bought the Baxter Building because the Fantastic 4 was inactive with Reed and Sue missing. Johnny stormed in ready to fight but when he saw Peter kept it mostly the same in their memory he couldn't do anything but hug him. Peter has sponsored programs to bring entire villages into this century by adding water and electricity. He's given a ton of reformed villains work including letting The Prowler, Hobie Brown work as Spider-Man.

The complaints arise from people claiming that Peter is no different than Tony Stark or Bruce Wayne but they don't realize, there's different kinds of rich people. I've said it before, Tony Stark may have been toned a little down because of the success of the films, but he's still as arrogant as he's always been. Tony does things just to be in the public eye. That's why he loves being a hero, not because he cares about people, but because he can get his face on the news. Peter however kept his secret identity, still tries everything he can think of to dodge press conferences because being on camera makes him nervous and on at least one occasion did one with his zipper down. Despite being rich that trait of his character has not changed. He just wants to help people and doesn't care if nobody ever knows who he is.

Then there's Bruce Wayne. Bruce gives money to charity but nowhere near the levels that Peter does. Bruce doesn't like to be in the cameras but he does anyway because he views Bruce as the mask for Batman. He cuts off people in his personal life if they aren't related to his nights as a vigilante. Peter hasn't done that. He's surrounded himself with people he knew before. Not just people he knew either, some of these were friendships formed by Doc Oct. Batman may do some global missions with the Justice League but he'd be perfectly okay with only protecting Gotham. That's the difference between Batman and Spider-Man. Peter wants to save EVERYONE. Peter let Hobie run around as Spider-Man, kept pestering Miguel until he was Spider-Man again, keeps an eye on Miles as Spider-Man while traveling the globe as Spider-Man because he needs to save as many people as possible.

Peter is still Peter at the end of the day. There's only one real change. Now Peter doesn't struggle day to day. He shouldn't have to either. People like to envision Peter as this young guy struggling to find his own place in the world. Marvel likes to age their characters unlike DC Comics. There's two scales people stick to for that, one year in Marvel is four or five years in real life. Either way, Peter is between 29 and 30. I hope when I'm 30 I'm not struggling to make rent, chasing a woman who doesn't want me and hustling dozens of pictures for a few dollars. Other writers have made Peter older, but Dan Slott made him grow up. Dan Slott made Peter into the adult that he should be.

Some claim that Peter is no longer relatable. Were you only relating to Peter as the nice guy who failed to get the girl and always lost no matter how much he won? That's a stupid thing to relate to. I was under the assumption Peter was relatable because he was always giving it everything he had. I thought Peter was a good hero because he only cared about saving people and making the world a better place, something we should all aim to relate to. If the only thing that made Spider-Man relatable to you is constantly losing at life, you don't know Spider-Man and need to sit down and come up with a plan to win at life. Dan Slott did not ruin Peter by making him rich, if anything he forced Peter do what a lot of us need to do, and that's grow up.

You can hear Darrell on the CP Time and Powerbomb Jutsu podcasts. He also plays classic arcade games on The Cabinet. You can also check out his playthrough of Sleeping Dogs or Skyrim

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