May 2025 -- I Got Ahead!
Hi!
We're approaching the end of May, so it seems like the perfect time to look back at how the month has gone, both personally and professionally.
Patreon Changes
Some housekeeping up front: I'm changing the way that some of the rewards work on my Patreon. (If you don’t know that I have a patreon, you can find it here: https://www.patreon.com/c/everyspidermanever)
If you're supporting me at any level above 'Just Thanks' you'll have your name in the credits, with producer getting much more prominence. I've already sent out messages to those who will soon find their names featured in June videos.
Also, this newsletter is going out to all followers -- both paid and free -- because I think it's a nice way to share what I'm doing. It's also going out via Buttondown (hello!), which has been very neglected (read: I wrote one newsletter, years ago).
Getting Ahead
May was a month that I got ahead.
I've never been much of a planner. It's not in my DNA. My almost-certainly-ADHD-but-need-to-get-diagnosed personality meant that I did/do most things the moment before they need to be handed in. I can kid myself that I just work best under pressure, but the truth is that I just don't work without it and it often means shoddy work or missed deadlines.
But in May, like I said, I got ahead.
By the end of this month, I will have scripted and recorded all six videos that I'm releasing in June. By the end of the first week, I hope to have edited and released all six videos for June. My hope then -- and I worry about putting this out there -- is that all of July's videos will be done before I even start July.
It's a freeing feeling to be this far ahead. I wish someone had told me sooner. I feel like I can take my time when edited or writing, that I can go for a second pass or a third take. I think the work is better because I'm not against a clock.
Which isn't to say there aren't downsides. When videos have been programmed way ahead of time, they don't have as much impact as when they finally release, for one thing. If I'm battling against the clock to release something, there's a sweet, sweet injection of dopamine at the end of it all.
Right now, there's nothing. So I need to work something out there, to celebrate each video releasing.
I also need to work out the right amount of ahead to be, because I should be taking time to work on those bigger videos, but my brain just goes "more ahead!" and I want to forge ahead with the normal weekly recaps rather than focus any time anywhere else.
Reading Spider-Man Comics
For 2025, my aim is to read four comics a day. Continuing the theme of being ahead, I could stop reading through all of June and still be on track with that target. Current count for the year is 737 comics read (in 2022, I read 717 ALL YEAR!).
Last month I said that the Clone Saga has just started. This month it has continued and continued and continued.
There is really good stuff in there. Spider-Man: The Lost Years is a real stand-out for example. It shows what Ben Reilly and Kaine -- two clones of Peter Parker -- were doing during the time they were gone. It's drawn excellently by John Romita Jr and written by JM DeMatteis, who seems to be the only writer that fully understand how narratively interesting the clones are.
But outside of the good stories, the general arc of the Clone Saga is that they want to narratively retire Peter Parker so that he can go be married and have a kid with Mary Jane, and sub in cool Ben Reilly. Which makes sense as a narrative thing they should do. Ben Reilly is cool.
But to achieve this, they reveal that Peter Parker is NOT in fact Peter Parker, but is in fact a clone and that Ben Reilly is actually the real Peter Parker, and I think that decision alone kinda deflates the whole thing. Because what, we haven't been following Peter for twenty years?!
What Else?
I spend a bunch of my online time in a discord for Video Essayists. Mostly that's just hanging and sharing ideas, but sometimes I have a change to help with other projects. Fugue State Waltz is one such project, a visual poem about memory and family and loss. It's a beautiful piece of work that didn't really find an audience, and I think it deserves to be seen more. My assistance was minimal -- a different order for some lines, and some tighter editing -- but I'm proud to have helped in any way to get this made.
I also did some line-reads for Did Disney Makes Star Wars Just Like Marvel?, an essay about how Lucas replicated some of the Marvel Method when making Star Wars. I play George Lucas here.
I've been watching and loving Poker Face season 2. For those who aren't aware, Poker Face is an episodic detective show following Charlie Cale (played by the ever-watchable Natasha Lyonne) who can detect whenever anybody tells a lie. Like Columbo before her, the episodes are structured so that you discover who did it first, and then learn how Charlie gets involved. Like with everything else that Rian Johnson is involved in, it's a real delight of a show, and something that I can lean back and trust that the people involved just...know what they're doing.
Last month I teased something that I was working on in private. I'm still not going to reveal it, although work is happening behind the scenes. But what I WILL do is also tease SOMETHING ELSE secret that I'm working on: a pilot for an idea I have and a way to interview comic folks in a more unique way. More info soon!
Coming Soon…
June is entirely Amazing Spider-Man, with the following releases coming:
5th June: Amazing Spider-Man #77
12th June: Amazing Spider-Man #78
19th June: Amazing Spider-Man #79
26th June: Amazing Spider-Man #80
If you get bonus videos, you'll also have a video where Sandman helps to kill the Fantastic Four, and one in which Loki races Thor in a weird dimension.
I have also finally cracked what I want to do with the next video essay -- How to Kill Spider-Man -- but that will not be releasing in June. I've set a (reasonably) firm deadline for the beginning of July, in time for James Gunn's Superman, so watch out for it.
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But that's it for this month. Hopefully Junes brings you joy and exciting stories to tell.
You're all amazing.