As pointed out by Sean Collins of Robot 6 via Corey Blake, Mark Millar’s best comic ever is seeing print in 2011. That’s right: Trouble is making it’s way to shelves in hardcover!
If you haven’t read this comic, then you are probably unsure of what you’re missing. In 2003, Marvel revived the Epic imprint with the idea that it could a) revamp Spider-Man’s origin with Mark Millar and b) create a succesfull romance/young adult comic. What we got was Trouble (pun intended), a comic by Mark Millar with art by the Dodsons (Terry and Rachel), starring two young girls who go on vacation to work at a hotel (similar to the plot of Dirty Dancing) where they meet two young boys and sparks fly. Of course, that’s just the tip of that iceberg.
The reason fans have such a reaction to Trouble is two big things. The first is that the covers of the single issues, based on the content inside, was borderline inappropriate – especially since the story revolved around the legally termed “statutory rape” (i.e. when one participant of a specific act is below the age required to legally consent to the behavior, or 18 years of age). I mean, just take a look here to the right at that cover. Does that strike you as something appropriate for a comic book with adult content geared towards young adults? Granted, we all know that kids are going to have sex if they want to, but that certainly didn’t help the case of the comic which promoted rather rampant promiscuity. However, the second thing (and oddly enough, the bigger thing) was that the characters in question were actually Peter Parker’s parents as well as his aunt and uncle, and the big twist of the story is that Peter is actually Aunt May’s child.
Needless to say, the fan reaction wasn’t positive. I won’t even begin to get into the continuity/timeline errors presented by this story.
However, what I will say is that if you want to read it, the good news is that it’ll be out June 28th, 2011! You can pre-order right here! The other good news is that if you DO want to read a good young adult revamp of Spider-Man’s origin, there is always Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane.
