Dragon said:
You have to include Marvel Team-Up, because that was a Spider-Man comic, just as Marvel Two-In-One was a Thing comic. Out of its 150 issue run, maybe 10 issues didn't feature him.
But it was completely random and there were different writers/artists and nothing of significance ever happened in it. There's no way it can hold the same weight as ASM or SSM.
But the point is, in terms of significance, Sandman stands next to Electro and so many others. If you know who Electro is, you know who Sandman is. If you know Electro's early appearances in Spider-Man, you know Sandman's. He's as heavy a hitter in the Marvel universe as Electro or the others. Spider-Man certainly had the same amount of concern over battling him as any of his other major foes.
If you know who The Lizard is, you probably know who Vermin is. Doesn't mean the Lizard isn't a much more important foe to Spider-Man.
Well, the subject of this thread is how "big" Sandman is. The person starting the thread probably assumed that Sandman only fought Spidey, and just a few times, thus believing his significance was low, like a character such as the Looter. Whereas Stan Lee clearly thought Sandman was a great character of considerable power if he'd have him single-handedly defeat the Fantastic Four, and even having him fight the Hulk single-handedly. The fact that he isn't just a Spider-Man foe doesn't take away from his importance.
Obviously he's bigger than like, the Looter, but I'm taking it one step further and qualifying him in terms of other Spider-villains. Like I said, the reason I brought up his numerous other appearances was to show that that one guy's "appearance number" list was bogus if we're talking about his importance to Spidey or as a Spidey villain.
And of course people "consider" him a big gun, that's one of my main points, that he's overrated by people. His worth as a Spider-villain is overrated by people because of ASM#4 and appearing in the first Sinister Six, but he hasn't done anything since then or even appeared very much.
It's not the worst thing in the world. I would rather a villain be overrated because of appearing early than for other reasons (like the Shocker being overrated because he had a cool voice in the cartoon, whereas in the comics he was barely any bigger than Boomerang or the Molten Man.)
Well, again, While I hated the idea of Sandman becoming a hero, the very fact that Marvel figured they could get so much mileage out of him as a hero says something of his importance. And let's not forget he made quite a number of appearances in Spidey's books during that period as well.
"Get so much mileage out of him?" They turned him into a hero because he was a boring villain that they couldn't do anything with except as petty muscle. Then he got boring as a hero as well so they had to change him back. They've gotten mileage out of other villains without turning them into heros. And making appearance in Spidey books as an ally doesn't help his ranking as a Spider-villain...in fact it probably hurts it. I think most people agree that Venom allying with Spider-Man all those times hurt his worth as a villain. The fact that you didn't like it doesn't change the fact that it happened.
Please. I said in one of my previous posts that villains like Ock are ARCHVILLAINS. Not the run of the mill villain-of-the-month, but really the heroes' mirror-image. I would never suggest that Sandman is that for Spidey. But he is an important character in the Spider-Man and Marvel mythos.
I put the "Vulture is more important than the Tarantula" in there because I thought you'd respond with something like "Well GG/Ock/Venom are like the ARCHVILLAINS of Spidey, they don't count, but everyone after them is the same." I'm qualifying him in terms of the others. Of course people "consider" him important because he appeared in ASM#4.
Well, I keep saying that Sandman isn't strictly a Spider-Man villain (And again, neither is Electro) but he is a Spider-Man villain. And, you can answer your own question. Did Jimmy Olsen fight and defeat Darkseid? Did Darkseid have to regroup and come up with a new scheme in order to defeat his sworn enemy, Jimmy Olsen? Not quite the same parameters.
Of course he didn't! You're HELPING my point! I mentioned the fact that Darkseid first appeared in a Jimmy Olsen comic to point out that your qualifications (of a villain "having to have his first appearance in that person's comic") were not valid.
Well, if you really need to play with semantics to make your point...It was an annual, a special event. And it stacks up against much of the multi-part arcs being produced to today.
Play with semantics? I was pointing out that your qualifications were arbitrary, and ironic since Sandman didn't even fit that category.
No. Swarm is not a great villain.
BUT HE'S A MAN MADE OF FREAKING BEES! FRIKKIN BEES, MAN!
t:
Electro hand 4 single appearances. Sandman had 3 (ASM #4, Marvel Team-up #1 and ASM #154). And he had even more appearances as a member of the evil FF. He was utilized because he was seen as being a great asset to the stories. If they felt as highly of Electro (And there's no reason why they shuldn't have) they'd have found a way of using him (They had him create his own team to fight DD). And if Sandman wasn't turned into a hero, they'd have used him as well, since they looked for every opportunity to cram him into stories, even unbelievably making him an Avenger.
I don't see your point here. "They would have found a way to use Electro?" They have found SEVERAL ways of using Electro as a villain, all the way from 1964 to the present. And he even joined the evil FF at one point, after kicking the asses of the other three.
Well, the person who started the thread, being that he placed it in THIS forum, must have at least figured there was some connection between his importance in the comics and to why he'd be chosen as a villain for this movie.
But it doesn't change his worth as a Spider-villain.
No. There's simply bad writing- whereas Peter is told to his face that someon killed his daughter and he does nothing. And there's things that are merely "a day in the life of"... And that he deals with and moves on to the next day.
If you think these things are unimportant, then the occasional Sandpunch must be REALLY unimportant.
I still want you to defend yourself for calling murder of the elderly an "adventure," you sicko.
Well considering that most of that period is forgotten by fans and industry folk alike, I think Sandman feigning being on the side of the angels in order to place himself in a position to fulfill more grandiose schemes (He was bodyguarding a Senator. He might have eventually gotten close to the President) is a stronger argument than being subject to the Wizard's "Mean machine".
Now this paragraph is just bizarre. A "stronger argument?" WTF? It's not up for debate! We SAW him get hit by the Wizard's machine. There was a whole backup story devoted to it. It's not up for debate, that IS what happened to make him evil again.
And then AFTER that happened and he became evil again, he pretended to be on the good side for one more issue for the Senator thing. The Wizard machine thing happened BEFORE the Senator stuff.
It doesn't make sense that he would "pretend" to be a good guy for 20 years. For one thing, how would he know 20 years ago that he would be protecting a Senator? But more importantly, we saw tons of internal monologues from him during those 20 years where we were privy to his thoughts, usually stuff like "It's hard being a hero, but I cant go back, I've made a new life for myself..." etc.
And he is. Like I said, the one starting the thread clearly has limited knowledge of Sandman's criminal career and didn't know that he fought others aside from Spider-Man. Now he knows. End of story.
My argument is that his worth as a Spider-villain is overrated because of his first appearance in 1963 when he hasn't really done anything as a strictly Spider-Man villain since then, except for a couple issues with the Frightful Four and one more solo villain appearance (and apparently a couple issues of Marvel Team Up.)
