The riffing rule of thumb tends to be that it takes quite a bit of skill to effectively riff on something that’s actually good; the exception of this rule seems to be when riffing something that was good fifty years ago, but nowadays is a little dated. My favorite riffs in this video are the “suck it, English Majors!” joke and the notion that glasses are just standard issue for all nerds that can you can just choose not to wear.

That's not to say, of course, that it doesn't take quite a bit of skill to do what you do anyway, or that Amazing Fantasy #15 wasn't the greatest thing since magical radiation.

Well, at least it won't happen again in the future!

...right?

No bonesaw? that's not right.

Also, why on earth would they make characters so lovably CREEPY!? Uncle Ben is pretty much the 60's father, but of course, it's creepy and they play it off like nothing.

Either way, really funny, keep up the awesome work! "Long Underwear Characters" or not!

Ah, you still managed to work in a Patton reference...this is why we love you Linkara

And don't feel bad for Uncle Ben, he had stage 1 Youngblood's disease. It's actually better this way.

It's hard to believe that the disease was still taking a hold over characters even before Youngbloods or their disease were even widely known. This is truly one horrifying disease to go undetected for so long.

Seriously though, good review Linkara. I agree that the comic looked pretty good, even today, although you still managed to make it funny. Loved the Patton and The Room references, although you should probably be careful with that second one. I'm interested to see our next character for Secret Origins Month.

That's nothing. There was even reverse Youngblood's Disease. Did ya see Spidey's face in the panel where it revealed the murderer?
Not to mention, his mask webbing looks like a floral design. ^_^

Love the Art for this review it reminded me of Super-boy Prime in a way lol xD

I like the title cards....whoever draws Linkara makes him so adorably cute :D I LOVE IT!

I like that Linkara is going over these origin stories. I don't usually read comics, so it's nice to know what the origin stories were really like. Plus he was funny as hell.
Also, I'm surprised on how well the Sam Raimi Spiderman film managed to transfer this story into modern times.

Tell me about it. I really enjoy watching the Spider-Man Trilogy, including how well they dated the character, and put him, and the rest of the Marvel Universe, into the real world.

I loved the CSI Miami parody, but I do have to say this: You should have included a pair of sunglasses, it would have worked better.

Also I'm surprised you included a scene from The Room... I know it's been a couple of months... but still...

I know - I can't believe he had the guts to include that clip! Enjoy this video while you can everyone, before Whine-seau has it taken down.

I actually like the the EXTREME CLOSE-UP. Gives a little variety.

Really hoping you make the "And I thought Batman was the detective" another running joke. :)

I frackin' love Spider-Man as well. Hell, I love all the other major superheroes from Superman to Steel (Not the one from the 1997 film starring Shaq).

5:03- Well, there are little kids who sleep in superhero suit style pajamas. I should know, because I wore the Batman ones. ...Why did I say that?

6:14- Or it could be that the "T" stands for Thomson. Just sayin'.

9:51- I guest this was just before thought bubbles were invented.
12:40- ...Wait.

10:20- Oh, hi, Lewis. =P

11:10- This is why I think the web shooters in the movies are more logical than the ones in the comics.

13:36- Lewis, you magnificent basterd, I READ YOUR MIND!!!

Amazing Fantacy #15 is indeed a classic superhero story ...OF SCIENCE!

I owned a copy of the reprinted origin comic too but sadly I lost it. :(

Great review Lewis! :D

Batman? Batman Batman Batman Batman BATMAN???? Please oh please oh please Batman?

Yes, Batman is my favorite.

yes, I'm pretty sure it's Batman. you can calm down now.

^^Detective Comics #27 is next week. Of course, Batman's origin wasn't elaborated on until Detective Comics #33.

"Criminals are a superstitious and cowardly lot, so my disguise must be able to strike terror into their hearts. I must be a creature of the night, black, terrible... a... a... A bat! That's It! It's an omen. I shall become a BAT!"

I have the Batman story of Detectice Comics #27 as a reprint in my copy of The Batman Chronicles Vol. 1.

i personally can't wait for that one,i really,really(don't have enough really's memorized) love batman(though i don't read many comics)and loove spider-man

Batman kicks awesome ass!!
All hail Batman!!! The greatest of us all...

great reveiw linkara

you should reveiw the leprechaun comic based on the movie
it sucks

Is Spider-Man your favorite hero? I assume since you get very vocal every time "Brand New Day" is mention(Don't worry, I hate it too.)? Anyway, Great review, keep up the great work on reviewing comics and History of Power Rangers.

Am I the only one who liked the dancing in Spider Man 3?
Also what is a WallFlower?
Also I'm 21, yet I am proud of my spiderman pajamas! They go well with my Doctor Who Scarf on cold nights! :D

A wallflower is someone who stays off to the side during a dance or party, just standing there not joining in.

Three: What kind of mother takes a five-year old to see horror movies?

At the time, a lot of them. Horror movies ran more to the stuff that were later run on MST3K, and not as often like the eighties or modern slasher flick. Not that true horror didn't exist, but she was probably talking about something like the Blob, and not something like Psycho. The theatre in my dad's town had double feature Saturday matinees for cheap and the parents would all just drop their kids off. Cheap babysitting. There was usually a western and a "horror".

The same mother who wouldn't do so much as turn around and check if her son is telling the truth before calling him a liar?

Ah, I'm a jerk. I keep focusing on the "dilemma" typo in the opening image. Ugh!

On the plus side, fantastic episode as always! :)

A Spiderman review with no One More Day joke?

BLASPHEMY!

(j/k)^.^

Read the title card.

Plus I put one in during the introduction. ^_~ "Clone-creatin', satan-dealin'..."

Anybody going to give "Big Time" a try? It doesn't reverse OMD but I think it is a big step in the right direction.

Everybody could talk against One More Day for hours. I was wondering... is there anyone who've loved it ? Seriously ?

I didn't, not because of the deal with the devil (but I'm REALLY pissed about that), but because they've gone back... there were change about the character, specially those introduce by Straczynski, that I really liked. Specially the fact that aunt May FINALLY knew about Peter and the conversation they had was a magnificent moment. You know, people change. Why does my favorite super-heroes can't ? That's ridiculous !

Anyway, sorry about the rant. You were great Linkara, specially because its always seems tougher to review something good. Can't wait next week !

Quesada, I would assume, loves One More Day seeing as it was his idea. Probably not the rain forest worth of hate mail about it though, unless he's just an ass who enjoys pissing people off.

so wait who was that guy spider-man was carrying on the cover?

He never actually appears in the story. Usually it's annoying when they put stuff on covers that doesn't happen in the comic, but I guess it's excusable here. I mean showing Spider-Man in the wareshouse wouldn't have showcased his powers as well as the cover shot did. I suppose they could have shown a scene from when he did the TV show, but really it's hard to argue that they could have made a better choice because the cover has become so iconic.

Thank-you for another great Origin Story comic review ^_^

But didn't you find it weird that he didn't have his costume on underneath his clothes already when he heard his Uncle Ben died?

That is a little weird, but he was supposed to be keeping his identity a secret even in that point in the story, anyway, so he could have just of worn the costume underneath his clothes on the way to set to avoid people noticing who he was, and then worn them underneath on the way back. What's quite strange is the fact that he wanted to keep his identity secret in the first place. I mean if you think that he wanted to show all the bullies at school up, he'd have no problem admitting that he was a celebrity and kind of rub their faces in it.

Although they fixed that problem in Ultimate Spider-Man because his reason for keeping his identity secret in that is that they won't accept minors, and in that he's being paid cash in hand so the contract thing that Link mentioned doesn't really come in to play there.

But really, looking back on it the story really hasn't changed that much over the years. I was quite surprised how much actually, I remembered it having a lot more Silver-Agey weirdness.

One weird thing that wasn't mentioned in the review though is that when Peter is bitten, he shows signs of being queasy and faint. The other people at the demonstration notice this but they just kind of make fun of him for being a wimp for some reason. But don't you think that if someone were showing sudden signs of sickness at a science demonstration, especially one with radiation involved, that would be a genuine cause for concern that the scientists there might actually check out? It's not like they didn't know radiation was dangerous back then. Although really sometimes I think that Stan Lee had kind of a problem distinguishing "radiation" from "magic" when he wrote a lot of origin stories.

They really didn't think it was, in small doses. And up until just about five years prior to this thing, they told people who'd been exposed that you could wash it off.

Wow. Really? You'd think they'd have learned their lesson after Marie Curie.

Alas, no. Without going into too much detail, Ive got some personal experience with this one. People didn't respect radiation nearly as much as they should till frighteningly recently, and even so, you can still buy antique watches that glow in the dark, and I certainly wouldn't recommend it.

And then there's being born in a city situated 80 miles west of a site where a military exercise occurred involving an air-dropped 40 kiloton nuclear bomb...

I just thought it was odd because he said it was thin *so* he could wear it underneath his normal clothes without attracting attention.
*shakes head*

Yeah, 'radiation' and the like did seem to be associated with magic back in the day...it's very odd. Interesting to see what they believed could happen, but very odd.

What's quite strange is the fact that he wanted to keep his identity secret in the first place. I mean if you think that he wanted to show all the bullies at school up, he'd have no problem admitting that he was a celebrity and kind of rub their faces in it.

They offer a fairly reasonable explanation for his disguise at first: it's just a test of his new found powers and he's afraid if something went wrong he'd look like evan more of a joke. That makes sense. However the reason he's given by the agent for keeping the disguise is a bit odd, he says it makes a great gimmack. Where there really any masked and anonyamous performers on early 60's television? Maybe if they were mimes!

Two odd side notes on performer angle:

1st)The agent says you'll be great on "Ed Sullivan's show." Was replacing THE with 'S just other way to save space along with "throu?"

2nd) While discovering that such an iconic chatacter name was chosen because it's "as good as any" may seem disapointing, it doesn't seem as bad as assuming "the human spider" is as good as any.
"Geez, kid that sucks!"

Wow, compared to Superman, nearly nothing has changed to Spiderman over the years. After seeing Marvel write the Ultimates series, I'm kind of shocked at that.

I like these reviews. You seem less likely to kill things or make references to Silent Hill in these~

You know out of all my comics I've always enjoyed the reprint of spiderman's origins but I've always wanted to see Dr. Strange's but it was unfortunately 'removed' before I had the chance to read it :D

Have you tried Marvel Digital comics? A lot of comics companies are uploading their old comics online now and if you register to the service you can read hundreds of them on demand. They have a subscription fee but if you read a lot of comics it's probably worth it.

Maybe Flash and Jughead are members of the same random letter shirt club. Hmm, I'm gonna guess you're doing Batman's origin next week. I hope you do Flash though, I love the Flash.

OMG, NOSTALGIA! EVERYWHERE! Growing up spiderman was always my favorite. I used to watch both batman and spiderman on T.V (spiderman original series and the batman and spiderman 90's animated series') and even though for the most part I got more excited about batman as a show, spiderman was always WAY cooler. For me.
Its almost like having a crush on somone where any notion of a romantic 'crush' has been taken away and replaced with a feeling of sheer awsomeness (in my opinion, there's something really inapropriate and just plain creepy about finding a super hero 'sexy' anyway).
Spiderman is the best. He's an underdog amoungst other superheros, with a good sense of humour and a really cool duel identity. Oh, and he's never afriad of heights. And for somone who's ALWAYS been terrified of heights growing up, that's made spidey a really cool icon to look up to.
:)

I liked Batman, but Spidey was always more entertaining - and dealt with more giant robots as I recall.

Amazing, Linkara..One of my favorite reviewers doing one of my favorite comics. Perfect.

And the best part about this review? It's spider-man without Marvel ruining him! I guess that it's also kind of sad that his first issues are some of the few times that didn't happen.

I'm sure its Batman's turn next week based on that "more loved onces dying"-statement.

Batman isn't the only superhero who experienced death as part of his origin. Almost every superhero has some loss that influenced them, even if it wasn't directly.You forget that tony starks parents also died in a car accident in his original origin story.This prompted tony to create a new form of technology and buy out the company that made the cars that his parents died in. He did this in order to correct the design flaw in the car and make it so that it would never happen again.
I would like to see Linkara tackle some less known superheroes with really awesome origins. He did state that he had Dr.Strange's origin so undoubtedly he will touch upon that. To be honest I'm rather looking forward to Linkara doing a Thor origin story as many people know little to nothing about Thor. He has been going down in popularity, as noted by his recent costume change( a ploy used by many comics in the past to appeal to a younger crowd). The upcoming movie is only to cement his place amongst the people who are interested in watching the avengers movie.

yea, i knew this one had to be coming. i actually held a copy my father owns of amazing fantasy 15 and read the full thing. i had myself a nice nerdgasim lol, though the other stories werent as interesting. was funny seeing how odd this is given todays standards. i was jsut to nerded out to actually check it out lol.

Little known fact, science majors (all of them) do in fact have web slingers and English majors can, in fact, suck it.

It's true, look at how many times I used the word fact. This ain't no opinion mate.

Also, if you declare yourself an Engineering major, you are immediately granted the ability to repair any mechanical device by hitting it with a wrench. True story.

Amen brother, amen !

However, if you double major in Foreign Language and Archeology, you gain the power to read ancient tomes and runes, and cast ancient spells upon your enemies!

Suck on that Science boy!
XP

Which comes in really handy if you have to fix a Lada engine...

Wait, you need a sledgehammer for that, not a wrench. My bad :)

I have a reprint that I got free from Old Navy for buying a T-shirt. It was actually kinda fun following along your review with my issue and seeing the laughable panels first hand.

The story is indeed dated [especially the delivery, presentation and lingo] but I can see why its a classic. The comic kinda plays out like an episode of the twilight zone; where Peter Parker's aggression against people, and his unwillingness to use his new found powers to help humanity leads to the demise of his uncle.

Still, its kinda hard to read lines like "He's a professional wallflower", and "Crackers and milk! bless'em" and still take the comic seriously. Also the self-narration and dated art-style don't help either. but if you can get past these issues,its an overall enjoyable comic, and a great origin for a great hero.

Yes! I was hoping you'd review the origin for Spider-Man. I've read this issue too, in an old volume of Spider-Man comics in my high school library. Thanks for the review!

That's so bad it's funny.

This is Linkara, not the Nostalgia Critic.

obvious troll is obvious