In
the last issue of The Amazing Spider-Man:
Renew Your Vows, we experienced Peter Parker’s struggle between his family
life and the life of his alter ago, although there was never a doubt to which he
would prioritize. Throughout both of these issues, we are constantly being
reminded of the lengths to which Parker will go to in order to protect his
family.
The comic first opens to a
brightly-coloured two page spread in which Peter is reliving the memory of when
he killed Venom in issue 1. Here he encounters Eddie Brock who swears that he’s
not responsible for putting Peter’s family in danger, but that he was under the
control of the symbiote – a familiar term used in the world of Marvel
comics. The warm colour palate seen here can be used to represent the fire in
which Spider-Man was finally able to defeat his enemy, but also the fiery hell
in which he has stumbled into. These colours as well as the frayed lines of the
images are in contrast to the cold, defined lines of reality, which helps us to
understand that our hero is having some sort of nightmare. This is further confirmed
when the cold blue colour returns to the last panel and the speech bubbles
inform us that he has been rudely awakened from his sleep.
Scott McCloud discusses the importance of colour in comics,
stating that “we live in a world of colours”, not in
one of black and white. Although the ideas behind art can be communicated more
directly through black and white, form itself is able to take on more
significance with the use of colour. Through the use of more expressive
colours, such as those seen in this Spider-Man series, comics can become “an
intoxicating environment of sensations” that can appeal to all our senses.
Many of the colours in
this comic are somber and dark, which reflect the ideas portrayed in this
particular issue. A lot of cold colours are used throughout the
comic to evoke feelings of guilt, doubt and fear, primarily from the standpoint
of Peter himself. Looking at the cover alone, we see that average Peter Parker
is at the mercy of his foe, Venom, who has him ensnared in his vicious claws. Varieties
of blues and purples are used to portray the innermost fears of our hero: being
consumed by darkness. In becoming Venom at the end of his nightmare, he begins
to fear the darkness within himself that has been brought out by the death of
Venom by his own hand. This is a common trope in superhero comics that the hero
does not kill because they believe this makes them no better than the villains.
Thus far, the quotidian life of Peter Parker the husband and father portrayed
in The
Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows
is proving to be far more interesting than I
ever thought possible.
- Brittany Baker
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