Amazing Spider-Man #39 OA by Steve Ditko 0

[Bronty]

1 hour ago, Unca Ben said:

Yeah.  
It's interesting re-reading those issues armed with information that I didn't know back then.

Ditko (with or without Stan's input) was developing Peter Parker - especially after issue 28's high school graduation.  Pete went out and bought a new wardrobe - open collared shirts without a tie, instead of his usual more formal attire.  But Peter still exhibited a more conservative randian approach to the current topics of the time, as you pointed out.  I can see Stan having some difficulty with that as he was purposefully aiming his stories at high school and college kids, many of whom would likely have been put off by Ditko's more stringent philosophies.

After Ditko left the book and Lee and Romita took over, Peter and his friends changed quite a bit.  I'm not just talking about their more pleasing-to-the-eye physical appearances, but the way they behaved and interacted.
Pete and his friends meeting at the Coffee Bean with its beatnik overtones; MJ and Gwen go-go dancing; Stan's approach to student protests.
I can only imagine how Ditko might have handled this (if at all) - but I suspect it would have been much different than Romita & Lee.

In fact, if Ditko had continued the book and Peter had been portrayed with a more Mr. A - Vic Sage/the Question attitude, those later issues of ASM would have been much different that what we got.
Can you imagine Ditko portraying Mary Jane in a mini-skirt and go-go dancing at a club?  He was still clothing his females like they were in the 1950's.
I mean, I LOVE Ditko, but I shudder to imagine some of those potential scenarios.

 

See and I shudder at the beatnik / go-go dancing issues.   Cringe. 

[Unca Ben]

46 minutes ago, Bronty said:

See and I shudder at the beatnik / go-go dancing issues.   Cringe. 

  Well played.

But did you shudder at the time that these were published?  It was a fair representation of the pop culture at the time.  See what DC, Archie, even Charlton were doing.  Not to mention pop culture outside of comics.

[Bronty]

Oh I agree but I still cringe hard

[bluechip]

1 hour ago, Unca Ben said:

  Well played.

But did you shudder at the time that these were published?  It was a fair representation of the pop culture at the time.  See what DC, Archie, even Charlton were doing.  Not to mention pop culture outside of comics.