As I hope most of you are aware, the name of this blog is Chasing Amazing. And while that might sound like a pun on the title of a Kevin Smith movie, the adjective “amazing” is quite intentional. The mission of the site is to follow “one man’s quest to collect every issue of Amazing Spider-Man.” I’m well aware that there are many other comic book titles that star Spider-Man, but since I was a teenager, I decided what limited resources I had to buy and read comic books (especially older, more expensive ones) would be dedicated to Amazing Spider-Man, because it’s the flagship Spidey title that has/had decades of history behind it.

This laser-focused approach has its advantages. As you should note from my “remaining chase” page, I’m only five issues away from having the entire 700 issue run of ASM – a feat that I probably would not have been able to accomplish if I was also chasing down issues of Spectacular, Web of, Marvel Knights, etc. to complete a collection. I’m not a wealthy man, and I don’t/never had the time to get to a comic book store every week for the latest Spider-Man title. So focusing on ASM has kept my goals streamlined and easier to achieve.

Of course, this approach has its disadvantages – mainly the formation of what I call my Spider-Man “blind spots.” While I think it’s a universally accepted truth that the majority of the all-time best Spider-Man arcs occurred within the pages of ASM, there are dozens of highly-regarded stories that appeared in the Web Slinger’s “B” titles. Also, the “B” titles have had a host of great writers and artists over the years (Roger Stern, JM DeMatteis, Peter David, Mark Millar, Frank Miller, Sal Buscema etc.) that are a draws all by themselves.

That’s not to say I’ve NEVER read another Spider-Man series beyond ASM, but I have mostly neglected them. I honestly never bothered to seek out copies of stories that were released in the years before I was a reader, and there were also a number of stories I read once and only once as a teenager (and this was mostly in the “bleh” Clone Saga era). When I was older and became a regular subscriber to ASM, I considered my work done in the purchasing department – so much so that I embarrassed myself a bit when I did a post about Avenging Spider-Man two years ago and called it the first new Spidey-centric title since I was a kid (forgetting some short-lived series like Marvel Knights, Friendly Neighborhood, Sensational, etc.).

What I like to do know is resolve and remove these blind spots from my appreciation of Spider-Man. Through the power of collected editions and the Marvel U app, I’m able to read these stories for either the first time ever, or the first time as an adult, and get a much better sense as to how they connect with the rest of the Spider-Man universe. I’d like to think that the content of Chasing Amazing was strong without me confessing these reader sins to you all, but all the same, starting tomorrow, and at irregular intervals from here on out, I’m going to do posts dubbed “Blind Spots” that look at some famous and infamous arcs that were featured primarily in the “B” titles over the years. I hope you like them and not think less of me as I unveil these!