I guess I'm in the minority here. I'd put McFarlane well behind a bunch of other artists. Steve Ditko, is for me, the definitive Spider-Man artist. His successor, John Romita is a close second, and the current Romita Jr. also is quite good at capturing the essense of the character.
MacFarlane drew strikingly beautiful splash panels. The one of Mary Jane cowering, weeping by the apartment door as she's being attacked by Venom is a great visual. But for storytelling, MacFarlanes style doesn't work nearly as well for me; Ditko and both Romitas are adept visual storytelling; it isn't about the still frames, it's about how the action flows from frame to frame, something that's never worked well for me in MacFarlane's work. This is also why Alex Ross's interior work often leaves me cold.
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I'm against ending blackness. I believe that everyone has a right to be black, it's a choice, and I support that.
~Steven Colbert
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