After the runaway success of X-Men '97, Marvel animation is on a roll. Along with the hype surrounding Robert Downey Jr's return to the MCU as Dr. Doom is another animated project - Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man (previously called Spider-Man: Freshman Year) - due out later this year.
This animated series is rumored to introduce several characters to the MCU for the first time. Let's take a look at a few of those.
The Totally Awesome Hulk will appear for the first time as one of Peter's classmates.
There are many prominent characters that have been confirmed for the first season including Daredevil, Scorpion, Rhino, Doctor Octopus, Norman and Harry Osborn. We saw these characters in an image that Disney released at its D23 Expo last week. All of these characters have appeared on the big screen at some point. One character that we haven't seen yet in the MCU though is Amadeus Cho, the latest iteration of the Hulk.
First appearing in Amazing Fantasy #15 (vol. 2), Amadeus Cho gains the Hulk's gamma-enabled powers using special nanites to become another Hulk. Amadeus will appear in the show as one of Peter Parker's high school classmates.
Amazing Fantasy #15 (vol. 2) is significant enough to be included in GoCollect's Modern Age CPI, an index of the 50 most important key issues of the Modern Age. Like most of the comic book market, this issue has lost value since 2022, but this book's value is actually up across five grades if you go back five years:
On the other hand, if you look at the most common grade on the CGC Census, a 9.6, you can definitely find some good deals. According to GoCollect, the FMV of a 9.6 is only $110 and the most recent sale of a 9.6 sold for a mere $65. $65 barely covers the costs of shipping and grading by CGC.
Nico Minoru of the Runaways will be Peter's love interest.
For the first time in a long time, Peter's love interest won't be Mary Jane or Gwen Stacy but a much lesser known character, Nico Minoru. Like Peter and Amadeus, Nico is no ordinary teenager, but the child of wizards and possessing magical powers like her parents. Nico' first appears in Runaways #1, an underrated (in my opinion) key issue from the Modern Age. Not only does this issue contain Nico's first appearance, but also the first appearances of Alex Wilder, Lucy in the Sky, Bruiser, Talkback, and Arsenic. Let's take a closer look at the most common grade on the CGC Census: a 9.8. Always good to invest in an issue with multiple first appearances.
According to GoCollect, the FMV of a 9.8 is $190. Interestingly, while a 9.8 has lost value since 2014, there's little evidence that the value of this issue was impacted by the comic boom. I'd probably avoid purchasing a 9.8 right now since, according to CGCData.com, there are only 278 9.8s on the CGC Census right now. If you're interested in purchasing, I'd probably buy a raw copy during an auction on eBay, consider having it graded and selling it while the supply of 9.8s is relatively low. Once the supply of 9.8s rises, it's likely going to negatively impact the value of 9.8s further.
