In any case, it still doesn’t really excuse the plot contrivance of no one being able to heal a bullet wound. It serves as a comeuppance for Peter, who has to be made to suffer for his actions, even though this example is rather drastic compared to the simple idea of a guy letting go his uncle’s future killer due to his ego. Which leads to the big plot point of no one in the Marvel Universe being able to heal Aunt May from her bullet wound. It didn’t help his characterization when at one point Aunt May’s soul was brought out and told Peter and MJ to let her pass on in peace. That as it may be, most people agree that it was still a choice Spider-Man needed to face and live with.
SPIDERMAN ONE MOMENT IN TIME WINDOWS
The parallels to the Amazing Fantasy origin were not so much windows into the subtexts of the characters and story as they were billboards strung up like yard sale signs. There was also the fact that perhaps it was Peter’s fault that his aunt got shot, as he could have easily left Mary Jane and May in Stark’s Tower and gone off to fight on his own. He was acting out of a false sense of responsibility. The problem arises in the fact that Peter wasn’t acting for his Aunt, even if he thought he was. It’s always an interesting story when readers can observe a hero’s desperation to do the impossible for the right reasons. No matter how badly Peter may have been acting in considering robbing banks to pay for May’s expenses, coming off as childish in his pleas for other people to help save some who serves as his mother, or his stubborn insistence to keep May alive to alleviate the nonsensical guilt from himself, Peter is still trying his damndest to save a life. Despite the telegraphed ending, the story right up to the very last issue is about Spider-Man’s manic attempts to save Aunt May.
In it’s fictional history however, “One More Day” is almost about the saving of a life as it is the death of an iconic love. Still, others hated the fact that Peter and Mary Jane were being split up at all, regardless of the means or reasons why. Some thought the very idea of it was too illogical even from a creative writing’s standpoint dealing with characters like Spider-Man. Many also thought that the character of Spider-Man was acting grossly out of character, being portrayed as someone who was at the end of his rope in his desperation. Many had predicted the ending months in advance, which they had plenty of time to do due to the aforementioned delays that was supposedly caused by JMS.
There are a number of reasons besides the obvious why fans detest this story. Take for instance the actual story “One More Day”. It makes sense that things can be missed in the moments of passion, anger or otherwise.
After all, many readers have grown up knowing only a married Peter and Mary Jane. In the wake of Joe Quesada exposing the relationship of Peter and Mary Jane as a fraudulent means to garner sales, (despite the fact that it wasn’t) one might get the impression that the cries of foul play in the writing of “One More Day” might be as mis-informed as Quesada was about the three years of issues leading up to the marriage in Amazing Spider-Man Annual #21. And again, we try to figure out what Joe Quesada is trying to say. “One More Day” is re-examined as we see how it lead into “One Moment in Time”.