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On Sunday night, Bleeding Cool ran a post that was simply titled, “Um…” which was basically just a copy/paste of a nine year old kid’s letter that originally appeared in Captain America #10, which ran eight months ago. The letter reads as follows (I didn’t include the kid’s last name because, well, he’s a nine year old kid)…

Hi. My name is KJ. I am 9 years old and I love Marvel comics! I am in the hospital right now because I have leukemia. Marvel comics have helped pass the time on some very long days. My favorite character is Captain America and my favorite comic is the Defenders. Just as sure as Spidey beats Doc Ock, I am going to beat leukemia! Thank you very much.

-KJ,
Hasbro Childrens Hospital
Providence, RI

Rich Johnston, the guy who runs Bleeding Cool and who authored the post, added that it was an “unfortunate juxtaposition.” At first glance, many of you, or maybe even most of you, don’t see what the big deal is. Okay, so allow me to translate what is meant to be a very geeky, inside joke/reference. In his letter, KJ mentions that he’ll beat Leukemia, “just as sure as Spidey beats Dock Ock.” Well, it’s no secret that Amazing Spider-Man #700 comes out on Wednesday and in that issue, without giving away too much, Spidey doesn’t exactly beat Doc Ock. So the gist of this post is basically, “Hahaha. Bad comparison, kid!”

I will say that, despite what Rich Johnston says, I do think this feels pretty dirty. Johnston says it’s an “unfortunate juxtaposition”. Is it? KJ’s letter ran ten months – forty weeks – ago. It wasn’t as if Marvel was running this the same week that they were shipping Amazing Spider-Man 700. No, Bleeding Cool is the one that did that. They created this juxtaposition. Additionally, the post leaves me with the mental picture of a bunch of comic geeks standing around snickering as this kid – who’s fighting cancer – is talking about his favorite comic book characters.