Greetings once again, citizens! This week, we continue our
look at Superior Spider-Man, starting with issue #6!
Wait… that’s not right…
So, funny story. When I went to the comic shop to grab issue
#6 of the series, I saw this with the #6 on it, and just assumed that it was
the correct issue. But alas, it was not. As the cover indicates, this is a
tie-in to the big event that was going on at the time, Age of Ultron (and event
I wasn’t reading because I don’t really care about Ultron). Now, I figured that
this would tie in to the events of the event, but still have something to do
with the plots that were going on in the main book. I was mistaken. I read the
issue and felt gipped. It had nothing to do with the plots that were going on,
and ultimately nothing really happened in it. I shouldn’t be surprised, given
that Dan Slott wasn’t the writer on this, so of course it’s not gonna be the
same. But I at least expected some similarities.
This is actually one of the great frustrations I have with
comics; the numbering. It’s something that by all rights should be simple, but
becomes entirely more complicated than it needs to be. They decide to throw in
decimals, fractions, letters, zeroes, I’ve even heard of them doing roman
numerals. An issue 0 I can almost understand, but all of that other stuff is
just confusing. Why not just use integers? Everyone understands them, and
there’s a real obvious sequencing with them. Why not have this thing just be
“Superior Spider-Man: Age of Ultron #1”? Are they trying to deceive people into
picking up the thing out of confusion? I’ll admit that it worked, but man, if
your event can’t stand on it’s own, why do you expect me to look at other
issues for it? Hell, I was considering getting an issue of the Age of Ultron
comic until I picked this up and just felt betrayed. But enough about asinine
numbering, let’s get to the actual issues at hand. And by that I mean issues
6-8.
Issue 6 opens with a shot of New York’s city hall with a
couple of confusing tweets, and Jameson giving a speech, where he states that
he will be closing down the Raft. The Raft is a jail for super powered
criminals that sits out in the harbor. He says he’s shutting it down due to the
obscene number of breakouts. Honestly, this makes a lot of sense. It’s not
exactly a good idea to house criminals so close to such a large population
center, especially when some of those criminals have the ability to melt steel
and cause earthquakes.
Anyway, after getting plot points for future issues
established, we find out what the weird tweets were about. A duo calling
themselves Screwball and Jester crashes the press conference and shoves a cake
straight into Jameson’s face, pantsing him, and then blasting him with seltzer.
They capture the whole thing on camera, posting it on a website that they run.
We get s few shots of people laughing at Jameson’s humiliation, including
Ock-Pete who is straight up doing a supervillain laugh.
He gets a message from Jameson and heads off to city hall,
where Jameson asks him to take care of Screwball and Jester. Ock-Spidey
initially declines, saying it’s not worth his time, but relents after he
briefly reflects on the times he’s been bullied.
We cut over to the Avengers, who have picked up on their
teammate not acting quite right and are discussing what to do about him.
Captain America suggests that he might no longer be fit for the team, to which
Thor and Black Widow agree. Wolverine however, points out that every member on
the team has a few red marks on their record, and he doesn’t like the idea of
abandoning Spidey when he needs them. My only complaint with this scene is how
Black Widow is drawn. She looks to be significantly younger than she should.
Like “still in high school” young.
Anyway, while the Spider-Bots sweep the city for Screwball
and Jester, Ock-Spidey’s got other business to attend to regarding his PhD. He
arrives on campus and sees that Anna Maria has also just arrived, and is being
teased by a couple of jerks about her being a little person. He flashes back to
a moment he was bullied in his childhood, bringing Ghost-Pete along for the
ride. Ock-Pete offers to take care of the creeps that were teasing her, but
Anna Maria just says it’s not worth dwelling on. Anna Maria set up coffee with
Dr. Lamaze, in order for Ock-Pete to try making a better impression on him.
Meanwhile, Screwball and Jester are going over the results of their latest
video. It turns out that they use the videos in a phishing scheme, getting
people’s passwords and credit card info after they’ve checked out the duo’s
videos. However, they’re spotted by one of the Spider-Bots. Ock-Pete excuses
himself from the meeting, much to Anna Maria’s exasperation, and changes into
his Spidey costume. He’s about to head off, when he catches sight of the two
jerks who were making fun of Anna Maria earlier, and thinks to himself that he
has “time for one extra thing.”
Back over to Screwball and Jester, they’re trying to find
another person to prank when Ock-Spidey shows up. They figure that he’s a
perfect target and the fight begins. They try and get him to do some funny
banter, but to no avail, and he finally manages to land a hit on Screwball, who
claims that he hit her in the boob. Not sure if it was intentional or not, but
it instantly makes me think of Scott Pilgrim. Ock-Spidey gets kinda flustered
at this, which gives Jester the opportunity to perform a classic piece of
slapstick comedy.
I’ll admit, I laughed at that. I normally just wince at nut
shots, but man of man, something about it being Spider-Man made me chuckle.
Anyway, while Ock-Spidey is stunned, Jester and Screwball begin pelting him
with paint balloons, making him unable to see through the lenses of his suit.
He tears them off and Jester promptly crushes them, echoing the memory we saw
earlier. It’s at this point that Ock is no longer in a playful mood.
However, we check back on Anna Maria, who’s trying to get a
hold of Ock-Pete, when she comes across a wrecked car in the parking lot, and
she hears the voice of one of the jerks from earlier. She’s sickened, and
immediately calls 911.
Back to the fight, Ock-Spidey webs up Jester and slams him
into Screwball. He then proceeds to beat the ever-loving crap out of them. We
get some shots of people’s reactions to the beating instead of actually seeing
the violence. Jameson is ecstatic, the Avengers all agree to bring Spidey in
and have a chat, and MJ is aghast. Ghost-Pete shows up, trying to find out
what’s going on since he was apparently being dragged into a bunch of memories
of Ock’s, and the last page is a splash page showing off Ock’s handiwork.
Issue 7 starts off at the reopening of what was once a
combination homeless shelter/criminal empire HQ. Now, it’s going to be an
emergency care facility, run by Dr. Elias Wirtham. Dr. Wirtham is secretly a
vigilante known as Cardiac, who I’d never heard of prior to this (I find myself
saying that WAY too often lately). He’s using the remaining hidden parts of the
building to run… another hospital. This one seems to use treatments that aren’t
exactly approved, and uses equipment that may or may not be legally obtained. A
little girl is in desperate need of treatment, but there’s apparently only one
piece of equipment that can help her, and Cardiac has to go “procure” it.
But enough of altruism, what’s Ock up to? Ah, sleeping, such
a noble pursuit for our hero. I kid, of course. Everyone needs to sleep, in
spite of that whole “no rest for the wicked” thing. But while Ock-Pete is
sleeping, Ghost-Pete attempts to exert some control over his old body. He
succeeds in almost scribbling a note, but it ends up as gibberish. Ock-Pete is
woken up by an alert from the police regarding a break-in at The Boneyard, the
storage facility for items confiscated in super-crimes. Cardiac is there trying
to find the previously mentioned MacGuffin and stunning the guards with his
elctro-staff. Ock-Spidey shows up, rousing some of the guards and getting their
assistance. Ghost-Pete muses that he never would’ve bothered trying to work
with the guards, and would’ve just gone on ahead. It’s things like this that
actually make me feel that there’s something to the whole “Superior Spider-Man”
thing, but I digress. Ock-Spidey manages to get the drop on Cardiac, and just
as he’s about to deliver one of his patented Spider-Beatings, Ghost-Pete
manages to make himself heard, which distracts Ock long enough for Cardiac to
try and blast him. They fight for a bit, until Ock-Spidey knocks Cardiac into a
stack of crates, which conveniently lets him find the MacGuffin. Cardiac
attempts to flee, but Ock webs the MacGuffin, yanking it away and discovering
that the item is the Neurolitic Scanner, confiscated from Ock himself. Ock gets
pissed off and indignant that somebody would dare try and steal one of his
inventions. He grabs Cardiac by the throat and is about to punch his lights
out, when Ghost-Pete once again interferes, this time forcing Ock-Spidey to let
go of Cardiac’s throat, allowing him to dodge. Ock is understandably confused,
and this gives Cardiac an opportunity to deliver a powerful blast to Ock-Spidey
and make his getaway, though Ock did manage to get him with a tracer. The
guards show some concern for Ock-Spidey, but he just shouts about them being
dolts and how it’s their fault Cardiac got away before heading back to his lab
for… y’know, it’s not really stated why he needs to go back to his lab. I sorta feel like Ock's way of relieving stress is to build stuff.
While in his lab, he gets a call from The Avengers, saying
it’s a top priority emergency and they need him. When he shows up however,
Wolverine tells him that there’s no actual emergency, that this is an
intervention. I don’t know if this has any basis or not, but to me it’s
head-canon that Wolverine’s had to go through an intervention or two. I get the
impression he’s gone through points in his life, where he’s struggled with
things like alcoholism, anger control, and muttonchops where friends have had
to get involved. This is also the point where I started noticing some really
wonky stuff going on with the artwork. There were a couple problems with the
art elsewhere, but man, these last few pages every panel’s got something going
on in it. Wolverine’s face looks more befitting a hawk, Black Widow looks like
she stepped right out of an anime except for her eyes being smaller, and Cap’s
face looks completely flat with only a suggestion of features.
The next page isn’t any better. Thor looks alright, and Cap
actually has a face, but Spidey’s neck has become absurdly long, and I think
Spider Woman’s having a stroke.
But the next page, I don’t know what is up with Spidey, but
he needs to see a chiropractor or something. Cap and Thor don’t look much
better, with the shadows on Thor’s face making it look like he’s wearing a
domino mask, and Cap’s pose just seems incredibly awkward.
And then Spidey flips Cap, and it seems like there’s some
sort of fish-eye effect going on, because Cap’s head is bent too far back, and
his torso looks way too long.
But enough about the art. Basically the Avengers tell Ock
the stuff we heard them discussing before, and that they’re gonna scan him.
Ock’s not gonna submit to that, and on the final page we actually get a good
looking shot of the Avengers in their battle stance facing Spidey.
The next issue begins with a page of stuff about Cardiac at
his secret hospital, but who cares about that given what we left off on in the
last issue? We get a really cramped looking two-page-spread of the fight, but
Ghost-Pete distracts Ock, and ends up getting zapped by Spider Woman, and
smacked by Cap’s shield, taking him down. I had honestly expected more out of
Ock-Spidey, maybe swinging away, trying to evade them and trying to wear them
down by making opportunity attacks. I think he could’ve made a decent go of it
since, to my knowledge, he’s quicker and more nimble than everyone else there.
But nope, Ock just sits there trying to dodge everyone, relying on his
spider-sense, and gets his face smashed in. He comes to during the middle of
the tests, but I guess he figures that if he tries fighting back now, it’ll end
worse for him.
Tangent time! So, something that is encouraged when writing
comics is having a sort of mini-cliffhanger at the end of every other page.
That way, it builds a little bit of tension, and encourages the reader to flip
on and see what happens next. This was very well done at this point, because at
the end of these two pages, we have Cap stating “All our tests conclusively
prove, with nor margin for error, that you, Spider-Man, are clearly - -“ This
was very well done, because it made me want to turn the page and find out what
it was the tests had proven. Does Ock get found out? Can he continue his
deception? Well, it seems like the editors decided to really mess with people,
because the next 2 pages of the book were ads. So the tension built up even
more, making me even more eager to flip the page (though I guess it’s bad for
the ad people, since I didn’t even look at what the ad was for). So what was
the pay off for this?
Anyway, looking at the results of the scans, Ock notices an
irregularity. He gets them to give him a copy of the data, and is told he’s on
probation. Black Widow tries to talk with him about why he’s been acting
different, but while she and Ock are preoccupied, Ghost-Pete tries to draw a
picture for Widow alerting her to the issue. However, he doesn’t have any fine
control, so the picture looks like nothing. Or maybe Pete’s just a really bad
artist. I don’t think I’d want him on my team for Pictionary.
Anyway, Ock-Spidey goes back to his lab at Horizon, where he
goes over the data, but finds it’s inconclusive. In order to get a better
picture, he needs the Neurolitic Scanner that Cardiac stole. So follows his
tracer to Cardiac at the secret hospital. They fight for a little bit, with
Cardiac shouting about how Spidey’s acting like a maniac, but then Ock sees the
scanner on the little girl’s head and he stops. He still wants to get it back,
but Cardiac tells him about how the little girl’s condition was caused by one
of Ock’s schemes. Ock actually feels guilt for what he did, and says he’ll
perform the surgery she needs himself. He gets suited up for surgery… still in
his Spider-suit… but Ghost-Pete starts trying to take control of the hand
again, to prevent him from starting. However, Ock’s able to exert control.
The surgery goes well, and Cardiac and Ock-Spidey
metaphorically pat each other on the back for a job well done, with Ock
offering his assistance for the future should Cardiac need it. The little girl
thanks Ock, and even gives him her stuffed penguin. I don’t care how sappy
anyone else thinks this is, I think it’s sweet and adorable. This is actually
something that kept me reading the series. I’m not gonna lie, I was kinda
getting turned off on the series at this point. The harshness of how Ock-Spidey
was dealing with the criminals wasn’t really something I wanted to read. If I
wanted to see harsh “justice” I’d read the Punisher. But I’m a big fan of
redemption stories. It’s part of why I love Star Wars so much, and it’s what
kept me reading this series. Because moments like this make it clear that while
Ock may have been a vile asshole in the past, he really does want to try to
make things right, repair some of the damage he caused.
The last page of the issue shows Ock musing about being a
hero, and also scanning his brain. Ghost-Pete gets discovered, and Ock
ominously says he’s going to perform a Parker-ectomy.
I more or less said my piece about these issues two
paragraphs ago, so I suppose that’s it for this week. Join me next week, for
issues 9 and 10!
Until next time, citizens!
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