Best of #3, 2005 edition . . . Story Arc

Ok, this has really been the hardest category yet, because I've got five candidates and they bring some slightly different things to the table. One of those is "Black is White and Up is Down" from The Punisher, issues 19-24. Jake at 2 Guys Buying Comics named it his best story arc of the year, and it might be mine, but if you're interested, I'd suggest just reading his post, it's porbably much more coherent than mine would be. At any rate, I'll focus on the other four choices.

Honorable Mention - "Hobgoblin", Ultimate Spider-Man, issues 72-77. It's odd. I thought I was disappointed by this arc, but I think that stemmed mostly from Harry's Hobgoblin being another big, fire chucking thing like his dad. It makes some sense, but it was kind of not what I wanted. Still, I thought the story had emotional power to it. Harry tries to reenter his old life, as Nick Fury has decided it's safe to let him do that. Harry has blocked out pretty much everything that has happened since the explosion at his dad's lab, but bits and pieces slip through.

Then an 'associate' of his father shows up, and lets Harry see the truth, about his dad, and Peter, and everything. So Harry remembers Norman killed his mom, that Peter is Spider-Man, and these facts freak Peter (already spastic from his run-in with Nightmare and Dr. Strange) quite a bit. He starts yelling at Mary Jane, convinced she's going to get killed, while at the same time trying to help Harry through what are clearly some serious mental issues. Even when Harry goes beserk there's a sadness to it, like a wounded animal just trying to get it over with. And as usual Nick Fury shows up, and makes things worse, because Nick Fury is a manipulative bastard. But, he gets punched in the face for it, which as I mentioned yesterday, needs to happen a lot more often.

The reason this only lands honorable mention? Say it with me now: TOO SLOW. This could have be done in three issues easily, four tops, it would still have had emotional punch to it, and there wouldn't have been a series of endings where you feel like you just read 22 pages of nothing. Still it's Bendis, so I guess I shouldn't ne surprised.

3rd place - "New Avengers" Amazing Spider-Man, issues 519-524. What can I say? I love Spider-Man, and in what's been a crappy year for Spidey stories, this stood out. The Avengers deal with something Avengery, Hydra and copycat Avengers. Peter, MJ, and Aunt May deal with moving in to Stark's tower. Spidey gets into a serious brawl, uses his brains to figure out what Hydra was up to, both when they sent out their fake Avengers just to show off their power and as a diversion from their true paln, and when he remembers the Ogalalla Aquifer, and there were just some hilarious moments, usually involving Wolverine. Aunt May dumping Logan's cigar in his drink (actually not too safe, since it was probably whiskey or something), and Peter chucking Logan out the window. And yes, Spidey would do that, it's not like it'll kill Wolverine. The arc gets into the lives of Peter and his family, which is an important part of who Spider-Man is.

The problems? Someone, I can't recall who, pointed out that Peter's life is about how being Spider-Man seemingly ruins his life (he's late to work, misses graduation, misses a date, can't get enough money for Aunt May's medicine because he's fighting Scorpion), but things really aren't so bad at the end of the day (he sells pictures of the fight, he still got a college education, the girl sees the bruises, take pity, and lets him ask her out again, Aunt May's tougher than he thinks). But, Aunt May's house gets destroyed and Tony Stark drives up and lets them stay at the tower? It seems too pat, too easy, set up as a plot device for the whole 'tabloid' situation, though I did like Stark threatening to crush the photographer if he didn't back off. In a world of flatlands, even a small hill can look like a mountain, and I think that's what happened here.

2nd place - "The 'Hood", Batgirl, issues 60-62. Batgirl's settling in as a crimfighter in Bludhaven, and she's going to make life hard for the Penguin. She gets her own place to stay, gets a snitch to keep her apprised of Penguin's dealings, and away she goes. I like this because it's something new for her. Batgirl seems to fight a lot of thugs with guns, and periodically some martial arts expert, probably looking to make a name for themselves, beating the girl who beat Shiva. But shapeshifters and intelligent gorillas, that seems like something a little different. It's the sort of thing that in Gotham, Batman deals with. But Batman isn't here, so it's up to Cassandra.

And the story gives us a look at how she works. Getting the records of the Brotherhood's old battles, figuring out the weaknesses she can exploit. I liked that she let the cops know about the arms deal that was going down. She hadn't exactly hit it off with them in the first meeting, but she realizes it's better to be with the good cops than antagonising them. The scenes where she's delirous and seeing Stephanie (Spoiler) were probably a bit overdone, but I was glad to see someone still remembers Steph, espcially since Robin doesn't seem to be thinking about her much. Too many OMACs I guess.

1st place - "Family Business", Spider-Girl, issues 86-88. Seems a bit out of leftfield doesn't it? At times Tom DeFalco's writing bugs me, just like at times how Ron Frenz draws May's head bothers me (he can't seem to settle on a consistent shape when she isn't wearing the mask). But I think DeFalco is going for more of a Silver Age feel with the book, especially in this story. You've got Spider-Girl 'teaming up' with the children of the Fantastic Five to fight Apox, the Omega Skrull, who's out to redeem himself from an earlier loss by destroying the original Fantastic Four, who are off in the Negative Zone. I put 'teaming up' in quotes because May consistenly has trouble working in a team setting during the story. She's a solo type, and she keeps trying to do things that way. So we have a cosmically powered Skrull mowing down Nova, the Avengers, the Hulk, Namor, and it boils down to Spider-Girl, Franklin Richards and a bunch of kids to oppose him.

There are a few other plot points that go during the story, like Normie asserting control over Oscorp, and whether the Venom symbiote is having an adverse affect on him, given that he's ordering weapons to be manufactured. You have May still feeling guilty about lying to everyone that they destroyed the symbiote, and trying to help her friend Moose through a tough time. The good thing is, while some progress is made on these stories, they don't weigh down the action. Once the fight starts, that's pretty much all May can think about, and so the fight becomes all that's being focused on. DeFalco has a couple of nice moments between May and Franklin, as he tells her a few things about his family, and shows how seriously he takes the legacy of his family name.

Lots of action, layers to the battle that Apox doesn't even know about, the Negative Zone, and we find what's been going on with Reed and Sue Richards all this time. Plus, they get a big happy ending. It isn't earth-shaking, or revolutionary, or any of that other stuff, it WAS fun though, and for all my complaining about this or that with the comics I'm reading, I felt like giving credit to a story that seemed like it just set out to tell an enjoyable story, enough spoken.

Best single issue comes tomorrow.