I don't know why February seems to be the worst winter month these days. We had that nasty, two-week stretch with the single digit temps and the ice and whatnot last year, and the month kicked off this year with a delightful little snowpocalypse.
The cover and the solicits I found online say Jed Mackay is the writer, but the first page says Zeb Wells, so I went with that. Anyway, it's the first issue of Amazing Spider-Man I've bought in over 8 years! Well, sheer luck suggested they'd produce something that interested me at some point.
Peter, having nearly died from being seriously irradiated in a fight with the U-Foes, is chomping at the bit to get back out there. Mary Jane and Felicia are not letting that happen until he can show he's ready. This is a training montage issue of Peter getting generally humiliated trying to keep up with Black Cat and Captain America, but not giving up. The variety of outfits they make him wear since he isn't allowed to wear the Spider-Man costume are sort of amusing. Felicia and her guys literally robbing a place and telling Spidey and Cap to catch them was funny. Can't see Captain America letting her get away with that.
The other plot thread is the Beyond Corporation's mucking around with Ben Reilly's memories to make him a better corporate symbol superhero is having a cascade effect in his brain. He can't remember the most important thing about power and responsibility anymore! And Gomez does this page of panels that zoom in on Ben's pupil, which looks very fragmented around the edges. I feel like something's going to come out of his pupil? Like he's a doorway to somewhere, but given my track record on predictions, probably not.
I don't really see them looking at Peter with disappointment like he describes at one point in the last bit of the montage. I guess that could just be Peter projecting his own frustration with himself. Seems weird to be so down on himself on what I'm guessing is Day 6 of his training, if this was supposed to be such a close call for him. You know, as opposed to the 47,000 other times Spider-Man has been near death, or actually died.
Dio has a strange dream about a butterfly and her importance to the Grrl Scouts, which she knows nothing about, so that's awkward. Natas can't help her make any sense of it, so she explains how Billy gambled away his own remains in one of those two-page sequences that looks like it's done on a legal pad. Gordi, on the other hand, seems to know something about the butterfly at least, though he's not saying. But he and the Azarians are heading out to help Dio, while Mistress Tako sends out more people to hunt down Dio and Natas. Tako also gets cussed out by Gordi's wife, who looks like a reasonably normal (by the standards of Mahfood's art) human being.
It does seem like Tako's goons are having doubts, if only about their odds of surviving with the increasingly weird stuff going on. Although Kettlehead is determined to kill Natas himself, for killing all Kettlehead's friends, and Binglesworth, who was a bit of a dickhead, but still. Group solidarity is touching, if ultimately going to get this guy killed.
Billy's ashes have wound up in the hands of some ugly guy in a poorly fitting suit whose hair looks as though it was done in crayon. Actually his whole face looks a bit like a clown's, as you can see in the provided panels. Ha, for once I included images which are relevant to the aspect of the art I'm discussing. The issue ends with Dio and Natas initiating the dream jump to figure out where Billy's ashes actually are.
I'm still very curious to see what happens with Natas when Turtleneck Jones resurrects after three days. Especially if Natas is wandering around inside some guy's dream. I don't have too much else to say. This issue has that feel of trying to get the characters in place for the next big thing. Bit of a breather issue, maybe. So we'll see if things get hectic in issue 4. I feel like there's going to be a time loop at some point, where Dio is somehow key to the Grrl Scouts' origin, even though she's in the future. Or this is set in the past.
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