Saturday Splash Page #151

"Down the Barrel of a Gun," in Spectacular Spider-Girl #2, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Frenz (writer/penciler), Sal Buscema (finished art), Bruno Hang (colorist), Dave Sharpe (letterer)

A 4-issue mini-series from 2010, where New York City is in the middle of a gang war between Black Tarantula and an old-school Maggia guy enhanced with cybernetics. No, not Silvermane. This guy calls himself Silverback. I guess DeFalco and Frenz thought Silvermane would have to be dead by now or something.

Mayday promised her parents she'd stay out of it, but it's not sitting well with her. But she's got enough problems as it is. There's a horribly-dressed weirdo named Wild Card who keeps kicking her ass and telling her to stay out of the conflict. I mean, the outfit is bad. Like he's trying to fight her by making her go blind. Her clone/sister April is really getting into her Mayhem identity, and is actually working for Silverback.

Oh, and Frank Castle came out of retirement (that he spent in South America, where he still periodically fucked drug lords up) because Silverback was a guy he left crippled as a message before ending his war on the mob. Years of reading Garth Ennis' Punisher leave me unable to see Frank doing either of those things. Not ending his war on the mob, and certainly not leaving a guy alive as a message. "People scare better when they're dying," is definitely a philosophy the Punisher subscribes to.

The story has a feel of DeFalco and Frenz clearing the decks. They probably know this is one of the last Spider-Girl stories they're going to write, and they try to definitively move the old guard off the board, both characters that existed before Spider-Girl, and ones that didn't, but are supposed to pre-date her. Silverback and the Punisher bite the dust. Black Tarantula opts to leave New York with Arana, basically removing him as an issue. Peter (once again) accepts that he needs to trust his daughter can handle things. Even the two goons of Silverback's that are based on DeFalco and Frenz (I guess they didn't de in the wilds of Jersey) end up turning state's evidence in the hopes of being able to start new lives in witness protection elsewhere.

Silverback turns out to be a puppet of another villain, and that villain gets killed by Mayhem. Which sets up April's continuing descent into a "lethal protector" type as Mayday's biggest issue. Especially combined with her desire to assert her individuality as the true, only daughter of Peter and Mary Jane, which would come to a head in Spider-Girl: The End.

And with that, Summer (and Fall) of Spiders draws to a close.

Sunday Splash Page #345

"Self-Aggrandizing," in Marvel Two-in-One Annual #7, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Wilson (penciler), Bob Camp, Mike Esposito, Frank Giacoia, Dan Green, Armando Gil, Chic Stone (inkers), George Roussos (colorist), Jim Novak (letterer)

The last, and best-remembered, of Marvel Two-in-One's 7 Annuals. The Champion (at this point presented simply as a powerful being from another dimension, rather than as the Elder of the Universe he'd become in Engelhart's Silver Surfer) wants to test Earth's worthiness in a challenge of athletic competition, as befits one who devoted himself fully to that pursuit. So he gathers a bunch of the physically strongest heroes on Earth to face him, one at a time, the Earth's survival on the line.

(I know Genndy Tartakovsky did a version of this in a "Dial M for Monkey" cartoon on Dexter's Lab, but I wonder if Akira Toriyama knew anything about it when he had the Cell Games in DBZ.)

Of course, like any guy that talks big about wanting people to bring it, the Champion's very specific about the rules and conditions under which it can be brought. Vision's disqualified for not being within the Champion's prescribed 'life-class.' Namor is sent away because he refuses to train, Doc Samson because he gets kayoed by the training-bot.

Well, OK, hard to argue with that one.

For all his claim of skill, the Champion restricts the challenge to boxing, rather than open it up to any type of fighting. When the Hulk charges, intending to manhandle Champion, he's disqualified because Champion won't soil his hands with a 'mindless brute.' Thor's out for using a weapon, even though he's made it pretty clear he's not putting down the hammer (and can't because he'd still turn into Don Blake in 60 seconds if he did.) The only ones who really box against the Champion are Sasquatch, Colossus, and finally, The Thing.

Beyond that, DeFalco really plays up the challenge, as Reed Richards' devices confirm the Champion is more powerful than Galactus, and the Champion can erect an impregnable force dome around the boxing ring that no one can get through. The first hit Ben takes, he declares was a harder punch than the Hulk or Silver Surfer ever landed on him.

I think the story is usually lauded as a great Thing story for his unwillingness to give up. The ref calls the fight after the 3rd round, but Ben drags himself across the ring, leaving a bloody spit trail behind him, still insisting he hasn't lost. But the Champion touts The Thing as the best among the heroes because he's the only one who understands the spirit of competition, possesses the spirit to play by the rules, to survive and win at any cost.

Setting aside some of that seems contradictory - Can you be willing to pay any price to win and follow the rules? - I'm not sure it tracks. I can see the argument Namor and Thor were too haughty and proud to play along, even with the world at risk. Thor's more insulted at the boxing trunks he has to wear than anything else. But I think most of the others understand the stakes. The narration makes clear the Hulk's been trying to keep his temper reined in, that Colossus and Wonder Man are scared (for different reasons) but going to try their best. I guess the point is Ben Grimm's the only one actually excited at the prospect of this fight, but even that, Sasquatch also talks about having been a world-class athlete and how he's missed pushing his limits. But that's more about challenging himself than testing him against someone else, maybe?

Ron Wilson drew several issues of the monthly Marvel Two-in-One, and would draw plenty of issues of The Thing's subsequent solo book, but the gaggle of inkers doesn't help him here. Some panels are pretty good - the one of Ben, hands taped, marching towards us, the knockout punch Champion lands on Sasquatch - other panels look half-finished or the characters are awkwardly posed or positioned. I don't know which inkers did which pages, so I don't know who to wish Wilson had been able to work with for the entire issue.

And there's a lot to get through, between the set-up, the training, the build for the fight, the other heroes' attempts to intervene, and the actual fights, so much of the story is crammed into small panels, alongside a lot of dialogue. But Wilson works around it, using short, wide panels to demonstrate the Champion's strength, when he knocks Ben the length of the ring (and the panel) with one hit. Or zooming in for a close-up on Ben's battered face (weird to see him with a black eye) as he climbs out of a hole in the ring.

Saturday Splash Page #146

"A Happy Sendoff", in Spider-Girl: The End, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Frenz (writer/penciler), Sal Buscema (finished art), Bruno Hang and Sotocolor (colorists), Dave Sharpe (letterer)

"The End" was a loose group of comics Marvel did that were essentially the "final" story for a given character or group. The ones in the early 2000s were mini-series. One for the FF, one for Wolverine, 3 for the X-Men, one for the entire Marvel Universe (written by Starlin, so of course Thanos was responsible.) There were some one-shots in the mid-to-late 2000s. Marvel apparently revived it for 4 or 5 books in 2020, but I only learned that researching this post. 

To my knowledge, the best-regarded is Garth Ennis and Richard Corben's Punisher: The End, which basically says Frank Castle would never stop killing criminals, even if said criminals are the last humans left.

Spider-Girl: The End is 180 degrees from that book. Unsurprising, given the respective creative teams. Set after the strips in Amazing Spider-Man Family, Web of Spider-Man (vol. 3), and the 4-issue Spectacular Spider-Girl mini-series (which we'll see next month), we're told the story of how Spider-Girl died by a kindly old woman talking to a bunch of kids in what looks like an idyllic paradise.

The clone/symbiote hybrid, April Reilly, is still after Mayday to admit April's the original, as well as the better hero. They fight, a fire starts, May pushes her sister clear of falling debris, then is able to launch her clear of the explosion via impact webbing. As it turns out, the old lady is April, and we learn (though the kids don't), she tried to take May's place, but their little brother Benjy immediately knew she wasn't May, which tipped of MJ. April flipped, went full "lethal protector", to the point the government combined mercs with Carnage symbiotes, and civilization went down the crapper.

April gets a chance to go back and change things, and does, in the process tying off her own storyline. May returns home, unaware of the near miss, Wes, who had been circling as a possible love interest for a while, drops by and reveals he knows she's Spider-Girl, and that's where the issue ends. An actual happy ending!

Obviously, that wasn't going to last. . .

Saturday Splash Page #145

"Desperation Flurry," in Spider-Girl #87, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Frenz (writer/penciler), Sal Buscema (finishes), Gotham (colorist), Dave Sharpe (letterer)

Olliffe leaves the book midway through a storyline involving Seth, the Serpent God of Death, handing the art duties to Ron Frenz (who had penciled a few fill-in issues previously) and Sal Buscema, who remain the art team for the remaining 40 or so issues.

I said last week DeFalco and Olliffe mostly avoided bringing back Peter Parker's rogue's gallery to challenge Mayday. That is not really the case for the DeFalco/Frenz run, where the Venom symbiote plays a major role, as well as the Black Tarantula's emergence as a major player in the organized crime world. DeFalco dusts off Carolyn Trainer, the second Dr. Octopus, and finally, near the end of the book, the original Hobgoblin, Roderick Kingsley.

Some of these work better than others. DeFalco has no issue letting the Hobgoblin smack around characters he's established as big deals or competent heroes previously, helping emphasize that this guy is dangerous. Likewise, the symbiote ends up connected to Normie Osborn, which creates a situation where Mayday trusts her friend, but worries the symbiote could be affecting him, and it becomes another secret between her and her parents. Mostly Peter, since he's far less trusting of Normie than Mayday is to begin with.

Along those lines, they try to set Black Tarantula up as a morally ambiguous character Mayday can't decide whether to fully trust or not. He offers her help, even brings in Elektra to train Mayday when she's getting her butt kicked by Doc Ock the Sequel, but he's still a guy consolidating his hold on crime in New York City, and not to dismantle it. So it's a little different than Peter's past friendships or alliances with people straddling the line between good and bad.

(There's also a bit where he seems to be courting Mayday, which I presume is because he doesn't know she's a high-schooler, but is really damn creepy. Not sure if that was intentional.)

Frenz tried to update his style, but it's not an improvement. Mayday ends up looking way too skinny, or with her face oddly shaped or angled. The longer he and Buscema are on the book, the more the art shifts to a place between Frenz's earlier work and Buscema's. By the time we get to Amazing Spider-Girl, it's more Buscema. Which means it's solid, but nothing revolutionary or experimental. It keeps things clean and easy to follow, emotions are typically very easy to read, the action is big, full of haymakers and people getting punched through walls. It's an old-school book in the writing, still lots of subplots and page space for the supporting cast, and the art reflects that.

I'm pretty sure I was buying the book monthly before Frenz and Buscema joined the creative team, probably starting in Olliffe's last year as penciler. I stayed with it until it was finally, truly canceled at issue 100 (it survived at least one more near-cancellation during this tenure, and maybe two.) Of course, Marvel started Amazing Spider-Girl 3 months later, so it wasn't a cancellation so much as a rebranding. 

I don't know if Spider-Girl was ever my favorite book, but there was a reliable, "competence" feels too much like damning with faint praise, level of care maybe, that I appreciated. You know what you're going to get with DeFalco, Frenz, and Buscema. It's not flashy, but they do their best to make sure you get your money's worth of plot, character arcs and action every month.

Saturday Splash Page #144

 

"Lecture," in Spider-Girl #44, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Pat Olliffe (writer/penciler), Al Williamson (inker), Christie Scheele and Heroic Age (colorists), John E. Workman (letterer)

Summer (and Fall) of Spiders is taking this trip across the multiverse, to visit the little book that wouldn't die. Originally the product of a What If? based around the notion Norman Osborn had Peter and MJ's child kidnapped, rather than the child being stillborn, Spider-Girl followed May "Mayday" Parker as she tried to navigate high school, superheroics, boyfriends, and an at-time overprotective father.

The creative team behind that What If? story, DeFalco and Olliffe, would work on the series for most of the first 56 issues of the book. The book was nearly canceled at least twice during that span, but apparently did very well with younger readers (including young girl readers), and especially when Marvel put out digest-sized collections. I'd figure you'd get eyestrain trying to read all DeFalco's dialogue and caption boxes in a manga-sized package, but you can't say he wasn't giving the reader their money's worth on time. (Although he also writes all the caption boxes in second-person, which I know some people don't dig.)

DeFalco's a writer of a particular style, old-school style, and so the book sticks to that. I think he mostly avoids trying to write too hip, which would probably end badly, but characters do tend to make big speeches about not giving up or doing the right thing even when it's hard, especially during fights. It feels maybe better suited for a more mythic figure like Thor than Spider-Girl, who mostly sticks to street-level threats (though she does does tangle with Seth, the Serpent God of Death about the time Ron Frenz takes over as penciler), but if you figure DeFalco's thinking about younger readers, big, on-the-nose speeches might be appropriate for them.

For at least part of the book's run, it would have been contemporary with my high school years. The fashions for the teenagers don't seem off to me, so I figure Olliffe did fine on that score.

On the plus side, DeFalco and Olliffe introduce a broad supporting cast for Mayday, both in and out of school. Best friends (boy and girl), potential love interests (only boys, though I thikn this is the book that established Felicia Hardy as bisexual), rivals, villains, mentors, allies. Most of these characters get their own subplots at one point or the other (often several at the same time.) Those run in the background, often independent of whatever Mayday's doing, until advancing to the forefront. It helps flesh them out, giving them lives that continue on even when the star of the book's not around, and makes it easier to care about them.

There's a lot of focus on her relationship with her parents, as Peter swings between trying to trust and worrying she's in over her head, while Mary Jane, who has to struggle with seeing her daughter risk her neck, sometimes plays mediator and sometimes is the voice that actually gets through to May, who has heard certain spiels so often from her dad they just bounce off.

It's very much a book of its era. It spun out of events of the Clone Saga, and so it draws heavily from that era, plus some of DeFalco's other work (Seth showing up from the DeFalco/Frenz Thor run, but also Lyja, the Skrull who impersonated Alicia Masters, is still around and married to Johnny Storm.) Mayday wears a version of Ben Reilly's costume and webshooters, rather than her father's. Kaine plays a prominent role in the book, first as someone trying to deter Spider-Girl, then as sort of a gruff uncle figure. The Darkdevil character ends up being connected to the Parkers via Ben Reilly's five years on the road. Normie Osborn struggles to deal with the legacy of his father and grandfather, and Mayday struggles with wanting to help someone who was kind of an older brother to her in their early years.

DeFalco and Olliffe mostly avoid just pulling out Spider-Man's old enemies to bedevil Spider-Girl. Jonah Jameson's still around, but he thinks Spider-Girl is great, a wonderful respectful hero, not like that menace Spider-Man. Raptor (who ends up more of a friend than enemy) is the daughter of the second Vulture, but most of the villains have no apparent connection to any of her dad's Rogue's Gallery (minus things like the teleporting, intangible Mr. Nobody working for the Kingpin sometimes.) Their designs are usually unique and avoid feeling like a rehash of someone with similar abilities. Funny Face is sort of a Joker-type, but goes with the full jester look. Kilerwatt has the electricity powers, but doesn't resemble Electro or the Eel or anyone like that.

The back half of the book, however, would not continue that trend, as we'll get to next week.

Random Back Issues #111 - Spider-Girl #81

Is that what's happening? I thought you two whiffed the high five.

Spider-Girl's fighting Aftershock, who I think was introduced in the only issue of the original 100 issue run not written by Tom DeFalco (issue 51, written by Sean McKeever). Aftershock's not doing so hot here, as the armored car she attacked was empty at the time, which the driver tried to tell her.

What should therefore be a pretty easy win against an idiot goes sideways when Mayday's distracted by her cellphone. She dodges the next attack without thinking and aggravates some recently injured ribs, landing in a pile of garbage. Yep, she's Spider-Man's daughter, all right.

The security guard tries to grab Aftershock and gets electrocuted for his trouble. Spider-Girl manages to perform CPR to save his life before heading home. She also gets a call from her friend Brenda Drago (former legacy Vulture villain Raptor), that Brenda's now engaged to Normie Osborn. So in addition to getting chewed out by her dad for not coming home to look after her baby brother after school (because she was losing to an idiot), she also has to hear Peter bemoan the idea anyone would willingly marry an Osborn.

Mary Jane tried playing peacemaker, but the forecast is chilly at school the next day when Mayday gets a call from the Avengers. Electro showed up at the mansion, demanding to speak to Spider-Man. He initially dismisses Spider-Girl as a 'teen sidekick,' then revises it to 'secretary' when she explains no one gets to see Spider-Man without going through her.

Peter throws on the old costume to meet Electro (who, in a nice touch, recognizes Spidey's walking with a limp, because he's missing a leg from the knee down). Aftershock is Max Dillon's kid, but he's stayed away from her. Partially because the mom insisted, partially because his aura and his daughter's are on different frequencies, so it hurts them both to make physical contact. There's even a picture in the file Max is carrying that shows him and what is supposed to be a baby, but looks like Tiny Gerald Ford reacting badly.

Peter agrees to help, musing how awful it would be not to be able to hold your child. In the middle of that, all the younger Avengers show up, because they all want to meet Spider-Man. Which is cool, that he's considered one of the greats by the next generation, and lets his daughter see a different side of him.

Mayday finds Aftershock robbing a jewelry store. Hopefully she didn't grab costume jewelry. Spider-Girl's holding back, leaping about and just slapping Aftershock instead of full on punching her. All that really accomplishes is pissing the girl off, and she blasts Mayday from the street to a rooftop at least a couple of stories up. Aftershock vows to 'melt the flesh off your scrawny bones,' but the Avengers arrive, and electricity can't get through melt the Juggernaut's kid (or, unfortunately, the flannel shirt he wears around his waist.)

Aftershock's not exactly happy to see her dad, and he considers bailing, but Peter gives him the speech about how parents can't ever give up, and so Max hugs his daughter. This hurts, but it seems like it fades after a few panels. I guess their bio-electric auras adapted or merged with each other given time, it was just Max never stuck it out long enough for that to happen before. Which is understandable. If your kid screams in pain every time you so much as touch them, you would probably stop doing that.

At home that night, the Parker family discuss what'll happen to Aftershock (she's a minor, so a light sentence or paroled into Max's custody is Peter's guess). Peter and Mayday stay up to talk and Mary Jane finds them asleep on the couch at 3 a.m., having apparently buried the hatchet. Except the cover for the next issue reminds me that Normie's about to get bonded to the Venom symbiote, so that'll be another thing to make Peter wary. But haven't we all had a friend our parents distrusted because they were forcibly bonded to a brain-eating alien slime mold?

{10th longbox, 88th comic. Spider-Girl #81, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Frenz (writer/art breakdowns), Sal Buscema (finished art), Gotham (colorist), Dave Sharpe (letterer)}

Saturday Splash Page #80

 

"Big Shoes to Kill," in Thor #387, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Frenz (penciler), Brett Breeding (inker), Evelyn Stein (colorist), John Workman (letterer)

As he would with Fantastic Four, Tom DeFalco took over as writer on Thor after Walt Simonson left. Thor probably suited DeFalco's style better, with his tendency to describe every conflict or individual hit as the mightiest one ever unleashed (or words to that effect). Fits with Marvel Thor's tendency to talk big-time shit.

While DeFalco did keep certain aspects of Simonson's run intact - the Rainbow Bridge remains shattered, and DeFalco expands this to have Asgard drift among different dimensions - others get promptly rolled back. The beard Thor grew to disguise the damage from Hela's Pimp Slap of Death? Cut, revealing Thor's face is entirely healed. Beta Ray Bill drops out of the book almost entirely, replaced more by Hercules. Don Blake remains out of the picture, but DeFalco bonds Thor to an actual mortal, architect Eric Masterson, after he's injured during one of Thor's battles.

Now Thor can have conflicts between his fights and Eric needing to pick up his son from school, or attend a custody hearing! Um, hooray?

DeFalco tries to go big with the conflicts, throwing Thor up against the Celestials right off, while Asgard is under attack by the forces of Seth, the Serpent God of Death (I think he has to be referred to by the entire title.) Odin comes back after his big move against Surtur, but I think that was as much so DeFalco could throw Surtur into the mix, too.

During that stretch, Ron Frenz is being inked by Joe Sinnott, and that really gives the book a retro feel, as Frenz seems to be trying to ape Kirby. His characters aren't as blocky and rough, but some of the energy's there. The covers are definitely done in a way to evoke the older comics. The dialogue is overwrought and dramatic, probably too much so at times, but the cast is mostly mythic figures, so you can argue that's just how things are with them.

After that arc concludes in issue 400, Frenz starts co-plotting the books with DeFalco. Sinnott stays on as inker, or sometimes is credited for finished art, but eventually that role goes to Al Milgrom takes. At that point, the art shifts away from the Kirby pastiche/homage and more closely resembles Frenz' work on Amazing Spider-Girl. Enough so I thought it was Sal Buscema inking him, but apparently not.

Probably the most notable addition from the Defalco/Frenz run, which lasted for over 70 issues, was Eric Masterson, who was Thor (or pretending to be Thor) for a time, before receiving his own enchanted weapon and becoming Thunderstrike. It's either that or the issue where Steve Rogers (as The Captain) is able to lift Mjolnir.

Masterson should probably be considered in the context of all the "replacement" versions we saw in the '90s, like Azrael-Batman or the various Supermen. At one point, when helping to rescue a sleeping Odin from Annihilus, he even goes so far as to heft a big gun emplacement and turn it on Annihilus' forces. This gets him chided by Sif for not being befitting of a true warrior, but hey, he can't be concerned with things like that, winning is what matters, lady.

That's not a stretch of issues I've read a lot of, though, so any comments beyond that would be based on half-remembered things or vague impressions.

Saturday Splash Page #43

 

"Fly-By-Night Operation," in Web of Spider-Man (vol. 2) #1, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Frenz (writer/artist), Sal Buscema (inker/finisher), Bruno Hang (colorist), Dave Sharpe (letterer)

In the late 2000s, Marvel briefly brought back Web of Spider-Man, this time as an anthology title. There was a mixture of done-in-one stories focused on supporting characters, but it was also another place for folks like me to get their "Mayday" Parker Spider-Girl fix.

The Spider-Girl parts only lasted a few issues, and continued threads from earlier stories in Amazing Spider-Man Family, the previous attempt at a Spider-themed anthology book. At this point the big issue was Mayday had a clone of her own, who was actually part symbiote thanks to Osborn. Calling herself "April", the clone tried to integrate into the Parker family life, but tended to resent the fact she felt she was the original and May had stolen her life.

That's woven in with an ongoing gang war involving Tombstone and the Black Tarantula, and then Fury the Goblin Queen up there rushes onto the scene, trying to both destroy traitors and the Parkers once and for all. April has to decide which side she's going to be on (for now, at least), and Mayday's boyfriend maybe figures out her secret. It's pretty standard DeFalco/Frenz Spider-Girl stuff, with Sal Buscema providing the finishes on the art. Lots of melodrama and big speeches. Lot of Spider-Girl triumphing through hard challenges and throwing big haymaker punches.

Oh, and DeFalco and Frenz show up working for Tombstone, only to be killed by Batwing, the character Kurt Busiek and Pat Olliffe created in Untold Tales of Spider-Man (which we'll get to in a month or so.)

Random Back Issues #55 - Amazing Spider-Man #281

How long you think Hydro-Man's been waiting to use that one? For that matter, how long did it take him to think it up?

An opportunity to use my "sinister syndicate" label! It's a great day! This is the second part of the first story that actually introduced that bunch. I have a soft spot for them since they formed to improve their chances of making money, rather than out of a desire for revenge.

Silver Sable's put Spidey on the payroll to help her catch Jack O'Lantern, and how nice, Jack called to tell her he'll be at Coney Island at midnight. Sable knows it's a trap, but figures with Spidey along they've got it under control. Now they're up against five super-villains (although Sable's disappointed none of them have a decent bounty on their heads.) Oh yeah, and Spidey's nursing an injured shoulder after he tripped Speed Demon last issue, and Sable hurt both her ankles kicking the Beetle. You know, the guy in the powered suit of metal armor. (She's not coming off as very bright, especially since she's putting a wrap on the right ankle she insists isn't too bad, rather than the left.)

 

Things look bad, but then the Sandman decides to join the party, having heard the commotion. Spidey and Sable dip out, but you know Parker's not going to abandon someone in need, so back they go. Sandman's doing pretty well when he lets Rhino just pass through him, but tries to match him power for power and gets smashed, then scattered by Speed Demon. He pulls himself together in time to go at it with Hydro-Man, as those two apparently really don't like each other. I do enjoy those kinds of petty beefs among villains. It's fun. 

 

Although Sandman describing Hydro-Man as like looking into a 'broken, distorted mirror,' is a bit much. But this is part of that gradual shift to being a good guy Sandman went through for a few years in the '80s and '90s, so I guess he's gotta feel bad about his past behavior.

 

Silver Sable takes out the source of Beetle's sting blasts (his antennae?) and Spidey slams him into a roof, then stops Boomerang. Unfortunately, Hydro-Man's learned turf beats surf and goes for the easier target (Sable) instead. Spidey disrupts his concentration by throwing Boomerang through him, giving her the chance to grab a fire extinguisher and spray it into waterboy, which makes him nauseous? Sure, fine. Unfortunately, Spidey took a serious hit in the back from the Rhino to make that throw. Fortunately, this activates his secret super-power (at least when DeFalco's writing him), The Desperation Flurry.

Sandman gets the drop on Speed Demon (who was already had one foot out the door wondering what it took to stop Spidey), but Hydro-Man gets the webslinger off Rhino and the villains retreat. Sable tells Spidey he's not getting paid because he quit when he chose to come back to help Sandman, but she wonders if Sandman would like a job? (As we saw in Random Back Issues #20, the answer's yes.) That lady is a shitty, shitty boss. Probably deducts funeral expenses from their pay. Spidey tries swinging home, broke and broken, and collapses on a roof before long, wondering if he got a permanent brain injury. Well, that would explain so many things from the late-2000s.

 

In other developments, the "Who is Hobgoblin?" story still isn't finished. Flash Thompson was arrested in a costume, but Robbie Robertson isn't convinced. Then Jack O'Lantern breaks Flash out of jail, thinking rescuing the Hobgoblin will make him a player in the New York underworld. What it actually does is piss the real Hobgoblin off. I don't know how framing Flash was going to work long-term since presumably the Hobgoblin would want to get back out there at some point.

 

The two of them fight from inside Jack's base out onto the rooftops, but it ends inconclusively. Hobgoblin gets Jack with a 'computerized barrage of electro-blasts', but Jack's armor protects him long enough to hit Hobgoblin with a pumpkin bomb, sending him careening into a storefront window. Meanwhile, Flash escaped in the confusion and is wandering the streets, unsure what to do.

The Hobgoblin thing has a ways to go yet, and of course the eventual end (Ned Leeds), ends up being retconned later, but at this point they've been teasing the mystery out for like 40 issues, which is just way too long.

[1st longbox, 60th comic. Amazing Spider #281, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Frenz (story layouts), Brett Breeding (pencils and inks), Nelson Yomtov (colorist), Joe Rosen (letterer)]

Random Back Issues #33 - Spider-Girl #87

'Doohickey'? Mayday, please, the appropriate technical term is "dingus" What would your father say?

We're looking at the middle chapter of a three-parter today, where Spider-Girl gets mixed up in a fight between the the Fantastic Four's kids and Apox, the Omega Skrull. Think "Super-Skrull, but with the Power Cosmic".

So you've got Franklin Richards (as Psi-Lord), plus Kristoff (wearing a Dr. Doom faceplate), Alyce and Jake (Ben and Alicia's kids), and Torus (Johnny and Lyja's son, but he's got Namor's eyebrows, although I guess they're supposed to take after his mom). Apox lost last time (about 40 issues ago) because there was a device at the base of his skull that fed him energy, but as Mayday finds out, that flaw's been corrected.

The kids aren't doing much more than annoying Apox, who is there to kill the originals, but it's enough for Apox to signal his Skrull warship to put a force field around the HQ. He thinks it's just to keep anyone from interfering, but the Skrulls aren't complete dopes. It's actually an extermi-field, which absorbs solar energy and will eventually blow up the entire city.

The team has a plan, but Torus gets cocky and gets taken hostage as Apox goes tearing through the building. Franklin and May give chase and pass by a bunch of inactive robots that Reed projects his consciousness into. That seems like the sort of thing you'd see in Earth X, but I picked up some of that last week and Reed's just moping around in Doom's pants. Lame.

Franklin explains Reed's body was damaged by radiation from a villain's doomsday weapon in the Negative Zone, and that Sue has been keeping the tear in reality the weapon formed closed with a force field ever since. The villain isn't named, only that he's a 'cosmically-powered warlord from another dimension'. I'm assuming some from DeFalco's generally derided FF run, but I don't know who it would be.

Apox gets the information from Torus (from telepathy or hypnosis I'm not sure) and reaches the Negative Zone portal. Jake and Alyce (whose powers remind me of X-Ray from the U-Foes) slow him down enough for Franklin and Mayday to catch up and Franklin has him pinned, but Jake makes the same mistake Torus did and distracts Franklin where he loses focus and Apox flattens the lot of them. Jake gets blasted through at least five floors, and Alyce gets knocked clear out of the building and bounces off the extermi-field. Ouch.

May pulls out the classic Spider-move of leaping around and hitting Apox from every angle really fast and. . . it doesn't work. Apox swats her (although he compliments her as the only one who attacked him like a warrior), and rips open the doorway to the portal while May barely keeps Franklin and Torus from being sucked in. Next issue, she charges in alone after Apox to try and stop him.

For a Tom DeFalco book, there is surprisingly only one subplot mentioned in the issue (if we ignore Mayday's long-established crush on Franklin Richards). Normie Osborn is running Oscorp and telling his designers to work on building some weapons. Glider-like weapons. He's being vaguely threatening about it, too. Normie had bonded with the Venom symbiote recently, and so the implication is the symbiote is influencing him. I think there ended up being a swerve there, that Normie's just trying to be focused and confident, but not evil.

[10th longbox, 90th comic. Spider-Girl #87, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Frenz (writer/penciler), Sal Buscema (inker/finishes), Gotham (colorist), Dave Sharpe (letterer)]

Random Back Issues #20 - Solo Avengers #6

And I'd have gotten away with nuking Algiers, if not for your meddling mercenaries and that damn carny!

Hawkeye's stuck helping Silver Sable on a job, so she'll intervene on is behalf with French authorities after he showed up in the country illegally because he was abducted by his old teacher, Trick Shot, who wanted to commit suicide via archer, rather than wait to die of his terminal illness.

The job in question is to bust into the hideout of the Red Skull. Which you think you'd want more than just Hawkeye and Le Peregrine, champion of France, to handle. Especially since the first operative Sable sent has gone missing. Well, I guess she tried one person and that failed. Now, she's trying two. If they botch it, then it'll be, I don't know, the Prowler, Rocket Racer, and Will O' the Wisp. After that, she'll call the Fantastic Four. Or the Power Pack. Not sure what her stance is on child labor laws.

(Also, I love that Le Peregrine chides Hawkeye for being too noisy, one panel after he loudly announces his name while not knocking out the goon before he fires off a bunch of rounds from his machine gun.)

But this is the crappy knockoff Red Skull, not the one that got a cloned body of Captain America or whatever. So it's really just a matter of beating up a bunch of cannon fodder and recovering a timing device for nuclear warheads the Skull swiped.

I don't know if Clint is tired from fighting assassins, Trick Shot, Batroc, and Silver Sable's goons over the last few issues, or if he's just pouting about having to jump through this hoop to get home, but he really seems to be half-assing it. He purposefully misses the Skull with a bunch of arrows to, as he puts it, add some excitement to Skull's humdrum existence. Eventually he throws a henchman through a glass container full of sand the Skull has, because he loves hourglasses, and whoops, it's Sandman, Sable's other operative. Might have been helpful if Sable told Hawkeye to be on the lookout for him. She's a pretty crappy boss, honestly, something Spider-Man could probably attest to.

Even with the Skull having an energy cannon strapped to his chest (why not use that earlier against the two essentially mortal heroes?), the fight ends quickly after that. Sandman takes care of the nuke the Skull armed as a last-ditch act of spite. Afterward, Le Peregrine tells Sandman that was a bad move, because they were supposed to return the timing device, not break it, and it'll probably come out of Sandman's pay.

Meanwhile, Hawkeye just wants to get home.

{2nd longbox, 42nd comic. Solo Avengers #6, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Mark Bright (penciler), Joe Rubinstein (inker), Janet Jackson (colorist), Jack Morelli (letter)}

What I Bought 8/16/2019 - Part 1

I didn't mention it last week, but we officially reached 4500 posts with Sunday Splash Page #74. It snuck up on me, since I stopped really paying attention to my total posts some time in the last few years. I figured now would be as good a time as any to mention it.

We're looking at some books from the first two weeks of August today. The first issue of a mini-series, and a one-shot I took a chance on.

Gwenpool Strikes Back #1, by Leah Williams (writer), David Baldeon (artist), Jesus Arbutov (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - For a second, I thought the expression on Peter's face in the smartphone did not match his actual expression, but I think it's that it's close up, so some more details are visible.

Gwenpool is not actually trying to ruin heroes' lives to keep herself from fading from existence. She is, however, trying to get a superpower that is easier for writers and artists to represent in team books and guest appearances than her current ability to jump into the space between panels. I don't know, I feel like you should be able to work with that. You just play it as confusing the hell out of whoever she teams up with, as she vanishes, then reappears abruptly with something useful.

Setting that aside, Gwen hopes Spider-Man can give powers via radiation, but only succeeds in accidentally unmasking him in front of a bunch of bank customers she took hostage. That puts Spidey in a mood, and he leaves her webbed up, until a cancer ridden version of herself shows up to free her, and sends Gwen on a trip outside the pages to find Radioactive Man and get. . . something from him. Cancer most likely. Not helping disprove all those people who think you're Girl Deadpool, Gwen.

Baldeon's work is loose and expressive enough for Gwen and her hijinks. The weird baggy sweatpants and hoodie look over her regular costume. The 9-panel grid page where Gwen explains her current status feels clunky, but all of Gwen's gestures and twitches make me think of a person giving a presentation who is really uncomfortable with public speaking and can't keep herself still. With Gwen it might just be a matter of struggling to keep still, period. And I like the version of the "gutters" we get as everything is on the verge of ending for her.

Sensational Spider-Man: Self-Improvement, by Peter David (writer), Randy Schueller (plot), Rick Leonardi (penciler), Victor Olazaba (inker), Rachelle Rosenberg (colorist), plus Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Frenz (writer/penciler), Sal Buscema (inker), Chris Sotomayor (colorist), Travis Lanham (letterer) - The costume inside isn't actually black-and-white. It looks more like a precursor to Spider-Man 2099's costume. Which wouldn't be a huge surprise, with David and Leonardi involved.

Peter's costume (and his back) get trashed fighting Firebrand, so Reed Richards whips him up a new, unstable molecule costume, with upgraded webshooters, which Spidey can barely control. Oh, and the web pits act as glider wings. Peter almost causes a helicopter crash, then barely manages to corral Firebrand before he kills his ex-wife for swiping all his ill-gotten loot. Plus, Firebrand's daughter is scared of Spidey in a black costume, so he mails it back to Reed.

Well, I'm not ever a fan of Peter getting new outfits from other people, so that's a strike there. Especially since Reed's apparently Neil Degrasse Tyson now, as he criticizes Spidey for calling the costume awesome, when that should be reserved for something like the Grand Canyon. Christ, Richards, could you try to not be a complete cock for two seconds?

Also, this is not some of Leonardi's better work. He needs a strong inker, and Olazaba's hit or miss here. There are panels in here where Reed's facial features are barely defined shadows. Like Puppet Master was making a clay duplicate but got bored halfway through. They did a lot better on the climax, with Firebrand's ex and Rita, the little girl. So maybe they just figured nobody cares about Mr. Fantastic and focused their efforts accordingly.

There's also a backup story by DeFalco, Frenz, and Buscema, where Peter tracks down some guys who killed an old many because his nephew wouldn't help them rob a warehouse. The kid did the responsible thing, but it didn't exactly work out, and Peter wonders if that's because the kid had no power. Kind of a bummer, especially when he doesn't give the kid an answer about whether the guilt of losing someone ever goes away. But I guess he couldn't say it does, since his over Uncle Ben hasn't, even if I subscribe to the idea Peter likes helping people and being Spider-Man, and it isn't only a guilt thing.

Frenz and Buscema on art looks pretty much like it always does, which is either good or bad, depending on your preference. Buscema's inks really make it feel like his art work, but I think Frenz' pencils help a lot. Either that or Buscema's going with softer inks than when he was on Spectacular Spider-Man back in the day. I always found his stuff back then a little too, sharp maybe. All the lines on faces were thin and stark and made everyone look kind of old and a little unpleasant (plus he gave Mary Jane what I assume was a beauty mark on her cheek that I thought was a mole every time I saw it). Which isn't the case here, or on their collaborations on Spider-Girl over the years.

Sunday Splash Page #57

"Shocking! Yeah, I Don't Wanna Hear It", in Solo Avengers #12, by Tom DeFalco and Ralph Macchio (writer), Ron Lim (penciler), Jose Marzan (inker), Andy Yanchus (colorist), Jack Morelli (letterer)

I shouldn't get to this title for a very long time, but they changed the title to Avengers Spotlight somewhere around issue #24, and the earliest issues I bought were the Acts of Vengeance tie-ins that came after that point. So I had it filed accordingly.

Like the title suggests, the book functioned as an opportunity for stories focusing on just one or two Avengers. A lot of those star Hawkeye, which is OK by me. But you get one-shots about the Vision, Wonder Man, Moon Knight. Rick Jones gets a story one month. Hellcat gets one where her crazy ex-husband menaces her about her memoir.

No, not Damian Hellstrom, her other crazy ex-husband. The high school sweetheart, Buzz, or whatever. God, Patsy, you have the worst taste in men. It's like the inverse of Matt Murdock, who is the worst choice for any woman who ends up dating him.

Usually two stories in each issue. Issue 12 features Hawkeye alone against the Abomination. Or Tyrannus' mind inside the Abomination's body. At any rate, Hawkeye punching way out of his weight class, which I always enjoy. less enjoyable is that we're at the point where he and Mockingbird are having problems because Clint still thinks she killed Phantom Rider, and he's all "Avengers don't kill," at his wife, who was, you know, drugged into thinking she loved the Rider for several weeks. Not the time or place for that discussion, Clint.

The other story is Rita Demara, the second Yellowjacket, developing a crush on the Black Knight, while trying to fend off the Fixer's advances. Dane crashes and burns spectacularly telling the Wasp his true feelings first, though. Notable mostly for being the earliest example of Amanda Conner's comic artwork I've come across. Which is one of the fun things about these kind of books, the earlier examples of the work of people that become big names later. The second story in the first issue is drawn by Jim Lee, for example.

Plus, it's a good book to go on back issue hunts for because you can pick and choose. There aren't typically a lot of interweaving plotlines. A story might carry over several issues, but it's still it's own thing. Since the book is from the '80s, anything relevant going on in other titles will get referenced as needed.

Sunday Splash Page #50

"A First Draft for Weird Al ", in Avengers Annual #16, by Tom DeFalco (story), Bob Hall (breakdowns), Tom Palmer (finishes), Max Scheele (colorist), Ken Lopez (letterer)

For the record, the Hall/Palmer art team is only for part of the book. As the story takes places in several locations, there are different art teams for each.

I only own two Avengers Annuals, and the other is the one where Rogue steals Carol Danvers' powers and we find out Carol was manipulated into going into that other dimension with Marcus, so. . . yeah, not using that one. (It's part of my copy of Essential Ms. Marvel).

This is the one where Hawkeye proves he's the guy you want around when Elders of the Universe come calling, just in case you thought his triumph against the Collector was a fluke. Grandmaster interrupts an intramural game of Avengers' baseball to tell them he's stolen Death's powers and he's going to destroy the universe, unless the Avengers can get past his Legion of the Unliving and disarm the bombs he's created.

The Avengers stop 4 of the 5 bombs, the only team failing being the Iron Man/Mockingbird/Black Knight/Dr. Druid quartet (drawn by Jackson Guice/Kevin Nowlan). To be fair, their opposition had Terrax and Dracula, so that was going to be a steep road to climb. I'm not sure if Death reverses that damage once it regains control. I'm also interested that Death can apparently reach into any afterlife realm, considering Skurge the Executioner was probably not in the same afterlife as Captain Mar-vell or Red Guardian.

The joke about this story is that practically everyone in the Legion of the Unliving has since turned out to still be alive, or else come back from the dead. Bucky's in there, Hyperion, Norman Osborn as the Green Goblin (unless that was actually Bart Hamilton, the second Green Goblin), Drax, Terrax, Nighthawk. . .

Sunday Splash Page #21

"Asking the Wrong Question", in Amazing Spider-Man Family #6, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Frenz (plotter, penciler), Sal Buscema (inks/finishes), Bruno Hang, Andrew Crossley, John Kalisz, Antonio Fabela (colorists), Dave Sharpe (letterer)

Last entry for stuff titled "Amazing Spider-(blank)". Unless I buy something else later.

After Amazing Spider-Girl was canceled, Marvel in its usual clear-headed and calm manner, let the character and setting go fallow for several years so that Mayday's eventual return was a big deal.

Just kidding. They almost immediately continued her adventures in this anthology series. When it ended at issue #8, they started up another anthology book using the Web of Spider-Man title, which ran for about a year. The Spider-Girl stories only went for a few of those issues, though. Marvel did helpfully collect all the Spider-Girl stuff in a trade, which is what I'm working from here.

It's DeFalco, Frenz, and Buscema on Spider-Girl, so it's basically what we got with Amazing Spider-Girl. A few different plots running simultaneously, taking turns in the spotlight. A lot of expository dialogue. Solid, straightforward art that gives you all the information you need and is easy to follow, if not particularly flashy. Callbacks and references to earlier stories, most of which at least one of those three creators were involved with. Not as much focus on supporting character subplots as you typically see, but they were more constrained on pages and issues than before, so that's not too surprising. Also, a complete lack of Norman Osborn, which was a big plus in my book.

But there's a momentum to it that's still appealing. Stuff happens at a decent clip. Even if some threads aren't resolved, they're still being added to and built up towards some conclusion. You may not end up impressed by how it ends, but you know they're at least going to try and give you some payoff. That's kind of meat-and-potatoes, but there's value to that.

Sunday Splash Page #10

 

"Friday Casual Spider-Angst", in Amazing Spider-Girl #2, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Frenz (writer/penciler), Sal Buscema (inker), Gotham (colorist), Dave Sharpe (letterer)

In summer of 2006, Marvel canceled Spider-Girl after 100 issues. It had narrowly avoided the ax several times before then, but not this time. But since this is Marvel we're talking about, the book was relaunched three months later with the same creative team, a slightly different title, and a brand-new first issue that boosted sales for, oh, two or three whole issues. The book did run 30 issues before being canceled again.

You pretty much know what you're getting with DeFalco. He has a very old-school style of writing; expository dialogue, big speeches about not giving up, the phrase "hoo-boy!". But he did at least try to not only build a supporting cast, but give them their own subplots that would eventually get the main stage. He and Frenz certainly tried to give the reader their money's worth. Whether a Clone Saga of her own, and the entirely unnecessary return of Norman Osborn (sorta) accomplished that is up to you. Wasn't what I was looking for.

Frenz had, in the previous series, been experimenting with what I think was meant to be a more modern style, maybe trying for a manga influence. It didn't go well. He moved back to something closer to his earlier style, especially with Buscema's inks. Late in the series, when Frenz was often credited with breakdowns while Buscema was credited with finishes, the art began to resemble Sal's art even more. The art was solid, clear, and easy to follow, not particularly flashy.

31 Days of Scans - Day 16

I’ve been thinking about this one (Favorite LGBTQ Character), and mostly drawing a blank. It seems like most of my favorite characters are established as being heterosexual. I know there’s a strong fan contingent that thinks Tim Drake could be gay and/or bisexual (mostly with regard to him and Superboy), but I don’t think DC’s ever officially gone that route with him. I like Shadowcat fairly well, and I’m pretty sure Claremont established that Kitty is at least bi at some point, but I’ve never read the story, and I don’t know if anyone else has ever paid it any mind. Harley Quinn is pretty clearly bisexual these days, between whatever is going on with her and Ivy, plus her interest in her tenant’s son who escaped from prison, plus her trying to cajole Power Girl into fooling around with her (although that may have just been teasing. Hard to say with Harley). Mystique is an interesting character, but hardly one I’d describe as a favorite. Cable/Deadpool had a lot of references to Wade having an interest in guys, but I’m not sure how seriously we were supposed to take his fantasies about him and Cable on a beach with suntan lotion. Also, I don’t think it’s been followed up on by anyone else.

I settled, such as it is, on Felicia Hardy, but even that’s perhaps shaky. Kevin Smith made one reference to Felicia being interested in women as well as men in his Spider-Man/Black Cat mini-series, but a) it was one caption in one panel, and b) that mini-series is generally better left forgotten. However, Tom DeFalco did establish very clearly in Spider-Girl that Felicia was bisexual. She’d been married to Flash Thompson, and they’d had two kids together. But at some point, they got divorced, and Felicia met Diana, and the two of them were together. I’ll confess, I’m pretty sure the implications of what Felicia was saying didn’t sink the first time I read that comic. You’d think them holding hands would have tipped me off, but I’m a little slow sometimes, and I think this was an interlude during some big fight scene at the Fantastic Five’s headquarters, so I was probably rushing through it.

I don’t think it got a lot of play. Felicia wasn’t in the book a whole lot, mostly during the stretch when her daughter, Felicity, was trying hard to convince Mayday they should be a crimefighting duo (with Felicity dressing as the Scarlet Spider), much to Felicia’s consternation. Mayday wasn’t terribly thrilled with it either. We did find out Felicity wasn’t entirely happy with her mother’s decisions, though I think DeFalco meant it as Felicity blamed Diana for breaking up her parents’ marriage, or blocking any chance of them getting back together, rather than Felicity being homophobic. We didn’t ever get to see mother and daughter sit down and clear the air the way Mayday did with both of her parents so often, and Felicia never showed up during the stretch when Mayday was dating Gene Thompson. I’d have been interested to learn what she thought of that pairing. Would she have seen enough of Peter’s sense of responsibility in Mayday to obliquely advise Gene to stay away?

Anyway, it never struck me as an out-of-character development for Felicia Hardy. It wasn’t difficult to see her and Flash drifting apart, or to see her meeting Diana, feeling a connection, and pursuing a relationship with her. She’s spent most of her life making her own choices, saying how she felt, doing what she liked, and dealing with the consequences as best she can. I can’t see her letting other people’s expectations of what they think is right deter her from being with someone she decides means something to her.

Both pages are from Spider-Girl. The first is probably issue 47, so DeFalco (script and co-plotting), Frenz (co-plotting and pencils), John Livesay (inks), Heroic Age and Christie Scheele (colors), and John Workman (lettering). The other would have been shortly after that, probably 48 or 49. So it's probably Defalco (script and co-plot), Pat Olliffe (co-plot and pencils), Al Williamson (inker), Angelo Tsang and Calvin Lo (colors), and Randy Gentile (lettering).

31 Days of Scans - Favorite Elseworld/Multiverse

I guess I could have picked GrimJack. It’s set in a pan-dimensional city where all realities phase in eventually, which sure sounds like a multiverse. But since I think they meant an alternate universe, there really is only one choice.

I know it isn’t really a Spider-Girl world, but it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world. It’s a generally upbeat world, certainly by Marvel standards. Bigotry and crime haven’t been wiped out, but giant robots haven’t herded all mutants into death camps, there’s nary an Apocalypse in sight, no Badoon or Martians invading. A new generation of heroes stepped up, and things are doing pretty well. Peter Parker did not make a deal with Mephisto. He may have hung up the webs, but he still helps people as a forensic scientist. Which doesn’t mean he won’t still bust some heads.

Peter and Mary Jane are together, and each is the other’s rock. Whatever problems one is having, the other shares the burden. Astoundingly, being married hasn’t made their life perfect. I don’t know how that could be, as I was assured by many fine people at Marvel that once you get married, all your problems are over, and the drama departs from your existence. Mary Jane has a health scare, Peter struggles from time to time with not being Spider-Man anymore (mid-life crisis). They both worry about their teenage daughter, the risks she faces, the choices she makes. MJ is there to help blunt some of Peter’s bluster, and provide a supportive ear for Mayday when she needs that.

Peter is there to offer the benefit of his years of experience as a superhero, and maybe lend a hand once in awhile. That issue actually highlighted something else I liked about that universe: Spider-Man is liked and respected by the new generation of heroes. Mayday’s teammates on the Avengers were ecstatic at the chance to actually meet the Spider-Man, much to her surprise.

Mayday herself is a generally decent kid, trying to do the right thing in her way. Wanting to give people the benefit of the doubt, and getting frustrated when they take advantage of that. She questions her own judgment, but generally recognizes she can only do her best, and other people have to make their own choices and accept responsibility for them. By and large, she continues to believe she can make a difference, and she keeps trying. Because she enjoys it, and because she wants to help.

It also doesn’t hurt Defalco, Olliffee, and Frenz gave her a pretty wide cast of acquaintances, and actually spent time developing them as characters. Davida, Courtney, JJ, they have their own likes and dislikes, their own plot threads, and those don’t freeze in place waiting until Mayday is unoccupied with Normie Osborn’s latest breakdown. Things progress while she’s not around, and that feeds into the conflict between her civilian and superhero life. Which isn’t a new thing obviously, but Spider-Girl always did it well, I thought.

It’s a world where the heroes mostly work together rather than fighting each other, and they mostly beat the bad guys, protect the innocent, and save the day, though not always without cost. It’s an optimistic world, where redemption is possible if you make the effort, and the current generation learns from the mistakes and experiences of the one before it, rather than ignoring them. That makes it a nice place to turn to when either real life or the current approach of a lot of other comics wears me down.

Images from Spider-Girl #44 (MJ calls Pete on his nonsense), by Tom DeFalco and Pat Olliffe (script, plot, pencils), Al Williamson (inker), John E. Workman (letterer), Christie Scheele and Heroic Age (colorists). Spider-Girl #81 (MJ putting the blanket over the father/daughter pair), by Defalco and Ron Frenz (script, plot, breakdowns), Sal Buscema (finished art), Dave Sharpe (letters), Gotham (colors). Spider-Girl #8 (Pete showing he’s still got it), by DeFalco (writer), Olliffe (pencils), Williamson (inks), Janice Chang (letterer), Christie Scheele (colors). Spider-Girl #100 (the page I lead off with), by DeFalco and Frenz (plot, script, pencils), Buscema (art finishes), Sharpe (letters), Gotham (colors).

They Seem To Be In The Wrong Mind For This

Last week, in the first half of my reviews, I was a tad dismissive of the fact that Amazing Spider-Girl appears to be wrapping up with Mayday battling Norman Osborn inside Peter Parker's subconscious. I have to say, that last sentence looks very strange actually typed out, and I've been thinking a bit about the whys of that.

At first, I thought it was because combat in the realm of the mind is outside Spider-Girl's usual ballpark. Well, that is true, but it's not like it was in Spider-Man's wheelhouse either, but I could see him having a battle like that. Still, I could see Spider-Man in a struggle like that. Maybe that's because of all those stories DeMatteis wrote that dealt with the inner workings of Peter's mind* that I read as a kid. Or it could be due to the character himself. I can't remember where I read it (probably multiple places), but someone said that Spider-Man is such a well-defined character that as long as you portray him "properly", he can be in that story and it's not so odd. So he can find himself face-to-face with Thanos, and if you show Spidey being freaked out, feeling totally outclassed, but still trying to do something to stop Thanos, or at least louse up his plans, then it can work.

She hasn't had anywhere the publishing history her dad has, but for me at least, Spider-Girl is a similarly well-defined character**, to the point I haven't batted an eye when she's gone into the Negative Zone to try and help the Fantastic Five against a Skrull bent on revenge, or if she follows that up with getting mixed up in another gang war. So I don't think it's that.

Some months ago, when I was reviewing some issue of Amazing Spider-Girl back when the Other May first showed up, and I wasn't too enthused with the issue, the Fortress Keeper suggested something to the effect that meeting this Other May, and the doubts it would raise about her own origins would ultimately lead to Mayday emerging from this with a stronger sense of herself, and an idea of how to balance the different parts of her lives (I would be in complete support of that result). This seems like the time for that, with the Other May exposed as some weird Parker/symbiont hybrid that's helping Osborn, but the fight's happening in Peter's mind?

Granted, Mayday's already had a run through her mind, dealing with some of her own doubts about being Spider-Girl, but there's still this other version of herself to deal with. Yet the focus seems to be on helping her father finally get past the specter of Norman {Expletive Deleted} Osborn. Which doesn't feel like an issue Mayday has to work through. Yeah, Norman had her abducted from the hospital as a baby, but she doesn't recall any of that. The most influence Norman's had on Mayday is how royally her screwed up his grandson. Maybe I'm just on Norman Osborn overload, but it feels like this is really going to come down to Peter against Norman, again, which would sort of push Mayday to the side in the final issue of her own title. I'm sure she'll play some important role, but it's going to come down to Peter getting on his fight and booting Norman out of his mind, you know?

* The Child Within, as one example.

** Probably it really helps to have had essentially just one writer for the character's entire existence. Has to make a consistent vision of the character more attainable.

Worrying About Fictional Babies

This feels a bit odd, because I'm worrying about something that probably won't even come up in the story, but I suppose that never stopped me before.

So in Amazing Spider-Girl, Mayday's little brother is getting prepped for a procedure that might restore his hearing. It's been determined that May's the best potential blood donor, should the need arise, and so Pete and MJ send her home to rest up for the next day. Except May went out to find Detective Drasco, and wound up caught by the Hobgoblin. So with May busy not resting up, I'm starting to worry about little Ben. I probably shouldn't, because the doctor's phrasing suggested both Pete and MJ are also acceptable blood donors, but May's already feeling guilty about Ben being deaf, since her using that sonic weapon to destroy the symbiote (Or is it symbiont? Hey Firefox isn't telling me it's spelled wrong! I guess Deadpool was right! How terrifying.) that had latched on to Ben is what wrecked his hearing in the first place. She was really happy that not only could the damage be fixed, but that she might be able to help, to atone for her mistake.

I'm not really concerned that Ben's going to die or anything. That doesn't really strike me as DeFalco's style, so that's not my major worry. I'm mostly concerned that there are going to be complications during the procedure, and May's not going to be there, so MJ or Peter will have to step up, then May will show up later, and feel guilty that she wasn't there like she was supposed to be. I just figure that with her already feeling guilty about Ben, Moose's dad, the fact she's still keeping secrets from her closest friends, the mystery stalker, her stress over Gene wanting to get back together with her, Hobgoblin, Deadspot, the ever looming presence of Black Tarantula, she has enough on her plate already. More grief and guilt over her little brother just seems a bit much.

I actually think DeFalco will have May get there in time, and the procedure will go fine, because things tend to work out well in that universe, but I couldn't quite shake the concerns, with may privately wondering whether the Parker luck will wreck things, and Peter being dumb enough to openly question whether the Parkers are finally getting some good fortune. Really Peter, you ought to know better than that by now.