Things are about to get a bit weird. This issue begins reprinting & expanding the story from Spectacular Spider-Man Magazine #1 by Stan Lee & John Romita. SSMM was a stab at something a little different: larger format, black & white, more pages. It only lasted 2 issues back in 1968
(And the 2nd was in color after it turned out no one wanted Spidey comics in B&W). Now it’s 1972, and they’re chopping up SSMM 1, coloring it, and adding more pages to turn it into 3 comics. Romita is back for alterations and additions, with new script supplied by Gerry Conway. I’ve read the original (And will cover it here someday), but not these. Some things will be different, from what I gather, and other things I know have to change (Like the prominent inclusion of dear, departed George Stacy). Who knows how this will go? Let’s get to it.
Page one adds a little recap for last issue and Peter’s eyes visible through the mask for continuity. Sadly, the lovely ink wash from the black & white original is gone. This isn’t a surprise, really, I just was curious to see what that would look like with color added. Maybe that’s not even possible in 1972, I dunno. Our man is out as Spidey, wondering where this politician called Raleigh who’s suddenly on billboards everywhere came from. He swings by some guys putting up one of those billboards when giant hands suddenly smash through it!
Well, there’s something you don’t see every day. Spidey get into it with The Smasher, but nothing he does seems to faze the big guy. Meanwhile, those two workers almost fall to their death, and Spidey has to save them instead of focusing on his foe. The big guy also tosses a big hunk of rooftop at the crowd below, again diverting Spidey’s attention. He’s doing pretty well in this exchange. But the fight soon re-endangers the workers, and Spidey once again swings over to save them, giving his opponent a chance to escape. Spidey’s sure they’ll see each other again, and he’s got other business on his mind, anyway, and swings over to The Daily Bugle.
This, obviously, is a new page for this version of the story, finally getting Spidey his real mask back after all this time in the costume store knock off. Mask retrieved, Spidey finds an alley to change in and emerges as Peter Parker, just in time to run into Harry & MJ. MJ declares her support for this Raleigh guy, and wants to give Pete a button.
The implication that this Raleigh dude is a heartthrob is strange to me. Peter wants to sell JJJ photos of the giant battle from last issue, but now JJJ’s only interest is a tip about a giant smashing Raleigh billboards. Between that, threats and bomb scares, it seems like the underworld is trying hard to keep Raleigh out of office. Peter leaves The Bugle just as Raleigh is giving a speech on TV…
This guy’s campaign speech has a lot in common with the Sam Bullit character from awhile back. Which is kinda funny since this story was originally published 2 years earlier. Raleigh angrily calls for a crackdown on crime, and once he gets off the air, runs into some pushback.
Raleigh really lays into the idea that he wants to see all crime destroyed “like the vermin you are!” and then we check back in with Spider-Man. He’s on his way to see Gwen and hash out her feelings for Flash Thompson (Which he completely made up, like, 6 issues ago now, I think? It’s been awhile), while contemplating where The Smasher could be hiding. Gwen, for her part, is beating herself up for running off Aunt May still, and thinks Peter hates her for it.
The reunited couple sit down just in time to hear the end of a speech by JJJ. But Peter can’t settle in, because his Spider Sense warns him of danger.
That ulcer of his is coming in handy! People spot a figure who can only be Spider-Man up on the ceiling, but can’t figure out what he’s up to. And while he’s trying his best, it seems like his web isn’t gonna be strong enough to keep the roof up, and… to be continued…
The letter column explains that the campaign-based story was first put out around the ‘68 elections, so when they thought about reprinting it in color, running it in time for the ‘72 elections seemed like an obvious choice. But running it as regular issues of ASM required Conway to rewrite “over half the continuity” and Jazzy Johnny to touch up quite a lot of the art.The changes from the original are frequent and interesting. Sometimes totally necessary to fit into the current continuity, sometimes just tightening up the original’s frankly meandering narrative, and sometimes adding whole new little threads to the plot. The big character didn’t really get a name in the original. He was called “the man-monster” on account of his size, but it’s not like that was his supervillain name. Now he’s The Smasher, and looks more like he’s wearing a super suit. Spidey obviously didn’t have to get his mask back from JJJ before, and Peter and Gwen had no problems between them in the original. But he did spend a few minutes looking for “The Man-Monster” on his way to pick her up, like it wouldn’t have ruined his night if he found him. This version, where he’s just wondering about The Smasher on the way over in the same panels, makes more sense. And this cliffhanger is just sort of tacked onto the bottom of the page in the original where Peter was trying to fix the roof to give us a clean break until next time. And from the look of things, this story’s going to be far more different from the original in part two!