Lookit these jokers. Even as a callow youth I was like “This is lame.” Faux-Cap is obviously the worst. He looks like a backup dancer for Paula Abdul. And then the other two. Why put so much effort into making them look vaguely like the real thing? Just make them look like the real thing. Serious hair on Fauxeye, tho.Jerry Bingham hangs in there this month, and Renee Witterstaetter hops in on colors as Spider-Man closes in on the address The Red Skull’s flunky gave him last issue. But he’s being followed, and after some traditional dodging of the gunfire, to no one’s surprise, his assailant is…
Solo is just a less interesting Punisher. At least The Punisher looked cool. But it’s the exact same dynamic, only worse. Anyway, the boys head inside, facing zero resistance and knowing it’s a trap, and then Taskmaster appears. He lets them know he’s been, uh, tasked with creating “nasty versions” of The Avengers (They shouldn’t even bother trying to talk to Janet Jackson), and now it’s time to test them…
I remembered that they were colored differently inside, but not how. Not improvements! “Blood Spider” looks close to Spider-Man 2099, oddly enough. Solo is forced to use his teleport to get behind Fauxeye and beat him up with nunckuks (The 90s!), while Spider-Man has some trouble with Not-Captain America, but overcomes him. Then Fake Spider attacks him and Spidey downs him with a gut punch in a single panel, which is kind of an obvious gag, but it still lands. Taskmaster, being Taskmaster, sees things going wrong and abandons his goons to their fate.
It’s worth pointing out that Spider-Man’s kinda been up to his neck in evil twins lately. Venom, Carnage, Doppleganger, now this.
Just like early Punisher stories. Spidey takes off, fretting. Taskmaster reports his failure to The Skull, who makes vague but ominous threats about both Taskmaster and about what’ll happen to Spider-Man if he shows up at the thingie tomorrow.
Weird, weird posing choices, Jerry! If MJ doesn’t want to be compared to a collie, maybe she should sit on the bed like a normal person.
What an insane position for Peter & May. Even more insane to consider Peter already went through this when Gwen seemed to turn up alive at the top of the 70s clone saga. He’s always so hung up on the people around him dying, but how do you cope with them coming back? Peter heads to work to try to find clues about what The Skull could be planning, and when that doesn’t work, tries to get Joy Mercado to tell him anything she knows about what might happen, which is very random, and somehow works out. As Spidey tells Solo later, he’s learned a Japanese official is making a surprise speech at the ceremonies tomorrow to ease trade tensions with the US, but The Skull is having him killed to do the opposite. This is pretty well in line with the kind of thing Gruenwald was doing with The Skull in Cap around this time, trying to get America to eat itself from within. Soon, Mr. Kuroto is arriving by boat under guard when goons start shooting. And Solo teleports in shooting back, but Spider-Man keeps him from killing anyone. Then Ultimate shows up in droves to keep things on task. Spidey notices the SWAT team guarding the VIP taking him to some random warehouse instead of away from the scene and smells a rat.
The physics of that punch are beyond comprehension. Solo and Spider-Man handily defeat the goons, Spidey managing to keep them from getting killed. He’s all set to web up Solo and include him in the arrests when…
Marvel was starting to make all the big books run 15 issues a year in this period. Which isn’t that uncommon now, but these days, when, say, Amazing Spider-Man is publishing at least 3 issues a month, there’s like six guys rotating on the art. This was very punishing on their biggest talent, and the bi-weekly summers were a reason McFarlane told them he wanted off ASM. You’d think that alone would’ve made them rethink. But Marvel wasn’t used to thinking the talent sold the books. As long as Spider-Man was on the stands, it didn’t matter who was producing it. Very shortsighted. Anyway. That’s it for this block. Time for as close to a trip through the eras as I’ll get from here on out. Next up, the last block of Marv Wolfman, then 80s Defalco, back to Michelinie, then 90s DeFalco. Really running out of time periods, as ‘87-’98 proves to be almost as much content as ‘62-’87. Sheesh.