Weird, weird cover. Is that background supposed to imply Kingpin’s windows? The color trails behind Spider-Man’s jump make it look like he came up out of the floor. Back to Alan Kupperberg, Jim Fern & George Roussos as the art team for this final chapter, which begins with Spider-Man swinging at us and yawning in front of a giant newspaper. Then a 2-page montage of newspaper headlines behind him fighting his way through mob goons, Hammerheads, Punisher, Hobgoblin, Rose, Jack O’Lantern, Daredevil, and… Blaze? What’s he doing there? A footnote makes sure you know this takes place before the Spider-Man Vs. Wolverine one-shot and after the Daredevil: In Love and War graphic novel. That book was in large part about Kingpin kidnapping a doctor to take care of his ailing wife, but not the doctor who’s been shown doing so in this story. Maybe they should’ve have brought it up. Speaking of whom…
I kind of think Fisk’s weird posture here may be an attempt to approach the crazy size he had in the aforementioned, Bill Sienkiewicz-illustrated graphic novel, whose giant Kingpin inspired Into the Spider-Verse, but it mostly just looks like his back really hurts. Anyway, while MJ & Felicia have a catty argument, and Felicia lets us know her apartment blew up in TAC, Peter tells Aunt May he’d love to come for lunch and seemingly leaves them to it. Back at Kingpin’s, he fires a very angry Jack O’Lantern, saying he’s not good enough for Kingpin’s much-vaunted “chief assassin” position. Quick cut to Alfredo vowing to kill Hobgoblin… again… and Richard Fisk thinking his “charade as The Rose” has all been for nothing, then over to Matt Murdock, Tork, Sam Wilson and Ben Urich in a restaurant, where they are the target of a particularly inept hit.
But as weird as this book has been under Priest, I’m not totally sure how inept it was supposed to look. Like all his issues, there’s this feeling that it’s 5 pages of comics crammed into one and a half. And that steamroller pace only picks up…
The cycle of Betty & Flash is another one of those things in this series. They keep finding themselves in similar places.
What did Jack O’Lantern do to Hobby? I just read all these books and I don’t know. So, like, if Lance is Hobgoblin, what does he have against Flash, a character I don’t think he’s ever even interacted with? And if Ned is Hobgoblin, what was that business with Lance right before this? All these attempts at red herrings are too much. Ned makes more sense out of the 2, but Priest didn’t want Ned to be Hobgoblin, and I’m pretty sure he didn’t want Lance, either. Really painting himself into a corner. Meanwhile, in Queens, Peter is losing to Mr. Chekov at chess and thinking about how Felicia all-but forced her way into living with him after her place blew up, and how he felt bad when MJ found them together, even though they’re not formally dating. Then Matt Murdock calls, and Peter just hangs up on him. Elsewhere, Hobgoblin attacks Jack O’Lantern as he’s bemoaning his lost job, accusing Jack of “deserting him” when he ran off to fight Spider-Man instead of doing what he was told in 286.
Where are we? How is Alfredo there? Could they have actually drawn some backgrounds to give us SOME idea of what’s going on? How rushed was this issue? Richard Fisk hears about Alfredo’s failed hit on Hobby, and knows the Goblin will blame him for it. Then his dad calls on a phone line only his man Varley is supposed to know about and tells him to come over. Meanwhile-meanwhile, Tork, DD and Falcon are waiting for Spider-Man to show up to a meeting I don’t think he should know about since he hung up on Matt, but he does, anyway, because this comic is really hard to follow. Falcon’s telling DD he’s treated Spider-Man terribly right before Spidey and Black Cat arrive, Spider-Man ready to punch DD’s lights out until he’s told Kingpin’s planning to have all his lieutenants assassinated tonight. DD says this is their big chance to get Kingpin legally.
Well, that’s a lot of info on one page. A literal “Who cares if Kingpin knows Richard is The Rose” is the most baffling indignity for The Rose as a character yet. The Rose was an interesting villain, and now makes no sense. I wonder if it’s personal, Priest tearing down The Rose after his falling out with DeFalco. Anyway, on a very fast-moving 12-panel grid, goons and heroes alike converge on Kingpin’s tower, Kingpin gets on stage in some kind of theater to tell the assembled mobsters they’re fired and then instruct his goons to kill them, Vanessa is put in an ambulance to be whisked off to Europe, and the heroes intervene to save the mob guys. All on one page!
How does Tork know about Vanessa??? Are the cops in on it? Things just keep HAPPENING without much comment or impact. That’s a very specific theory Spidey has, which is undoubtedly true, because this comic is terrible at exposition. Spidey bursts into Kingpin’s office to have one of their usual “I hate you but I can’t hurt you” “you hate me and I don’t even care” conversations until…
Where id Punisher go???? And so, the story that was meant to be a final climax to The Hobgoblin mystery puts him on the sidelines for most of its running time, instead turning into this random Kingpin stuff, and on top of that, it becomes one of the all-time worst Daredevil stories with Spider-Man as his unwitting pawn despite taking place in a Spider-Man comic. A full-tilt disaster. A disaster really similar to the 1996 Blood Brothers arc that was similarly meant to end The Clone Saga for real, long after it should’ve ended, but didn’t, and in fact did nothing at all, due to a constantly changing state of affairs behind the scenes. It’s the cycles that get me. Well, it’s finally approaching. The big reveal. And anyone who’s read Spider-Man Vs. Wolverine has some pretty concrete evidence for their guessing. Or do they?