When will I be free? JM’s days on Spider-Man are numbered at this point. This is his 2nd-to-last issue, infact. And yet, White Rabbit will not go away, having appeared as recently as 2022. She wasn’t riding a giant robot rabbit then, tho. It’s the usual gang on deck this month, as we open on TV being taken over by a pirate broadcast.
This is a comic book they thought would be worth $2. We cut to the mayor having fallen out of his chair laughing, because obviously. Meanwhile, somewhere that doesn’t make me regret having learned to read, MJ asks Peter if his meeting with Hobie went well…
It’s good of them to tie all the disparate pieces together, it almost felt like each book was doing a different take on the same plot. They wouldn’t do that, would they? Well, our heroes see a bunch of people laughing hysterically in an electronics store, and soon learn what this issue is about. Peter says he has to go help those idiots, and wishes he had time to run home and get that Dusk suit (I think he 100% does), but then has another idea. Meanwhile, at The Daily Bugle, Osborn is looking at today’s paper, about how Spider-Man’s been driven into hiding, and thinking about how painful this must be for Peter, which is a succinct way to show the difference between them, when JJJ comes angrily storming in.
Is DeMatteis trying to tie his “Mad Jack” version of Jack O’Lantern to Osborn? Who knows, he won’t get the chance.
Poor Flash. His meal ticket has an expiration date. Then 2 insufferable pages with this month’s A story, wherein White Rabbit explains she used to be one of those women who marries an old rich guy for his money, then she killed him, and she used the money to become a rabbit-themed sueprvillain. Then she finds out the mayor isn’t taking her seriously and decides to go on a rampage. I am mentally, physically and spiritually incapable of caring about this. Meanwhile, an interesting idea is floated that won’t go anywhere…
I actually think that would’ve been pretty fun. And, in fact, conditions will occur in about a decade that could’ve made MJ’s idea much more feasible. Ah, well.
Aunt Anna’s very first character development. It only took 30 years, and it’s kind of generic, but good for her. Well, we have to deal with this stupid crap now, so White Rabbit announces over a loud speaker that she now wants five million dollars in quarters or she’ll “bomb Manhattan back into the Stone Age,” and then Peter Parker sneaks onto her stupid zeppelin, in a new costume. Well… sort of…
Yes, no gag is too dumb to avoid revisiting, so Bag Man is back.
At least the improvised origin is actually funny.The 2 goons reveal they’re out of work actors WR hired because no real villains wanted to work for her, and then she unveils a giant rabbit robot, although a more humanoid one than on the cover, and it begins shooting machine guns, which, according to the dialogue, may be firing carrots.
No comment on THAT bit of reasoning. The furry dorks blow up the robot and that’s that. Peter thinks that he was awake the whole time, but saw the dorks had freed themselves and decided to let them do their thing. There’s a lot of allegedly funny talk about what it is to be a hero and how to get your own action figure, and then we see a Bugle headline wherein they really did get an action figure deal as we return to The Parker Home. MJ can’t believe Peter did Bag Man, but he says it’s the first time he’s had fun being a superhero in a long time, and that reminds her of something.
MJ producing all those metal parts seems impossible and I don’t know why the whole face couldn’t just be a mask, but here we are. As improbable as it seems, starting next month, Peter Parker assumes a different hero identity in each of the 4 Spider-Man titles. For 2 whole months. But that’s where we’ll pick up next time we visit this era. I am officially in the home stretch. Each of the next 3 blocks is the end of an era, and then I will be at the reboot. I really never thought I’d make it this far, but then, I’ve never really known how to stop once I start a routine. Next post, we will begin to finish up the 60s.