Well, the Spider-books have made it to issue 12, and comics love an anniversary, so they’re all extra-sized, extra-priced spectaculars. And ASM & PPSM are a 2-part Sinister Six event. And they have a connecting cover, with one half drawn by Byrne and the other by Romita, Jr., which doesn’t really match up:
Vulture in that stupid, stupid new costume. Electro in his. Venom in Doc Ock’s spot. Kraven replaced by his son and Sandman still acting evil for no reason. Mass hysteria. Tho the cover says Ray Kryssing from Chapter One is gonna ink this, inside, inks are credited to Beatty/Ramos (John and Rodney, I think), with Joe Rosas coloring. On page one, Spider-Man has run into Mysterio, now in full gear, and is not sure how he’s not dead. As they battle atop a World Trade Center tower, Spidey brings up DD7 and ASM 7 & 8 and wants to know the deal, and Mysterio makes a bunch of mysterious comments about maybe he’s dead, maybe he’s a new guy, maybe he’s never been what Spider-Man thought he was, and then he dives off the tower saying maybe it’s time for him to die, too.
Ok! Peter arrives home to find the place swarming with people. Aunt May says MJ’s agent wanted her around people for her protection, but May thinks this is about publicity. Jill is there, of course, and recaps how her dad ran off and she doesn’t know where he is. Peter makes his way to MJ and gets her alone to try to make amends (Which first entails recapping them keeping secrets from each other), and says he wants to keep MJ safe, to which she says he means Spider-Man does.
Ouch. Meanwhile, Sandman is at The Bar With No Name, an infamous supervillain bar that maybe has come up before, I don’t remember, when Mysterio appears, saying he heard Sandy was looking for him. Sandman also wants to know about Mysterio’s supposed death, so Mysty kills himself again, this time with a grenade. He reappears when Sandy says he had a proposition for him, and then finds out it’s the Sinister Six. But instead of being led by Octopus, he’s one of their targets, which gets Mysterio’s attention. Then Sandy goes and recruits Vulture in the middle of a bank robbery.
Quick cut to Sandman recruiting Kraven II as he’s hunting muggers in the park. Then Spider-Man goes to threaten Senator Ward in a kind of pointless page. Then Sandman recruits Electro.
Then there’s more really laying it on thick about how YOUNG they are. A singular obsession of Mackie’s. 12 years since they married and “barely out of being newlyweds” they are. Sure, man, keep tellin’ yerself that. Meanwhile, Senator Ward is furious that someone he summoned isn’t coming to see him until a Doctor Octopus tentacle smashes through the window and yoinks him out.
Spidey begins confronting Arthur, but then he sees Kraven leading some ninjas down the side of Ward’s building. Really. How did he not see Ock? So he’s back into action. And immediately attacked by not just the Vulture, but also some giant vultures. But those turn out to be illusions, and then Electro attacks, and Spidey knows what’s going on.
Spidey gets attacked by Kraven, but throws him into Vulture. Ock realizes Mysterio isn’t Quentin Beck as he appears beside him. Electro and Sandman corral Ward as Sandman decides to provide the exposition.
Now that… is a terrible, terrible looking Venom, my goddess. He looks like he ate a bee. Well. I’m sure all this will go somewhere next issue, but this one’s not over. Now Mackie, Sean Phillips and Joe Rosas bring us a Mysterio back up. Mysterio comments, seemingly to the reader, about the recent inconsistencies visa vie his being alive and all before briefly recapping his entire career and apparent death in a single page.
Follow up question: who cares? Next time, we wrap this up.