That guy looks super perturbed. As a NY cabby, seems like he’d see superheroes all the time. Maybe he’s new. Big, big news in the credits this month, tho you can barely read them:
Cory Petit really dropped the ball putting that small, thin text on those tree branches. But if you can read it, Dan Buckley is president of Marvel. Bill Jemas is no more. His abrasive public antics and capricious, often baffling management style proved his undoing, I think. He & Quesada dragged Marvel out of bankruptcy. We’ve seen he had some strong ideas that contributed to the success of USM. And yet… all the other stuff. Buckley remains president today (As of this writing in 2023), outlasting Quesada and his predecessor and currently working with his predecessor, so he’s some stability at the top for the next 20 years. If that’s not enough change for you, Matt Milla is the colorist this month, and his more subtle touch compared to Dan Kemp is obvious on page one. Similar philosophy, but Kemp’s highlights tend to make people look like they’re wrapped in plastic (Not like Laura Palmer). This is less harsh.
Oo la la, who could May be giving Peter’s secret up to in the park!? May’s narration insists she’s ok with Peter’s “job,” and most days, she doesn’t even think about it, even as she walks past kids playing Spider-Man, a newsvendor and another guy arguing about Spider-Man, and Daily Bugle Spider-Man headlines. Then some masonry crashes to the ground, and she reiterates “most days.”
So, he found himself fighting this random dude, who proceeds to send a much bigger hunk of building down toward the crowd below. Spider-Man managed to web it all, then sling it back up onto the roof, smashing the guy in the process.
A flashback within a flashback that took over from a different flashback to the same events! Whew! I wonder if “the Shaker” is a joke, having Romita, Jr. co-create “the Shaker” after his dad co-created “the Shocker,” both with a vibrating power. If it’s not intentional, it’s a heck of a coincidence. We cut back to May’s narration as Shaky gets up for another round. She muses about how silly it seems that she used to worry every time Peter had the sniffles, never suspecting what he was getting up to when he left the house. She recalls going into… I guess the phone store…?
Aunt May: Hero of the Verizon Store! Or whatever it is. Meanwhile, Spider-Man and Shaky were shakin’ it up, and Peter returns to narrating, as they’ve fallen down into the building, and it’s flooding, and he has an idea. He notices there’s a spa and pool area next door, I guess they’re in a hotel or something, and he tosses Shaker through the wall and into a pool.
Remember how May suddenly had a gaggle of old lady friends at the top of Vol. 2, and then we never saw them again? That was weird. Just saying.
Uncle Ben’s grave and gravesite sure have changed and moved a lot over the decades. This iteration looks pretty nice. A cute story. Would’ve felt at home in the Jenkins/Buckingham run of PPSM.