This one I remember in detail. It sucks. Man, reading this series is like a death march. I got used to mostly enjoying these comics, more fool I. Well, it begins with Peter trying to put MJ in a cab in the rain.
41 years and the rain has never been a factor for his danger sense til tonight.
And he’s just standing there saying all these things in front of the cabbie and passers by. “So, exactly which superhero IS your husband, ma’am? Did he say ‘spider sense?’ Is that one word or two?” Ugh. Back upstairs, Peter thinks about what to do. He decides he has to make excuses to May’s friends (Sometimes she has so many friends, not pictured!). He thinks he can’t call the cops, and who would a superhero call instead?
So, issue one was an excuse to let Osborn do a sort of Silence of the Lambs thing from jail or whatever, see. So why not start this book after the Pulse? Osborn plays up the “How could I have done it? Also I probably did it” shtick, implying he could’ve given Peter’s name to someone else and instructed them to kidnap May if Norman ever went to prison before saying he could have just made that up to torture Peter. We’ve seen this movie.
Here’s where I just gave up on this title. Spider-Man, card carrying reserve Avenger, can’t get into the Mansion because (checks notes) Jarvis refuses to look out a window. Like this is such a terrible excuse to have him fight the Avengers, like you know he’s about to. And if pressed, I’m sure Millar would reference 60s comics, where superheroes did stupid things like this all the time, as if those stories weren’t written for children, and these for an adult readership that is only getting older. And now the Avengers have a security detail? Earth’s Mightiest Heroes need rent-a-cops all of a sudden?? Crap, crap, crap. And I would be remiss if I didn’t point out the presence of Ann Liebowitz up there, actual, real world famous photographer. Millar loved putting real celebrities in his comics. He has Ultimate Nick Fury based on Samuel L. Jackson without his permission or consent. Jackson is a comics fan, and found out he was in the book when it was shown to him at his local store. If he hadn’t thought it was cool, he could quite literally have sued Marvel right back into bankruptcy. Like, the entire future of the company literally hung on him being a fan and being flattered. It’s reckless and stupid. Elsewhere, Millar had the lead of his series Wanted drawn to look like Eminem, while heavily implying that Eminem was in talks to play him in a movie. None of that was true, but it helped get the book some press. Millar is a shameless huckster, more carnival barker than comic book writer, and I find his antic exhausting. Spider-Man is smashing his way through all these SHIELD goons, allegedly moving so fast no one can get an ID on him (Literally impossible), having taken out Hawkeye in one panel and Scarlet Witch off-panel despite her being probably the most powerful single member of the team. Quicksilver and Captain America are now also on the case of “The Mysterious Intruder Who Announced Himself as Reserve Avenger Spider-Man When He Arrived.” Hope they brought their detective hats!
Just writing Quicksilver like it’s 1965.
This is miserable. Since when does Fury know Spider-Man’s secret? The only explanation I can come up with for that is a reference to a book coming out at the same time as this one, maybe, but it’s so nonchalant.
Just stupid, stupid, stupid. So stupid. Not a word of this plays! I am so unhappy to be reading this again. Spider-Man has now broken into The Owl’s lair, and gives HIM more info about May than he gave THE AVENGERS, and convinces him to look into her kidnapping by saying he’ll owe Owl a favor. Then there’s this weird page were the guard Spider-Man knocked out talks about how he had surgery for Crohn’s Disease, a condition Millar actually suffers from. I don’t know why that got a page. Then Owl returns saying the names of Electro and Vulture.
Over Vulture’s objections, Electro and Vulture have gone to an underground bar run by the Russians. They apparently got $20 million for kidnapping May and Electro is eager to spend some of it before they leave town. This place offers more than just drinks.
Super-escorts. It’s frankly kind of embarrassing. Millar and Bendis were and presumably still are good friends. Bendis won critical acclaim doing comics for adults. Comics with real, believable people and real, complex situations in them. Millar’s career is about making “edgy stuff” for “adults” that reads like it was written by a 13-year old. But he somehow convinced everyone he was great and continued to fail upward.