Getting to these USM blocks is kinda like reading the 60s ASMs. It’s nice not to have to switch between titles and creative teams and decipher what goes where all the time and just enjoy some comics.We are back in the capable hands of Bendis & Bagley, aided by Thibert and Transparency Digital, and they get us going with the classic Spider-Man trope of him out looking for trouble and just about to give up when he hears a gunshot.
Great gag.
There’s some thrilling heroics as Spider-Man battles the Enforcers and the people he was trying to save from the Enforcers while pondering aloud why the Enforcers aren’t in jail. For their part, they think this Julio guy hired Spider-Man for protection, so they’re only more angry at him, and eventually, our man disappears up into the darkness above, only to drop a huge carpet of web on top of everybody.
Bendis bringing back Kingpin the same month Ultimate Six #3 came out, a story that heavily features the Sinister Five crashing at Kingpin’s place and saying Kingpin has left the country, is kind of confusing. It means this had to come after the miniseries, but it also feels a little weird. After the Enforcers leave, Kingpin throws a tantrum about Spider-Man costing him millions and also about all the public servants he paid off not helping him, as his right-hand guy there mentions he was caught on camera killing someone and got off, but he doesn’t care, he just wants revenge. Meanwhile, at the Daily Bugle…
Sam Bullit! Jonah endorsing him! It’s like old times! Bags even gives him a pretty Romita-y face, tho not the same face from way back in ASM 91 & 92. USM hasn’t hewed too closely to any particular ASM story since some of the Doc Ock story, so it’s fun to see this. Well, this leads to Peter feeling sorry for himself in his basement when a much happier MJ arrives with a list she’s compiled of people who know he’s Spider-Man, and I just can’t help thinking of MJ helping the other Peter make a list of who knows he’s Spider-Man in MKSM. Like there’s so many things repeating through the books in this period. This is a few months before MKSM started, but still. It’s just strange.
Really lampshading the Yiddish thing.
Peter catching the piece of paper by sticking to it is such a great little touch! MJ is better than Ultimate Peter deserves, but hey, they’re just teens, all emotion, all the time. Later, Spider-Man is looking at a campaign ad for Bullit on the side of a bus, wondering where he came from when a woman starts panicking over his existence.
Some days it just doesn’t pay to be Spider-Man.
Why does Betty seem so happy about this? He got this job by helping her! Ultimate Betty is such a weird little background character. Also it’s so funny that even in realistic, grounded Ultimate Spider-Man, only 5 people work at this newspaper. Well, 4 now, it would seem…