Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale did a lot of things together as a team in comics. They did they “Color” series at Marvel, such as Daredevil: Yellow, Spider-Man: Blue, and Hulk: Grey, wherein each titular hero would retell an abridged version of part of their classic era in the context of them moping about a dead lover, which is kind of insane, when you think about how they were able to keep doing that bit over and over. At DC, they did the beloved Superman For All Seasons. But before all that, there was Batman: The Long Halloween, a 12-issue miniseries released to much acclaim. It spawned several sequels and became kind of a cottage industry unto itself. After the untimely death of Sale, in 2025, DC and Loeb had the nerve to release Batman: The Last Halloween, with an all-star roster of artists, allegedly in tribute to Sale, but to my eye, doing one of those Loeb/Sale books without Sale didn’t feel terribly good.
At any rate, for some reason, years later, here comes this riff on that. It’s a one-shot rather than 12 issues, and thus, a very short Halloween, comparatively speaking. As the cover triumphantly crows, it is written by Seth Meyers and Bill Hader, at the time popular members of the SNL cast. No famous person would be turned away at 2000s Marvel, but both of them are good writers, so maybe this will be good. And, to my surprise, this is the blog debut of beloved comics artist Kevin Maguire? I woulda sworn I read something he contributed to by now, but I guess not. Maguire is most known for a revered run on DC’s Justice League International (With Keith Giffen and one JM DeMatteis), and for being really good at facial expressions. Here, he’s enhanced by the always excellent Dean White. Ok, enough preamble, let’s get to it.
You know, it only just occurred to me that hiring someone known for facial expressions to draw Spider-Man is maybe not the best use of his time.
There, however, is the type of thing he does best. That guy says he’s Fumes, a member of a new supervillain team called the Furious Five. The girls ask if that’s like the team in Kung Fu Panda, and he says maybe they should change it. No love for Grandmaster Flash, et al? Then Spider-Man comes swooping down, and Fumes seems to rocket away in a cloud of, well, fumes. As Spidey gives chase, someone in a Spider-Man suit drunkenly stumbles onto the street, pursued by 2 guys dressed as Green Goblin and Doc Ock who he apparently threw a drink on.
Spidey may not have a face to draw, but Maguire’s Spider-Man is pretty cool! Even if it’s mostly not really Spider-Man. Those guys get out of the cab and let Ronnie throw up in an alley whilst arguing the merits of Halloween, while, as luck would have it, Fumes lands on the roof of the building Ronnie is throwing up on.
Well, jeez. I went my whole life without realizing that in some alternate dimension, Kevin Maguire is one of the all-time Spider-Man artists, and now I have to know. Look at that Spidey! Sure, he doesn’t know what to do with the back of the hands for some reason, but look at it! Well, as you might guess, Ronnie’s pals pick up a semi-conscious Spider-Man, who weakly says, “I’m Spider-Man” just like their friend, and try to take him home, not spotting their friend passed out in some trash. Above, Fumes thinks he’s maybe just killed Spider-Man, which would be very cool, except now the Punisher might come after him. The guys drag Spider-Man up the stairs to Ronnie’s place as Fumes runs down to the alley increasingly hoping Spider-Man isn’t dead. Then Ronnie’s girlfriend Cheryl shows up angry at his place.
Suitably goofy villains. Back at the other place, Cheryl storms in, talking about how Ronnie ditched her, and then gives a heartfelt speech to the semi-conscious Spider-Man about how she’s leaving him and hopes they can be friends after this. then she tries to kiss his hand and webs herself in the face. In the alley, the baddies debate whether to kill Spider-Man, how anyone would know it was them, and so on, while back with our hero…
Uh-oh. Back in the alley, the Badge guy is getting ready to kill the rest of them to get to Spider-Man, and Fumes is thinking he doesn’t want any part of this as he flashes back to his humble childhood as the son of a vacuum cleaner repair man.
“Like everyone does!” is my favorite gag in this book so far.
Elsewhere, Badger Teeth reveals to Mr. Think that he’s bee on several other villain teams, and they reason no one’s ever heard of them is he always “gets super mad” and kills them. He thought this time would be different. But then, he notices Fumes trying to drag the faux Spider-Man away, and Fumes prepares to defend Spider-Man’s life against a crazy badger man.
As the scuffle continues, the Shaun of the Dead guy accidentally gets thrown out a window by Not Doc Ock, and blames Ronnie as he plummets to his death.
Lucky for him that didn’t go the way it did for Gwen Stacy. It would have been funny if they did the tired old “No! This is just like Gwen!” bit in this situation, but they only have so many pages. Speaking of which, back in the alley, Badger Teeth is monologuing at Fumes, who is barely avoiding his various claws and so on, until…
Hey, that was fun. Unusually fun for this era! Do not understand what Maguire is thinking with those gloves. Seth Meyers and Bill Hader should’ve totally given up their Hollywood dreams to write Spider-Man comics. They are officially far and away better Spider-Man writers than Bob Gale, if he can be here, why can’t they?