{"id":64,"date":"2020-10-19T00:00:52","date_gmt":"2020-10-19T04:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/deweybass.com\/spiderman\/?p=64"},"modified":"2019-10-31T00:11:28","modified_gmt":"2019-10-31T04:11:28","slug":"asm-135","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/2020\/10\/19\/asm-135\/","title":{"rendered":"ASM 135"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Coming at this from the angle I am, it\u2019s always a trip to hit a cover with an iconic Spider-Man on it that got used a lot in advertising and such, and this is surely one. My copy is signed by then Marvel Editor-in-Chief Roy Thomas. I mean, allegedly. I got it off eBay, I don\u2019t know. All I know is, this issue, the 2nd full appearance of The Punisher, was so expensive I thought it was just one of the ones I\u2019d never get, and then this one showed up for under $20, so I went for it. It\u2019s not in mint condition or anything, but I didn\u2019t pay $300, and it may even be signed by Roy Thomas. It feels like a win. Most of this vintage you can rest assured are eBay purchases. Any books with a more personal story, I\u2019ll talk about. Hey, why not get to the comic?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You already know what it is, mostly. Gerry Conway, Ross Andru, Frank Giacoia. Dave Hunt is off the team, but otherwise, same drivers as usual, as we pick up right where last issue left off. Spidey is more or less paralyzed on the deck of a cruise ship, about to be shot by The Punisher. If you can set aside wondering how and why Punisher was on this boat, this is a smart twist. He catches Spider-Man here with another spider-themed dude, and he\u2019s still not convinced Spidey is a good guy? Good excuse for a fight. Tarantula isn\u2019t missing this opportunity:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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That Spidey on the left reminds me of the one on the cover of ASM 316<\/a> almost 15 years in the future. While he\u2019s beating up Frank (I mean, what\u2019s gonna happen, Spider-Man versus a dude whose superpower is being an angry old man?), he berates him for keeping him busy long enough for Tarantula to escape. Which he does.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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To Hades, I say! Punny apologizes to Spider-Man, and tells Spidey to meet him at midnight if he wants to go after Tarantula, then dives off the side. Spider-Man notes that Punisher seems to know a little about Tarantula. Then the passengers start trying to beat him up for trying to rob them, forcing him to dive overboard, too. As he swims away, people say he must be guilty because he\u2019s running away instead of letting them beat him up, which is pure Spider-Man. Meanwhile, MJ has noticed they don\u2019t know where Peter is, and Flash Thompson is remarking about how strange it is that Pete disappeared right before Spider-Man showed up, while also recapping last issue. Then, the crew spots a man in the water. Guess who?\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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JJJ is pretty happy! But while a very amused Robbie tells Betty what just happened, another member of the cast is feeling less jubilant\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Things are about to get ugly. But we have to see this Tarantula story through, first. Peter gets out of the shower, puts his Spidey gear back on, and swings out to meet The Punisher at the place he named, the Museum of Fort Tyson. Once there, Punisher leads him inside, and Spidey gets off my favorite joke in awhile\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u2026before Punisher gives him Tarantula\u2019s backstory. He\u2019s Anton Miguel Rodriquez, once a revolutionary in an unnamed South American country. He was kicked out of the army for being too overzealous, and being rather crazy, didn\u2019t mind switching sides, and becoming an enforcer for the dictator he had been fighting to overthrow. This is when he became The Tarantula, but he was too violent & unstable even for that job, and also got kicked out of that army. So he terrorized his way North, until he arrived in New York. Now everyone\u2019s on the same page, Punisher knows where Tarantula is holed up, so they run off to get him. Um. If he knows where Tarantula is, why did he wait until he was almost done ransoming a cruise ship to do anything? He says Tarantula\u2019s been in New York for six months \u201clearning the ins and outs of the underworld.\u201d Like\u2026 what? Ah, well. Our guys head out, Spidey webs up the guard on the door\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Spider-Man\u2019s not actually seen The Punisher kill a guy, but he knows that\u2019s his MO. He seems awfully cavalier about this. Frank starts shooting, and like any reasonable person, Tarantula just runs away\u2026 but Spider-Man is waiting for him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Tarantula manages to toss a chunk of masonry into Spidey\u2019s gut and run off into Central Park. But running won\u2019t get him far against Spider-Man\u2019s web swinging, and soon it\u2019s fightin\u2019 time once again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Spidey takes out Tarantula while giving a speech about how he gives revolutionaries a bad name and isn\u2019t fit to shine the boots of the men he betrayed. Punisher shows up carrying the bodies of Hidalgo and Juan. Dead? Alive? It\u2019s not mentioned. He and Spider-Man part on surprisingly friendly terms. But it\u2019s not all smiles\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Uh-oh.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Has Tarantula ever teamed up with Batroc the Leaper? Or, better yet, have they tried to fight? Both just kicking endlessly at each other? That would be funny. It\u2019s hard to take Tarantula seriously. They had something with him being \u201cthe twisted, perverted Captain America of his country \u2013 a superhero for a fascist state.\u201d That part of his deal is pretty cool, actually. The Captain America of a dictatorship has potential as a villain. The notion comes back much later. But it\u2019s undermined by the fact that he likes to gently poke people with his feet. Also: Marvel Value Stamp safe’n’sound!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Coming at this from the angle I am, it\u2019s always a trip to hit a cover with an iconic Spider-Man on it that got used a lot in advertising and such, and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6864,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[9,11,12,41,73,22,13,26,172,21,171,74,2,114],"class_list":["post-64","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-1970s","tag-amazing-spider-man","tag-betty-brant","tag-flash-thompson","tag-frank-giacoia","tag-gerry-conway","tag-harry-osborn","tag-j-jonah-jameson","tag-joe-robertson","tag-liz-allen","tag-mary-jane-watson","tag-punisher","tag-ross-andru","tag-spider-man","tag-tarantula"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6875,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64\/revisions\/6875"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6864"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}