Last issue’s letter column said this Jack O’Lantern was created in Mark Gruenwald’s seminal Captain America run. That’s untrue, tho editorial may not have known it at the time. That was a 2nd Jack O’Lantern, a minor mercenary who worked for The Red Skull as part of his Skeleton Crew of goons, but this is a 3rd. According to Brian Cronin’s long-running, super fun Comic Book Legends Revealed column, JM didn’t actually have a plan for who was in this suit, and decided to just wing it til he came up with a good idea. Risky. Especially given the sometimes fickle nature of comics. Can’t be sure you’ll be around to reveal the truth if you let it ride too long. Spoilers: He let it ride too long. Anyway, DeMatteis is back to scripting this month as we find Jonah in the hospital with his suddenly child bride…
Marla looks younger than John, for cryin’ out loud. Come on, dude. Spider-Man hops up on the roof, but then almost falls off, this time having a dizzy spell. With 4 titles a month having to drag this out until the guys who spun it up decide to finish it, this is getting old fast. As he recovers, his Spider Sense goes crazy, because Jack O’Lantern is near. But Jack doesn’t see Spidey as he’s peering in Jonah’s window, so Spider-Man webs him off his Pogoball before he knows what’s happening.
As with Judas Traveller, DeMatteis is setting up a character way too mystical and metaphysical to work in Spider-Man. As with Judas Traveller, someone else will try to correct that. The same someone. Everything goes in circles around here. No idea what MJ’s wearing. Looks to have pajama pants on on the next page. MJ is so wrapped up in her thoughts that she misses the teacher calling on her to answer questions. Later, walking with her new best pal, walking mistake Jill Stacy, she’s very embarrassed, but Jill tells her it’ll be ok. Peter dashes by, later for his tutoring session, and MJ is miffed he doesn’t stop to talk. We cut to The Bugle, where Betty is late on a story and Flash stops by to be way too attached and say thank you for her help last issue. She runs him off and he’s very sad, and Robbie walks over and doesn’t recognize Flash even though they were almost blown up together recently in SM 75. Seems like you’d remember that, at least. Cut to John Jameson, Dr. Kafka & Marla at lunch. Marla’s trying to put on a brave face, but she’s understandably a wreck. I mean, not only did someone beat her husband half to death, but she’s suddenly like 30 years younger, life comes at you fast. And so does this cat, apparently:
At least, it’s allegedly a cat. “A much younger woman!” Something of an understatement right now! What is going on with Flash? Dare I even guess? No idea, we skip to this:
I feel like this is a much more 60s approach to their relationship than is normal for 1997. Spidey takes his leave, and JJJ feels invigorated. Spider-Man hopes to catch Jack floating around the hospital again, and he only has to wait 2 panels. Jack chucks a big fireball at him, which our man easily dodges. Jack says a bunch of boilerplate “You don’t know what I really am” mystery man nonsense that will all come to naught as Spidey leaps onto his glider thingy and they go shooting up into the sky.
DeMatteis really only has like, 3 moves, doesn’t he? Good grief. I can only read so many “Spider-Man falls into a nightmare illusion” bits by the same person. He did it TWICE in Block 35 alone between Harry Osborn and Kraven’s ghost and here we are doing it again. Write some new material, buddy!
JJJ’s dead THIS time for sure! Flashback! Flashback was a really weird and unsatisfying stunt that interrupted several comics in mid-storyline that I’ll be handling here in a bit. We’ll proceed with TAC 248 next time.