Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man is a real mouthful for a comic book title. But, then, it’s not Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man, so I guess it’s ok. Fresh off a top-3 all time Fantastic Four run (In my opinion), art team supreme Mike Weiringo and Karl Kessel return to Spider-Man, now aided and abetted by writer Peter David and colorist Paul Mounts. David weirdly never became a superstar despite being one of the most well-liked writers in comics. Like his Hulk run made him a true legend to a lot of people, but he never got a book that sold a lot. But, he kept on plugging away, and he’s got his own convoluted history with Spider-Man, and he’s back. Ringo may not have been a topline artist, but he was to me. Seems like a good recipe for a Spider-Title. Just one problem: It launched during The Other. This story promised 2 things: Still more Morlun/Totem stuff, which by now had worn out its welcome, and a story that would force me to buy 4 issues each of 2 additional Spider-Man titles, one of them written by Reginald Hudlin which, as we have covered, did not appeal to me. So, Marvel’s plan to force me to buy FNSM and Marvel Knights Spider-Man to see what happened in this story instead resulted in me dropping ASM for the first time since the early 90s. I just skipped this entirely. Good job, Marvel! Ya coulda had my money for 4 issues of ASM during this time, but you got greedy, and instead, you got nothing. And once I started hearing about how bad this was, well, I sure didn’t feel bad about my choices. There is some legendarily bad stuff in here, especially thanks to, you guessed it, Reginald Hudlin. This is one of the absolute most reviled Spider-Man stories since the clone era. And my stupid ass bought it all a year ago for this blog. What a life. What a series of choices we all make. But, if nothing else, I’m excited to see some prime Ringo Spider-Man! By the point this comes out, I think he’s one of the best Spider-Man artists of all time. I was really mad buying into this series would mean reading The Other. But now, at least, I get to see the art. And one assumes the Waid issues are at least well-written, subject matter aside. All the covers to this series have this monochrome color scheme, and I feel like this one, in particular, sums up the dissonance between the comics industry and Mike Weiringo in a single move. He was growing more and more disgruntled with comics becoming “mature” and “realistic,” aka dark. And here we have a fun shot of Spider-Man doing his thing, during what is clearly a daytime scene, turned red and scary and evil. The white on the suit looks weird, too, in context.
Well. There’s something you wouldn’t see in comics last time Peter David was writing Peter Parker. That’s one way to get the exposition out of the way. Next day, some dork is robbing a bank, and Spider-Man appears on the scene. The dork leaves the teller to keep packing his money, assuming he will make short work of Spider-Man outside, who tells him he’s got “new bad guy smell.”
Kinda fascinating, really, comparing this Spider-Man to Ringo & Kesel’s last outing in these pages. It’s clearly Ringo, but he’s leveled up so much since in then. They seem to be doing a sort of Ditko-y thing here, which will not remain part of Ringo’s Spider-Man. It’s very interesting. But it’s so clean and looks so nice! The dork goes back inside, shoots a guard in the leg for no reason, and tells them his name is Tracer before he departs. Cheers, luv, the cavalry’s here! No, not that Tracer. Also not the Tracer from TAC 211. Tracing is so easy. Just ask Mike Deodato, Jr.! Over a page of Spider-Man running from the magic bullets (What, do they have tiny jet engines in there, as well as GPS?), tricking them into going through a Daily Bugle anti-Spider-Man billboard that doesn’t stop them, he begins flashing back to earlier, where MJ had taken it upon herself to get Captain America involved with Peter worrying about dying. Rather surprisingly, Cap begins teaching Peter Tai Chi (With MJ also participating). He talks about how instinct can kill you, how Peter should develop focus, and then gives some rather specific, “Here’s some random stuff Peter David read about” examples of people in history who died following their instincts. Cap says he needs to learn to be calculated and focus.
I don’t… think that’s what Cap had in mind. Why didn’t he just web the bullets?? Well, he soon finds himself being worked on by a “Doctor Castillo,” recommended by Captain America, who appears to be Peter David making up his own Night Nurse. She patches up superheroes on the sly. Like Night Nurse. Why not just use Night Nurse? She removes the bullet, takes some blood for blood work, and slowly gets him to trust her.
Why does Peter have a mullet? Did Ringo look at those hideous MKSMs and think that was the current model? Or did he just pick up where he left off in 1998? Well, Peter says he got a spider tracer on, uh, Tracer, and insists that he has to go get this guy to overcome his fear. MJ is not thrilled, but then he’s off. And eventually, he picks up the tracer in a limo, and then he… sets up his camera? Is that “summer job” at the Bugle still happening? I am so confused.
Goodness. Then Peter is home, bemoaning his bad luck, when Dr. Castillo calls. She needs to run more test, because the first one came up with things.
And we’re off. Boy, do I not want to be off, but we’re off. You may perhaps think you know where this is going, but I can pretty much guarantee you do not.