I really just cannot get over how bad Jimenez’ Spider-Man looks. Why is his head so weird?! Jimenez is a perfectly capable artist! I get that he’s riffing on Todd McFarlane, but Todd’s did not look like this! Page one this time is just a huge close up on Freak’s messed up face. He is yelling. I think anyone would be, really. The cops react to Mr. Gross, Spider-Man worries that if he goes down there, they’ll just start shooting at him.
In a perfect world, this guy Al would not be allowed to be a cop. In the real world, he’d probably have made captain already for valor in the line of executing people. Down in the sewer, Freak’s body forms a new chrysalis around him as Spider-Man swings away. Suddenly there is a weird 18-panel grid 2-page spread. Top row is discord in the Bar With No Name over the outcome of the betting. Middle is Carlie interacting with Mr. Personality Al up there. Bottom is Spider-Man going to the DB and becoming Peter Parker while doing some Traditional Spider-Man Worrying. The kind of sequence no one’s really done since before JMS. Only it’s related to 1/3 of a very crowded spread. Bennett is furious Peter didn’t get any good photos, continuing to get everyone’s last name wrong in this “hilarious” running gag that wasn’t funny the first time, and then dispatches Peter to get “unflattering” photos of Lily’s dad at his press event, as the DB is supporting his future opponent. Which he does, feeling bad the whole time, and also deciding Lily is really pretty and then feeling bad for thinking that about Harry’s girl. Just feelin’ bad, man.
In the sewer, we see Freak’s perspective as he bursts out of the thing, finding he now has reptilian-looking limbs, and he sees his own face floating in the water. He finds his way into an “authorized personnel only” door and into a locker room.
Hard to imagine why this guy didn’t take off like Venom. At the hospital, JJJ has bribed someone to get him a Bugle, or, now, a DB, and is upset about the lead story. But he doesn’t seem to realize the DB is the Bugle, and is even upset they stole the trumpet icon from their header. Komedy business. Man, this feels like the 70s. All the great minds put their heads together and worked really hard to return Spider-Man to the most boring, uninspired decade in his publication history, then and now. A+, much better than having him be married. Totally worth it.
“Computer-cropping” would require a computer, no? Meanwhile, Freak emerges from the sewers dressed as a city worker, and then kills and possibly eats a hot dog vendor.
You know, the 70s are starting to look pretty good by comparison. Well, Crowne’s doing his thing when the Freak attacks, actually just looking for Spider-Man and tracking him to the event via the smell of his butt. Thrilling comics. Our cop guys Al & Vinnie are there, and they agree to “shoot for the head!” Very in character. That obviously doesn’t accomplish anything, but it does give our hero time to set up his camera and change.
Was Spider-Man making a vaguely pro-George W. Bush joke there? Gross.
Thicker webbing sure worked out. Even the cliffhanger feels like the 70s. Well, we’ll see how all this nonsense wraps up next time. Maybe Spider-Man will have to play football against an evil computer or something.