{"id":14067,"date":"2022-08-08T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-08-08T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/?p=14067"},"modified":"2021-05-13T23:29:42","modified_gmt":"2021-05-14T03:29:42","slug":"tac-243","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/2022\/08\/08\/tac-243\/","title":{"rendered":"TAC 243"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I\u2019m reading these things so far ahead of when they\u2019re published that once in awhile I take days or weeks off and it doesn\u2019t matter. I\u2019m not even sure when I read TAC 242. Maybe only 3 days ago, maybe a week, I dunno. But, I\u2019m back. Lookit all those Chameleons. Oddly, the back half of this book is a few centimeters wider than the front. You can see exactly where the staples are by which page is peeking out there. But the cover doesn\u2019t look wrapped or cut wrong in the printing process. Weird. Hey, maybe talk about the comic inside. Ok, I will.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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It\u2019s the Jack O\u2019Lantern who\u2019s been haunting TAC for a few issues. Of course, the original Jack became the 2nd Hobgoblin, so who\u2019s this guy? I don\u2019t know that I ever found out. A lot of \u201cmysterious\u201d new versions of old villains were introduced in this period whose identities I didn\u2019t bother to learn. Chief among them The Black Tarantula, but also this guy and a possibly new\/possibly the original Rose. And this Jack is apparently Irish, which, I mean, sure, but how he relates to the original seems like it\u2019ll be hard to explain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Oh, man, did Ross whiff the panel of his head getting shot off. Terrible angle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cSome guy with my exact name and outfit was around, but don\u2019t worry, I\u2019m here to assert that I\u2019M the real one and HE was the fake!\u201d is really lame. Also lame: Luke Ross\u2019s faux J. Scott Campbell art is not even remotely working for what\u2019s supposed to be spooky, gruesome events here. Anyway, Jack starts laughing and then we cut to Ashley Kafka with her patient, Spider-Man, who, as you may recall, is not Peter Parker, but some guy who looks like an extra from a mobster movie who seems to have amnesia, because not much makes sense around TAC lately. He wonders aloud who he is, and then we get this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Herbert rejects all this, and Kafka reminds us she\u2019s probably Chameleon working a ridiculously elaborate scheme here (I sure don\u2019t recall). Herbert tries to prove he\u2019s Spider-Man by climbing a wall, but can\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Good time superhero adventure, back again. Herbert relents and begs for help. Dr. Kafka says they\u2019ve made real progress today and walks out of the room, dropping the disguise and turning back into Chameleon, who is thrilled by his scheme. Meanwhile, the real Dr. Kafka rolls up to the van John was in in what is either a police car or a security car from the institute., I dunno. We never see it or its driver up close. As Kakfa jumps out, spying John.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Man, I don\u2019t remember this romance, either. I wonder whatever happened to John\u2019s old fiance. If their breakup even got shown on-panel. I know that, between appearances in Spider-Man in the 70s, they tried to make Man-Wolf some kinda sword & sorcery space hero in the vein of John Carter of Mars in Marvel Premiere, if you can believe that. And I know once he was \u201ccure\u201d of being a werewolf in TAC Annual 3<\/a>, he wandered off to be part of the Avengers\u2019 support staff and Captain America\u2019s personal pilot. But whatever happened to\u2026 Was it Kristen? I dunno. Probably doesn\u2019t matter. We learn Jack O\u2019 Lantern\u2019s cat is named Maguire (very important) and that he\u2019s planning to use John to get revenge on JJJ. Not that we know what he\u2019s got against JJJ yet. Meanwhile, Flash Thompson is not as perked up by Spider-Man\u2019s pep talk as he seemed, and is moping around until he decides to\u2026 call Betty Brant. Healthy choice! She answers, and even though it\u2019s the middle of the night, says if he needs to talk, she\u2019s there. Meanwhile\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Why does the illusion remove the lil\u2019 tabs on the corners of the photos? \u201cDr. Kafka\u201d runs in, seeing her \u201cpatient\u201d getting upset and saying he needs another sedative. When asked if he trusts her, \u201cHerbert\u201d says of course, they\u2019ve known each other for years, which is  not what Chameleon wants him to be thinking right now, but it\u2019s too late.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Our man remembers who he is, and Chameleon drops the ruse. Chameleon tries to talk his way out of gettin\u2019 whupped by pretending to be a confused victim, and when that doesn\u2019t work, makes it clear he knows he\u2019s talking to Peter Parker and can ruin his life. But Peter yells \u201cI don\u2019t care!\u201d while hitting Chameleon so hard his mask shatters around one eye. I was under the impression that was just his face now rather than a mask.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Chameleon almost looks like a Fred Hembeck drawing in that first panel\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Oh goody. Just what we needed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m reading these things so far ahead of when they\u2019re published that once in awhile I take days or weeks off and it doesn\u2019t matter. I\u2019m not even sure when I read…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14068,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[410],"tags":[1240,427,177,12,93,331,125,27,442,610,629,21,121,2],"class_list":["post-14067","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-1990s","tag-alexei-kravinoff","tag-ashley-kafka","tag-chameleon","tag-flash-thompson","tag-foggy-nelson","tag-jack-olantern","tag-jm-dematteis","tag-john-jameson","tag-john-kalisz","tag-john-stanisci","tag-luke-ross","tag-mary-jane-watson","tag-spectacular-spider-man","tag-spider-man"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14067","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14067"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14067\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14080,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14067\/revisions\/14080"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14068"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14067"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14067"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14067"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}