{"id":19252,"date":"2023-12-04T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-12-04T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/?p=19252"},"modified":"2022-06-13T12:18:48","modified_gmt":"2022-06-13T16:18:48","slug":"sm-85","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/2023\/12\/04\/sm-85\/","title":{"rendered":"SM 85"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In this era, it felt like editors were scared to let a cover go out without copy. Even stupid, useless copy, like this. This happens all the time in late 90s Marvel comics. And then, because DC is always playing catchup whether a trend is good or bad, it happens all the time in DC comics in the early 2000s, when Marvel has stopped. \u201cSHOCKING!\u201d Well, I sure wouldn\u2019t have enjoyed or understood this image without that, thanks. Comin\u2019 in hot tonight! This month, regular writer Howard Mackie and inker Scott Hanna are joined by guest penciler Andy Smith and colorist Mark Bernardo. This will be kind of interesting because you get to see another guy doing what Luke Ross does, desperately trying to integrate J. Scott Campbell and Joe Maduriera\u2019s styles into his own, with ugly results. This is worse than Ross, tho, as we shall see as Aunt Anna is about to find Peter\u2019s Spider-Man costume in the dryer\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

The thing about Andy Smith is his usual deal was a rip off of Bart Sears, whose claim to fame was drawing everyone as hideously contorted roid rage bodybuilders and then having the nerve to write a column on how to draw comics in Wizard magazine, so look at Peter on the next page\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Ugh! Laughable. The toga party reference is good continuity. Not overbearing, just reminding us all these books are happening to the same character. MJ insists on meeting up with Jill as Peter gets in his Spider-Suit. Meanwhile, Paul Stacy, no one\u2019s favorite character, is at Arthur Stacy\u2019s home, refusing to answer a constantly ringing phone, knowing it\u2019s his racist buddies from last time we saw this era. Does Paul live here? Does Jill? Who knows? Arthur strolls in and tells him to be a man and answer. He picks up and hangs up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Oh, ok. I forgot. Hey, it\u2019s been a year! I\u2019m amazed by how much I do remember.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

It wasn\u2019t as clear in the opening scene, but the same J. Scott Campbell influence that permeates Luke Ross\u2019 stuff in this period is really coming through here. And look at that weird, gangly Jill. On the other end of the phone, Donovan Whatshisname (I can\u2019t seem to care to retain it) decides to hire someone to kill Paul for rejecting him, which is super rational. Then we\u2019re back to the Stacys for more hilarious Stacy Family Retconning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Look, man, you can say that the last 20+ years were \u201c5 years ago\u201d and therefore Gwen didn\u2019t die that long ago, no one can stop you, but that doesn\u2019t mean your mostly teenage audience who literally hadn\u2019t been born yet when she died is at all interested in Paul\u2019s relationship with Gwen. No sale! Well, at any rate, they\u2019re off to see Pete & MJ, MJ having engineered this on purpose even tho she must know Paul is a racist and he & Peter hate each other, what could she possibly be thinking? This is her idea of having a fun night? We skip ahead in the evening to the girls getting up to go to the bathroom, leaving the guys to \u201cget to know each other.\u201d This is really terrible. Jill & MJ hang out in the bathroom chatting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

MJ\u2019s torso is smaller than a guy\u2019s thigh in that last panel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

..Aaaand panel 2 is clearly MJ, but they put Jill dialogue on her, anyway, despite it not matching her facial expression, wow. Firing on all cylinders this month. I sure miss Romita, Jr. His art is certainly unusual, and plenty of people hate it. I understand that, even if I also think they\u2019re crazy and missing out. But, l mean, could even the most vocal hater say this issue is better without him? Sheesh. This comic has had 3 and a half backgrounds drawn in 5 pages! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

\u201cThey were the only friends I had! One of them was an old man, we didn\u2019t even live in the same country and I had a family of my own, but they were all I had!\u201d No sale! Paul backs off and leaves, and Peter becomes a somehow both lanky and over-muscled Spider-Man to find out why his danger sense keeps going crazy. Meanwhile, Paul\u2019s walking down the street wallowing in self-pity when the assassin sent after him turns out to be The Shocker. Remember how he randomly showed up during that vertigo story in SM 83<\/a>? Well, he\u2019s back, just as randomly. Shocky lets Paul know why he\u2019s about to kill him, and Paul, at the end of his rope, just accepts his fate. But you know\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Spider-Man looks like he\u2019d be 12 feet tall if he stretched out. I am interested to note that Smith is trying to draw Romita, Jr.\u2019s Shocker. The really thick padding, the chunkier wrist weapons. I\u2019d guess Johnny was just intepreting the design in his own style rather than trying to update it for others, but then, copying people is what Andy Smith was all about in this era. I wonder how his story goes. Did he move beyond his influences\/the styles of the time to become great like so many have in the past, from Barry Windsor-Smith to Bill Seinkiewcz to 90s guys like Travis Charest, Mike Weiringo or Dan Panosian, just to name a few? Or did he keep on being mediocre, like, uh, most of them? I guess I could look it up, but I probably won\u2019t. Well, the super guys start fightin\u2019, and a crowd gathers to watch, which happens to include Billy Walters, boy reporter. What luck for him! Shocky is more interested in his contract, so he endangers the crowd in two ways at once so he can run off. Spidey saves everyone, of course, and then he\u2019s off to catch up. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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

Wait, Shocker was only in this issue for 4 pages? Wow. \u201cSHOCKING\u201d indeed. What a ridiculous turn. What is going on with those birds in the background? I guess we\u2019ll never know. Super excited for the return of JRJR next issue. Rather comically, despite the fact that we\u2019re a year out from Ben Reilly\u2019s death, this issue runs letters on SM 80, which ran letters on SM 75, so we still have people debating it in the letter column. Comic book letter pages were like really, really delayed message boards.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In this era, it felt like editors were scared to let a cover go out without copy. Even stupid, useless copy, like this. This happens all the time in late 90s Marvel…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19239,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[410],"tags":[1694,617,36,415,976,1254,21,1242,417,1456,2],"class_list":["post-19252","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-1990s","tag-andy-smith","tag-arthur-stacy","tag-aunt-anna","tag-howard-mackie","tag-jill-stacy","tag-mark-bernardo","tag-mary-jane-watson","tag-paul-stacy","tag-scott-hanna","tag-shocker","tag-spider-man"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19252","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=19252"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19252\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19253,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19252\/revisions\/19253"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19239"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}