{"id":3228,"date":"2020-02-03T00:00:42","date_gmt":"2020-02-03T04:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/?p=3228"},"modified":"2019-06-03T00:23:28","modified_gmt":"2019-06-03T04:23:28","slug":"asm-47","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/2020\/02\/03\/asm-47\/","title":{"rendered":"ASM 047"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Ok, so this is maybe the weirdest post I\u2019ll ever make. I sit down to read ASM 47, won off ebay in February, 2019. Open up this cover promising Kraven, and Spider-Man is in mid-fight with Mysterio. And not in the usual \u201cwe put something exciting on the splash and then roll back to see how we got here\u201d way. In an \u201cI clearly missed an issue\u201d way. But\u2026 it\u2019s 47. I just read 46. How? Answer: This is the detached cover of ASM 47 wrapped around a coverless copy of ASM 67. Seriously? Good grief. This was discovered way back on March 11, 2019, a solid month after winning the auction. Seems too late. To add insult to injury, I already bought ASM 67, presumably with cover still attached. So I go on ebay immediately to see if there\u2019s a 47 floating around that I might be willing to pay for, by chance. It\u2019s weirder than that. There\u2019s a COVERLESS copy of 47 up at a low price, \u201cBuy It Now.\u201d So I figure\u2026 why not? I\u2019ll just put this cover on that copy. So, today I got the actual 47, and have placed it in its new cover. Good grief. What a bizarre situation. But\u2026 I can read it now, so here we go.
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And we begin with a good ol\u2019 fashioned retcon. We learn that in one of Kraven\u2019s prior appearances, Kraven wasn\u2019t just attacking Spider-Man for fame, he was doing it because The Green Goblin offered him $20,000 to beat Spidey. When he almost beat him one time, The Green Goblin was actually there, watching. So Kraven figured he did well enough to prove he was going to beat Spider-Man in their next meeting and demanded half his money up front. When a mysterious agent of The Goblin refused on his behalf, Kraven followed him back to Norman Osborn\u2019s house, and determined Osborn must be on The Goblin\u2019s payroll. Strangely, Stan says this totally new background information could\u2019ve happened during ASM 15 or 34, he doesn\u2019t commit, but it seems like it would\u2019ve been ASM 15. But, at any rate, in ASM 34, Kraven was once again defeated by Spidey, and hasn\u2019t been in the book since, so he never got paid.
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Whoa. A lot to unpack there. I actually like this a lot, and am surprised I\u2019ve never seen it referenced before. Kraven just randomly deciding to hunt a dude instead of animals is such a flagrantly illegal and weird and silly thing to do. But being tempted with a big challenge and a big pay day by a master manipulator recontextualizes their initial conflict in a good way. Nice work, Stan & Johnny! 2-and-a-third-page flashback complete, we can now join Kraven in the present.
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Romita is very much drawing Ditko\u2019s Kraven,to the extent that his face looks weird on Romita pages. The Goblin\u2019s not actually dead, of course, but the world at large doesn\u2019t know that, and neither does Norman Osborn, having lost his memory of ever being The Goblin. But Kraven still wants to get paid, so he decides to go take what he\u2019s owed from Norman, and sets out to find his Manhattan offices. Meanwhile, Aunt May is unpacking all her stuff at Aunt Anna\u2019s place when a visitor arrives.
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This whole \u201cpussycat\/pussywillow\u201d runner is a combination of not very funny and kind of awkward in 2019, but Stan seems to be loving it. MJ showing up just to dance, however, is timelessly funny.
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You can see Stan not knowing what to do with that middle Kraven panel and improvising. The Marvel Method can be really fun to watch in action. Kraven goes on to reveal to noone in particular that he can now shoot little lasers out of the lion eyes on his chest to \u201cmagnetize Spider-Man\u2019s muscular electrolytes,\u201d so he\u2019s pretty sure he\u2019ll have no trouble beating him this time. Whatever you say, buddy! We move then to ESU, where Gwen is making sure everyone knows about her going away party for Flash. There\u2019s a lot of banter about Harry and Peter wanting to take Flash\u2019s place as her dude now that he\u2019ll be out of the picture, but Gwen fends them both off. After class, Peter heads for The Bugle, hoping to sell Shocker photos and invite Betty & Ned to Flash\u2019s party.
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Same ol\u2019 JJJ. Meanwhile, Kraven has gone out to The Osborn mansion in Westchester to get his money. He smashes through the front door and brutalizes Norman\u2019s poor butler until he\u2019s convinced he\u2019s not really there and then just leaves. Then we check in on Harry & Peter as they get fancy and go pick up Gwen & MJ in Harry\u2019s car. As usual, Peter thinks about how much he\u2019s into Gwen even though MJ is right there as his date, which is just\u2026 kinda gross\u2026 and then they arrive at the party, which Flash himself hasn\u2019t shown up to yet, but basically everyone else has.
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As Stan has been assuring us the whole time, because comics in this period don\u2019t usually go this long without a fight, it\u2019s all coming together. Kraven says he\u2019d recognize the son of Osborn anywhere (It\u2019s the hair, of course) and begins demanding to know where his dad is (How hard is it to believe a billionaire industrialist might travel for work???) in typically rough Kraven fashion. Flash leads a charge of college dudes trying to help his buddy, but they all get taken out in a single slap. Peter rushes off saying he\u2019ll call the cops, but of course\u2026
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While they get into it, Gwen & Flash help poor beat up Harry back inside, while an unfazed MJ watches the battle and calls it a \u201ccool happening.\u201d Ned & Betty find a phone so Ned can call the story in to The Bugle, and since he\u2019s friends with Norman, JJJ grabs Frederick Foswell and rushes to the scene himself. As Kraven & Spidey keep fighting, Norman gets back into town, contacted by the butler, and gets a cab back to Westchester. But when he hears about the fracas with Kraven, he demands to be taken there. With all the regular people accounted for, Stan & Johnny can focus on the fight.
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Spidey\u2019s in a bad way post-zap, but is saved by the arrival of Norman. As soon as he sees him, Kraven forgets about Spider-Man for awhile, snaring Norman with a rope and hauling him up to the construction site he & Spidey have been fighting on.
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Strangely, Kraven decides he\u2019s done here, and \u201cwith the past behind him, he can carve a might future for himself,\u201d so he just leaves. Spidey wants to follow, but then the bound Norman falls off the tall perch they\u2019re all on, so he has better things to do.
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That was a wacky one. Strange plot structure, and like I said, unusual that the fight was so late and so short. Osborn sticking up for Spidey really makes it seems like his Goblin days are behind him. Maybe they even were, as far as the team was concerned at this time. But, as we know\u2026 it didn\u2019t last.
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Ok, so this is maybe the weirdest post I\u2019ll ever make. I sit down to read ASM 47, won off ebay in February, 2019. Open up this cover promising Kraven, and Spider-Man…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3235,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[9,36,35,12,16,22,13,17,45,21,39,2,6],"class_list":["post-3228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-1960s","tag-amazing-spider-man","tag-aunt-anna","tag-aunt-may","tag-flash-thompson","tag-gwen-stacy","tag-harry-osborn","tag-j-jonah-jameson","tag-john-romita","tag-kraven-the-hunter","tag-mary-jane-watson","tag-norman-osborn","tag-spider-man","tag-stan-lee"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3228","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=3228"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3228\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3466,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3228\/revisions\/3466"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}