written by Zeb Wells
drawn by Todd Nauck
colored by Sonia Oback
With his tenure (finally) winding down, and with most of his major storylines having drawn to their close, current writer of The Amazing Spider-Man, Zeb Wells, revisits a character that he literally last left in Limbo at the end of the "Dark Web" crossover, Ben Reilly, aka Chasm.
In this story, the antihero Chasm and his girlfriend and partner-in-crime Janine Godbe aka Hallow's Eve reunite following Ben's escape from government custody, and they have a plan to fix Ben's broken mind once and for all, to use the Winkler device, a McGuffin which supposedly helps capture and transmit memories, with the help of Ashley Kafka, aka the Goblin Queen. The only problem is that Peter Parker, aka Spider-Man and his friend Betty Brant are also after that very same device because Betty needs it to prove the innocence of her husband Ned Leeds, who was brainwashed into becoming the Hobgoblin by that very same device. What Ben doesn't realize is that Kafka has very different plans for him and the device, and the only question is whether Peter will be in time to stop her.
I'm not going to lie; it's been difficult to persevere with this series for a number of reasons, foremost of which has been Zeb Wells' writing.
I have, however, wanted to know what he had in store for Ben Reilly, and while this brief two-parter is really just a prelude to the grand finale that Wells had lined up for Peter Parker, Norman Osborn and the Green Goblin, it was a fairly satisfying story in its own right, thanks in part to Wells' guest artist, Todd Nauck, probably best known for the five-page story in 2009 in which Spider-Man met Barack Obama. Nauck is a solid if not quite spectacular artist whose clean linework was, if I'm honest, a refreshing break from the last few issues. That said, he's no Ed McGuinness.
Up next: my thoughts on yet another 50th issue of The Amazing Spider-Man.
7.5/10
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