Some Goofy Silver-Age Fun...Or Is it? A review of Spider-Man and Hulk: Fire and Brimstone

 written Kevin Smith and Andrew McElfresh

drawn by R.B. Silva

colored by Federico Blee

I didn't even know this book existed until writer Kevin Smith popped up on my Facebook feed (reasonable, since I regularly look up comic books) plugging it. I had practically just finished "One World Under Doom" and as a result I was quite keen on picking up a new book drawn by R.B. Silva--even if it meant risking Kevin Smith's chronic lateness. I pulled the trigger on what promises to be a fairly interesting miniseries starring the stars of the world's number one box-office hit of 2026: the Amazing Spider-Man and the Incredible Hulk.

The story starts out with Peter Parker, aka Spider-Man, on assignment as a photographer, taking pictures of Easter Sunday Mass in Central Park when suddenly, the mass celebrant Cardinal Leviticus Thornhill and the gathered faithful are suddenly attacked by a motley assembly of supervillains who all have "man" in their names (e.g. Mole Man, Man-Bull, Titanium Man, Absorbing Man, etc.) and who are called, amusingly enough the "Manosphere."  Spider-Man takes on the Manosphere and gets an unexpected helping hand from Bruce Banner, the Hulk, who is at the mass for reasons later revealed. After the fight, Spidey takes a de-Hulked Banner to the apartment of Matt Murdock aka Daredevil to cool down, and they find out why Banner was at the mass: he's trying to vanquish the Hulk by calming his soul. When Cardinal Thornhill makes a shocking announcement on television about the collateral damage from the attack, Banner makes a shocking decision that could have permanent implications for his alter-ego.

I find it worth stressing that the entirety of Spider-man's fight with the newly-dubbed "Manosphere" (which, ironically enough, actually has a woman villain named "Everyman" in its ranks) is loaded with more puns that one could shake a stick at.  The whole issue is loaded with the kind of jokes and quips that would look right at home in a book of dad jokes. In short, it's a book that doesn't take itself too seriously and invites the reader to have fun with it, which is easy to do with Smith's and McElfresh's humorous, if sometimes wince-inducing dialogue and Silva's lavishly gorgeous art. 

My only apprehension has to do with the fact that the book appears to take on religion as one of its central story themes.  I don't consider myself a particularly religious person, but I am a practicing Catholic, and I brace myself every time my religion shows up in pop culture because it can lean a bit too far right or a bit too far left (with Marvel tending towards the latter). Cardinal Thornhill (a villainous name if ever there was one) comes across as a religious zealot who quite literally demonizes the Hulk and proposes to exorcise him from Bruce Banner forever. I'll give Smith points for the novelty of the premise; apparently Banner has never tried it before.   That said, I can't help but fear that this could be yet another ham-handed swipe at religious types considering that there's no way that this series will actually end with the Hulk being banished from Banner's life for good. I fear that Cardinal Thornhill will either end the series having learned a lesson in humility, or something even worse. I hold out hope that Smith has something more clever in store, but I remain cautious.

For all my misgivings, though, this first issue has been a fun read, and if Smith, McElfresh and Silva keep it coming out on time, I'm seeing it through till the last issue.

8.5/10

Peter's New Crucible: A Double-Review of The Amazing Spider-Man #33 and #34

 written by Joe Kelly

drawn by Ed McGuinness (pencils) Mark Farmer and Wade Von Grawbadger (inks)

colored by Marcio Menyz

It's been a long, LONG while since my last review of an Amazing Spider-Man comic book. I have not been reading them (or comic books in generally) quite as regularly as I used to; my trips to the comic store in the last few months have been rather seldom for one reason or another.  Plus, there was the fact that Spidey got embroiled in that tiresome Venom-centric "Spiral" crossover which I didn't have the patience to review, even though I was glad to learn that in that story, the most hated man in comics, Paul Rabin finally met his gruesome and much-deserved demise.

Well, we're two issues away from the landmark Amazing Spider-Man #1000 and having read what are basically issues #997 and #998 (in terms of "legacy" numbering), I thought I'd finally give a review.

A lot has happened since the last time I reviewed this title; Peter Parker has gone off to space and come back, his job at Rand Industries has been all but ruined by Ben Reilly standing in for him while he was gone and, well, Peter has learned, thanks to the meticulous stalking of the serial killer Torment, that he has a long-lost cousin named Cormac Crane, who was actually Ben and May Parker's biological son who, they had been told, had died at birth. In the meantime, Peter also seems to have picked up a new ally in his crimefighting: the folks at Damage Control, led by ex-S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, Agent Griffyn.  (This, of course, lines up with their alliance in Spider-Man: Brand New Day, though given the events in that film one wonders where  this particular team-up is headed). Also, Peter's trying to make amends for the turbulence that resulted from his absence while he was off in space, including helping his boss at Rand Industries, Maira Osmani-Milton, especially in the wake of the catastrophic failure of the fungus project that Peter had been working on with his former high school friend Brian. 

What weighs heaviest on Peter's mind, though, is whether the sudden appearance of Aunt May's long-lost son means he will lose her, as he has lost many other people in his life. 

To be honest, all of the status quo-altering stuff of the last several issues really didn't do anything for me, which was why these  two issues, which basically take us inside Peter's head as he grapples with a new problem, were pretty refreshing for me.  People had worried that Marvel had dusted off the long-abandoned, poorly-received "Trouble" storyline from the early 2000s  to suggest that Aunt May was Peter's son from a fling she had with his actual father, Richard Parker, but that wasn't the case.  As obvious a retcon as this is, at least there's a logic to the way it was done; Cormac Crane was the son Aunt May never talked about because she had sincerely believed him to have died.  On its face, it might seem petty that Peter would feel threatened by Crane usurping his place in May's heart, but, well, we have to remember that abandonment issues are kind of a big part of Peter's character makeup. Is it a little hamhanded? Maybe, but it still works from a narrative point-of-view.

A little less smoothly done, in my opinion, is  Peter's teaming up with Damage Control, which is so blatantly written in to mirror the movie's storyline. While Spider-Man historically does team up with cops, from Jean DeWolff to Lamont Cranston to Neil Garrett to Yuri Watanabe, and he has worked with Damage Control in the past, when their thing was doing post-hero fight cleanup. This new thing of  fighting side-by-side with them just feels a bit abrupt and a tad convenient. This is the sort of activity Peter would question, and to Kelly's credit, Peter does this to look out for them more than to actually team up with them. 

It's easy to forgive these little contrivances when the overall story works, though, I did enjoy Joe Kelly's scripts for these two issues.  This story is less about his adventures with Damage Control and more about how hard he's taking the sudden appearance of a new relative who, to his mind, could gravely compromise the one thing he holds dearer than life itself: his relationship with Aunt May. 

It also helps to have Ed McGuinness on art duties.  I am a big fan of regular artist Pepe Larraz's stylish artwork, but if he needs a reliever to help him hit his deadlines for those big stories like Spider-Man/Superman or the upcoming Amazing Spider-Man #1000, I can't think of anyone better to pinch-hit for him than McGuinness. I have long been a fan of McGuinness' work so it's a treat to see him pencil two issues in a row.  

Two more issues to go till the big 1-0-0-0!

9/10

  

 

Global Dictatorship, Marvel Style: A Review of One World Under Doom

 written by Ryan North

drawn by R.B. Silva

colored by David Curiel

It's not as hard to imagine an authoritarian running the world these days as it would have been around sixteen years ago, which was the last time Marvel Comics introduced a story in which the bad guys were "in charge."  Back then, after Norman Osborn ended the Secret Invasion storyline by shooting the Skrull queen, Veranke in the head, he was basically named the head of S.H.I.E.L.D., and along with his supervillain cohorts plunged the world into a form of dystopia until the heroes kicked them out of power.

In 2025, Marvel Comics launched a slightly "refreshed" version of this concept, except instead of Skrull invaders, it was vampires threatening the world in the "Blood Hunt" event, and instead of Norman Osborn blowing someone's brains out, it was instead Doctor Doom who, as Sorceror Supreme, defeated the vampire  scourge.  Except this time around, Doom doesn't settle for running S.H.I.E.L.D.; he becomes Emperor of the World.  He does this not through subjugation, but somehow, through global consensus.

This is, of course, completely illogical to the world's heroes, who, knowing Doom as they do, instantly suspect that he has an angle somehow, with the prevailing theory being some form of mind-control, and so the Avengers, X-Men and Fantastic Four join forces to ferret out the truth, and figure out a way to take Doom down. The reality they discover, however, is far different from anything they could have imagined, and not only do they realize that defeating Doom will be far more challenging than they anticipated, but they actually find themselves asking: do they actually want to beat Doom this time?

This isn't quite a new story, having been published from 2024 to 2025, but I only just recently got my hands on the collected edition so I wanted to share my thoughts on it.  As much as I appreciate the craft and earnestness on display here, I do confess that, having read the book and thought about it at length, I have some mixed feelings about the story. It's far from the staightforward, old-fashioned superhero yarn one hopes for from a book featuring the X-Men, Avengers and Fantastic Four taking on one of the Marvel Universe's biggest bad guys, which is a good thing. That said, even though, as political allegory it works a bit better than the controversial "Civil War" storyline did 20 years ago, it still doesn't quite capture what's particularly disturbing about the way so much of the world has embraced authoritarian rule. Writer Ryan North clearly tries his level best to lay the basis for a world that would accept Doom and to be fair, a lot of the beats ring true. For example, when Doom argues that a lot of the heroes opposing him are actually villains in their own right, like Reed Richards who hoards his intellectual property instead of using it to cure cancer, or Tony Stark, who using his vast fortune and intellect for machines or war rather than ending world hunger, he actually makes a bit of sense.

For me, though, the allegory falls a bit short.  In most situations, authoritarian rulers don't actually make life better for great masses of people like Doom does here. They don't solve all of society's problems at some hidden, unspeakable cost (which is revealed later in the story, spoiler alert) but rather, they identify a problem and sell themselves as the solution, creating a narrative that, in the beginning at least, they are able to to control.   This problem is usually identified as an "other" whom the authoritarian seeks to eliminate. It's a playbook we've seen played out quite a lot over the last decade or so, with very unfortunate results, like mass murder and human rights violations.   The worst part is that this has widespread buy-in from the population, something not discussed enough in the story. Still, this is a superhero book so I can grudgingly allow North his creative liberty.  Also, R.B. Silva's lavish artwork makes this story go down so much easier that it would with a lesser artist.  This is some really extraordinary work on display across all nine volumes. I applaud Silva for not only his exquisite linework and storytelling, but for finishing the entire series without any fill-in artists. It's sad that this even has to be mentioned, but it is what it is.

From a superhero story standpoint, it's a little harder to swallow the insane amount of plot armor bestowed on Doom here. I acknowledge that Doom is canonically one of the most formidable villains in the entirety of the Marvel Universe, but even then, the way he takes on basically all of the big superhero teams in the Marvel Printed Universe is somewhat...hamhanded.   There are a number of Omega class mutants in that lineup who could have easily handed him his ass if we were to go into a whole power-scaling discussion, but clearly the story imperatives here were...different. Doom's definitely lucky that Magneto wasn't among the masses of superheroes that he had to face. I accept that it's at least debatable that Doom is capable of the power he puts on display here, but personally, I don't buy it.  

I will give this to North; he doesn't try to change Doom from villain to misunderstood hero or antihero. His Doom is just as vain, narcissistic and frankly evil as he has ever been.  Sure, there's a glimpse of his humanity at the end, but at no point did I ever root for him, even when I found myself agreeing with some of his points.  North doesn't shy away from this being a story centered around the bad guy, and whatever my qualms with the overall story may be, this key aspect of the story ensures its narrative integrity. 

8/10 

Comfortably Old School: A Review of Batman/Wonder Woman: Truth

written by Jeph Loeb

drawn by Jim Cheung

colored by Jay David Ramos

Oversized one-shots from mainstream comic book companies are a tragic rarity nowadays, in the age of compressed storytelling and anthologies taking the place of series when it comes to major events. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that DC Comics was publishing this title, so much so that I was actually ready to pick up each of the issues before I learned my joyous surprise, that it was a one-shot. I have long been a fan of Jim Cheung, going all the way back to his Young Avengers days in 2004. I have collected quite a few of his works for Marvel since then, like Avengers: Children's Crusade, New Avengers: Illuminati and Spider-Man: Clone Conspiracy.  I've enjoyed his work so much, in fact, that I regretted missing his runs on titles such as Justice League and even Spawn, so when I found out that he'd be working on something I had a chance of picking up, I decided to go for it. 

It's a properly fun little story. 

Bruce Wayne and Diana Price (aka Batman and Wonder Woman) hold a gala event at which to launch the display of Wonder Woman's single most remarkable possession: the Lasso of Truth. No sooner, however,  does Bruce place the lasso in its protective case, than it is stolen by none other than Batman's ex-fiancee, Catwoman. As Batman and Wonder Woman give chase, Catwoman manages to give them the slip, only to have the lasso taken from her by Harley Quinn.  As it turns out, Batman had requested Catwoman to steal the lasso to test Wayne's security system (spoiler alert: the system failed the test).  Harley Quinn's intervention, however, was unexpected, and where Harley Quinn is, Joker can't be far behind. Will Batman be able to keep his feelings for his ex in check, and will Wonder Woman and Catwoman be able to set aside their differences long enough to recover the Lasso of Truth?

I admit to being a little surprised that the story, apart from being self-contained, wasn't some status-quo shattering event but just a fun little done-in-one that contains some pleasant character vignettes, some decent action and some nice money shots for Cheung to showcase his stellar art.  This is the kind of comic book we don't quite get enough of these days.  

As I write this, the comic book community has marked the anniversary of Dwayne McDuffie's death. For those who don't know, McDuffie, was an extremely prolific television and comic book writer who co-created well-known properties like Static Shock and Damage Control and who wrote several episodes for beloved series like Justice League and Ben 10.  McDuffie excelled at creating rich compelling stories that could be consumed in 22 minutes and which didn't talk down to their audience. I can give no higher form of praise that to say that this is the kind of story Dwayne would have written.   

10/10

An Interesting New Direction: A Review of Daredevil #1

 written by Stephanie Philips

drawn by Lee Garbett

colored by Frank Martin

I was not a fan of the last run on Daredevil by Saladin Ahmed and a rotating gaggle of artists.  It started off strong, with Ahmed and (then) regular artist Aaron  Kuder, working with an interesting premise; having come back from the Hell where he appeared to have been trapped at the end of Chip Zdarsky's run, Matt became a Catholic priest. As the series progressed, though, the storytelling started to come apart at the seams, with Ahmeed's "seven deadly sins" storyline becoming a lot more bloated than it initially appeared to be, and with Marvel seemingly unable to keep their pool of artists to fewer than five.  It actually ended on an interesting note but I wasn't sorry to see it end.

This new direction and creative team of Stephanie Phillips and Lee Garbett, however, looks promising.  Matt Murdock has taken a job teaching law at Empire State University, even though he's no longer a licensed attorney. By night, of course, he's still fighting crime as Daredevil, but he gets a nasty surprise when a new, unknown supervillain appears at Murdock's apartment, telling Daredevil that Matt Murdock in going to die.  It's not exactly new to Matt, but the fact that this new threat completely plays havoc with his enhanced senses and seems to anticipate his every move means that this isn't just another every day threat for Matt but could be someone genuinely dangerous.

Philips and Garbett make for a good creative team, but I refuse to sing their praises too effusively until they've finished at least one five-issue story arc without another artist stepping in to substitute for him. They're not exactly reinventing the wheel with Matt's profession, which was what made Ahmed's run so appealing in the beginning, but as was the case with Peter Parker's teaching career years ago, I think they could go interesting places with this. This is a surprisingly muted issue #1 considering it practically coincided with the second season of the Disney+ show Daredevil: Born Again, but I don't really mind. Splashy first issues are overrated, in my opinion, and what matters most for serialized storytelling is consistency in quality. This new team is off to a pretty solid start, so I hope they're able to keep it up. 

8.5/10

A Heck of a Story to Adapt: A Review of Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow

 written by Tom King

drawn by Bilquis Evely

colored by Matheus Lopes

In a couple of weeks, audiences will be treated to the first "Supergirl" movie in 42 years. That's how badly the box office failure of 1984's Supergirl scared off anyone from bringing her back to the big screen.  DC Studios, under the leadership of James Gunn, hopes to exorcise the memory of that failure with a highly-promising movie from director Craig Gillespie starring Milly Alcock.  After the first trailer dropped, I confess I grew interested n the story that the film was adapting, an eight-part 2021 miniseries titled "Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow."  DC Comics made the sage decision to reprint the story in a compact, affordable collected edition and so picking it up at a bookstore was a no-brainer.

Having read it, I cannot imagine a better way to introduce Supergirl to noobs like myself.

This story begins in a distant galaxy, where a young girl named Ruthye, whose father has been stabbed to death by stone-cold killer Krem of the Yellow Hills, is wandering around her world looking to hire someone who will kill him. She offers, as payment, the valuable sword Krem left lodged in her father's chest, but when a bounty hunter she has hoped to hire tries to make off with the sword, she gets an unexpected hand from someone she least expects: Supergirl, who, traveling with her dog Krypto, is celebrating her 21st birthday in a galaxy with a red sun so that she can actually get drunk.   Ruthye attempts to hire Supergirl to take out Krem, and while Supergirl is politely refusing her, they are attacked by Krem and the bounty hunter whom Supergirl thrashed. She's more than strong enough to take them on, even in her weakened state, but when Krem shoots Supergirl and Krypto with poisoned arrows and makes off with her spaceship, she finally agrees to accompany Ruthye on her quest to take Krem down as it's the only way to get the antidote to the poison in Krypto's veins. Will they succeed in time?  

Like many folks out there, I only know Supergirl as Superman's cousin Kara Zor-el from Krypton, sent to Earth to protect the infant Kal-el, only to discover that he's an adult and hardly needs protection. I know her story has been retooled over the years but this seems to be the prevailing canon. Writer Tom King revisits and expands this origin considerably, which provides a very effective introduction to this character. He is helped along by absolutely superlative artwork by Brazilian illustrator Bilquis Evely, who lavishes the entire eight-issue story with exquisitely detailed illustrations that are both unique and yet vaguely evocative of art deco stylings of the 1920s. Supergirl and Ruthye, in particular, have a very "roaring twenties" aesthetic to their faces. The art is just pure eye-candy, especially helped along by Matheus Lopes' rich colors.  

 More than just the (very) pretty pictures, though, I admit one thing about this book that deeply impressed me was how Tom King was able to strike a balance between the extraordinarily dark tone of the story's subject matter and Supergirl's ultimately hopeful characterization. She is, after all, Superman's cousin, and not exactly a super-powered Punisher. King doesn't hold back; there's plenty of mention of violent death, mass murder and even borderline genocide as Supergirl remembers the death of both Krypton, and later, of the community of survivors who managed to escape it for a while. Krem allies himself with a group of brigands famous for traveling the stars to murder people for kicks, and while their acts of depravity aren't explicitly depicted, King doesn't shy away from describing them vividly.  Supergirl goes up against some very evil people in this book, but King still manages to remind the reader that even after all of this, the rays of hope still manage to shine through. That's all the description I'll give to avoid any spoilers.

Between the extraordinary story and artwork, I honestly had to struggle to not finish this book in one sitting; I always make it a point to stretch out books, be they prose novels or graphic novels for as long as I can and this book is a great example. I hope that the Supergirl movie cleans up at the box office when it comes out in a few weeks' time, and I hope that after watching it, people go their bookstores  or comic books stores and check out this fantastic, character-defining story. 

10/10

Marvel's Deep Bench: A Review of Wonder Man

 Showrunners: Destin Daniel Cretton and Andrew Guest

I was pleasantly surprised to read about how good this series was, considering that, when it was announced, I was at best mildly interested.  I was slightly worried that it would a bit like HBO's old show Entourage with superheroes, but fortunately, my fears were completely misplaced, and instead, Marvel, through showrunners Destin Daniel Cretton and Andrew Guest have brought us something really special in these eight compact episodes.

Wonder Man is the story of struggling actor Simon Williams (Yahya Abdul-Mateen), who's hiding a terrible secret that could sink his career before it even starts; he has extremely destructive super powers that get triggered when he is under extreme stress.  He's also somewhat obsessive in terms of how he approaches the characters he plays (mostly bit roles) which makes it challenging for him to hang on to a job for more than a few days.   However, a chance meeting with Trevor Slattery (Ben Kingsley), once known for playing the terrorist The Mandarin years earlier, may change Simon's life forever as he may get the chance to play the role of a lifetime, that of superhero Wonder Man, in a remake of a movie that Simon loved as a child. A friendship is struck as the pair of them audition for the roles of Wonder Man and his best friend Barnaby, but what Simon doesn't know is that Trevor still has a secret that he's keeping to himself.  

It is a testimony to how well Marvel Studios has handled the vast majority of its characters that it is able to turn to another D-list character for some quality stories. For the uninitiated, Simon Williams aka Wonder Man is actually an ex-villain co-created by Stan Lee and Don heck who turned good and actually joined the Avengers, of whom he has been a member since the 70s.  He's been around for quite some time, in short, but has never really been regarded as an A-lister. I'd argue that made him an ideal candidate for this adaptation because it meant minimal noise from the gatekeeping community.  To the best of my knowledge, the depiction of Simon's powers is comic-book accurate: he basically manipulates ionic energy to perform a number of superhuman feats such as displays of superhuman strength and others. 

In truth, we barely get to see any feats of superhuman derring-do, and yet it is utterly compelling. The way the super stuff is framed is actually quite fascinating; when Simon's powers show up, it's bad news for him, which kind of flips the whole super narrative on its head, and even makes for some pretty harrowing moments.  In one episode Simon and Trevor chase down a kid who has captured footage of Simon using his powers to take out thugs.   The show's greatest strength is the utterly magnetic performances by Abdul-Mateen as Simon and Kingsley as Trevor as well as their chemistry as student and mentor. It's a really great buddy comedy, and apart from the two leads there are some brilliant supporting turns from Zlatko Buric as the Oscar-winning director of Wonder Man Von Kovac, MCU veteran Arian Moayed who reprises his role as Damage Control's Agent Clearey which he first played in Spider-Man: No Way Home, and X Mayo as Janelle Jackson, Simon's beleaguered agent. There are also some hilarious performances from Joe Pantoliano and Josh Gad, who play some really unpleasant versions of themselves.

I love how this show introduces deep universe characters like Wonder Man and his brother Eric, who in the comics is known as the supervillain Grim Reaper, and even Doorman, an obscure 80s character created by John Byrne when he was writing the West Coast Avengers book.  It's interesting seeing someone struggle with super powers as opposed to reveling in them, or using them to do the more "traditional" superhero thing. The Doorman episode, apart from being laugh-out-loud funny for its depiction of Josh Gad as a complete jackass, is particularly instructive as it explains the "Doorman clause" that makes it impossible for a super-powered individual to get work in the MCU's version of Hollywood.    I still have my thoughts on the kind of projects Marvel should pursue, for both the big and small screen, and this show reaffirms my belief that they can do great things if they're willing to step outside of their Avengers/Spider-Man comfort zone.   

10/10

*SPOILER ALERT: Close to Home: A Review of Daredevil: Born Again

created for television by: Dario Scardapane, Matt Corman, Chris Ord

showrunner: Dario Scardapane

Since the original Daredevil show on Netflix ended in 2018, Daredevil: Born Again was something that I, like many fans of the original Netflix show, had hoped for but remained unsure of ever getting.  When Season 1 finally debuted last year I was able to watch two episodes before tuning out due to the demands of the  real world.  I meant to get back to it but then Disney Plus lapsed, and it would be a while before I reupped it.

Well, having bulldozed through the remaining episodes of Season 1 and all of Season 2 in a week, I have this to say: nice save, Marvel.

Yes, DBA S1 quite violently kicks off with a shocking death at the hands of notorious assassin Bullseye (Wilson Bethe) and Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox) getting his vengeance by throwing Bullseye off a roof, four stories to the pavement.  Years later, Matt has gone full time in legal practice, having retired his superhero alter ego and is shocked to discover that his old nemesis Wilson Fisk (Vincent D'Onofrio) has not only managed to stay out of jail after the events of Season 3 but is actually running for Mayor of New York.  Fisk wins, much to the chagrin of people who know who he really is. Of course, a leopard will never change its spots, and the newly-elected Mayor Fisk trains his sights on vigilantes, forming a task force full of cops with anger and disciplinary issues and giving them carte blanche to solve the "vigilante problem."  The emergency of a new serial killer, the gruesome Muse who drains his victims' blood and paints with it, complicates things further for Matt, who has sworn off being Daredevil but cannot continue to the cry for help to deal with this killer, even with the Anti-Vigilante Task Force keen to claim vigilante scalps.  It doesn't help that apart from targeting vigilantes, Fisk has other, more sinister plans that might even have something to do with why Foggy was killed in the first place.

In Season 2, Matt stumbles on Fisk's plans to smuggle guns through his Red Hook property, which protected from scrutiny by a little known, archaic charter, and has to brainstorm with Karen to stop him, all while Fisk and his bloodthirsty Anti-Vigilante Task Force are gunning for them both. Will they run out of time, or will they be able to turn the tables on the once-and-forever Kingpin of Crime?

To be clear, the Netflix Daredevil series which ran for three seasons was far from perfect. Season 1 was sublime, Season 2 was a hot mess, and Season 3, while a conspicuous improvement, still didn't quite match the magic that Steven S. DeKnight and Drew Goddard had woven with that magical first season. But overall it was a really satisfying adaptation, especially when compared to the disastrous 2003 movie. It was a really high bar for Born Again to clear, so to my mind, so it was almost inevitable that it would fall short. That said, by the send of Season 2 they had really reestablished the quality for which this series was well-known when it bowed out in 2018.

There's a lot I like about this series, including some new characters introduced. I didn't quite care for Dr. Heather Glenn (Margarita Levieva), the therapist who goes from Matt's frustrated girlfriend in Season 1 to full-on antagonist in Season 2, with a still bigger role planned for Season 3, but I liked the other new characters like Daniel Blake (Michael Gandolfini) the ultimate Fisk yes man with a surprisingly moving story arc, Sheila Rivera (Zabryna Guevara), Fisk's Chief of Staff, Kirsten McDuffie (Nikki James), Matt's new law partner, Cherry (Clark Johnson) an ex-cop who helps Matt and Kirsten out with as their investigator, BB Urich (Genneya Walton) the niece of the late Ben Urich who's followed in his footsteps as a guerrilla journalist, and Buck Cashman (Arty Froushan) as Fisk's deadly right hand.  Of course, it was a treat to Cox return as the character for which he will undoubtedly be best remembered, and D'Onofrio as his nemesis. It was also nice seeing old favorites from the old series like Elden Henson as Foggy Nelson, Deborah Ann Woll as Karen Page and Wilson Bethel as Bullseye, even though they sat out most of Season 1.  I admit to being mildly disturbed that at one point I was actually cheering Bullseye on (there is a context for it).  There's a nice walk-on from Jon Berthnal as the Punisher but it is regrettably brief, and quite clearly just as setup for his one-shot special Punisher: One Last Kill, which in turn will lay the groundwork for his appearance in Spider-Man: Brand New Day. 

The writing and character work take a while to find their footing, but the acting, particularly from Cox and D'Onofrio is very much on point all throughout both seasons, as is the incredible fight choreography, though wonky swinging CGI makes an unfortunate (but thankfully, rare) appearance.  This is still a Marvel production, after all, so action is very much a cornerstone of the storytelling, though, it does veer into the silly fairly often, between Wilson Fisk's superhuman strength and Matt Murdock's apparent ability to shrug off gunshot wounds as if he were Wolverine or Deadpool.

More than just fisticuffs, though, Daredevil: Born Again hit close to home for me with its disturbing themes on gross abuse of authority, which as outlandish as some of the storytelling can be, is actually one of the more plausible aspects of the series.  If the first season back in 2015 contained a story like this, with Kingpin basically taking over New York with a violent good squad, I would have dismissed the writing as utterly implausible, but unfortunately, these days, it feels all too real. 

Overall, Marvel have, to my mind at least, successfully transitioned Daredevil into the larger MCU (where he was supposed to be in the first place, given that the very first season referenced the alien attach from the Avengers), which was the main mission, and have expanded on the character's lore in pretty memorable fashion.  The setup for Season 3, which is currently being filmed, is pretty darned tantalizing, and I've certainly enjoyed this series enough to say for sure that I will definitely be back for more in 2027. 

8.5/10 

The Very Best for Last: A Review of Spider-Man/Superman #1

written by Brad Meltzer (main story), Dan Slott, Joe Kelly, Geoff Johns, Louise Simonson, Stephanie Phillips, Brian Michael Bendis, Jason Aaron, Jeph Loeb

drawn by Pepe Larraz (main story), Marcos Martin, Humberto Ramos, Gary Frank, Todd Nauck, Phil Noto, Sara Pichelli, Russell Dauterman, Jim Cheung

colored by Matt Wilson (main story and one back-up story), Muntsa Vicente, Edgar Delgado, Brad Anderson, Rachelle Rosenberg, Phil Noto, Federico Blee, Jay David Ramos

lettered by Clayton Cowles (main story), Joe Caramagna

Well, Marvel actually went and did it. They took this expensive anthology format in which all of the recent Marvel/DC crossovers have been published and produced a book that, in my humble opinion, at least, deserves a perfect ten.  I didn't think it possible, but I'm happy to have been proven wrong. 

The main story, featuring Spider-Man and Superman, opens with our heroes caught in an apparent death trap set by Lex Luther and Green Goblin, and with a big chunk of Kryptonite having incapacitated Superman, Spider-Man struggles to keep the death trap, from crushing them. Not all is as it seems, however, and the plan hatched by the villainous purple-and-green clad duo may prove to be even more catastrophic than Peter Parker and Clark Kent could have imagined! Will the red-and-blue clad pair of heroes manage to save the day?

Backing up this absolute gem of a story are some really fun stories of varying lengths, including a retro adventure featuring Spider-Man Noir and 1938 Superman, an entertaining conversation between Gwen Stacy and Lana Lang, a Thing/Superman story, a Supergirl/Ghost-Spider team up, a meet-up between Superman from his trunks-less, New-52-era and Miles Morales, and many more.   

Every single story has A-list caliber talent working on it. I know I said something similar about the DC published Superman/Spider-Man, but in the case of that book some of the talents were clearly outshone by the others, and the score I gave the book was mainly on the strength of the main story by Mark Waid and Jorge Jimenez and the novelty of seeing Jim Lee draw Spider-Man. 

Brad Meltzer, a DC superstar whose only previous work on Marvel that I know of was a brief Spider-Man story in the Marvel #1000 anthology from a few years back, and his collaborator Pepe Larraz, the current main artist on The Amazing Spider-Man, are still very much the stars of the show.  Their story has action, humor, and some nice character moments between Peter and Clark.  Mild spoiler alert: I really like Meltzer's somewhat novel take on why Peter does what he does, basically taking the trope that Peter acts purely out of guilt and chucking it out the window. Meltzer, in my humble opinion has just made the case for a regular gig writing The Amazing Spider-Man; he truly gets the character in a way quite a few writers and more than a few editors over the last few years have failed to do.  His pairing with the outstanding Larraz was inspired, and I will grudgingly give it to Marvel editorial for making that call. Also, this story is a couple of pages longer than the main DC story, which gives it yet another advantage. 

The backup stories are uniformly excellent, with highlights for me being the story by Geoff Johns and Gary Frank featuring the Fantastic Four's Thing and other Marvel and DC heroes who team up to rein in an out-of-control Hulk. It was a short but sweet story about finding civility in a world eternally at conflict, and Johns and Frank, who actually worked on an Avengers story over two decades ago, made more than a few fans, myself included, wistful for their return to the House of Ideas. I for one, would love to see them do a run on the Fantastic Four monthly book.  They captured the essence of Ben Grimm in their brief story, and given that the Thing is often the beating heart of the team, I think they'd do a bang-up job on Marvel's First Family. There are plenty of other treats, like Dan Slott's and Marcos Martin's 1930s noir caper, and Jason Aaron and Russell Dauterman's lavishly illustrated Jane-Foster-Thor and Woman Woman team-up.  Like I said; every back-up story has A-list quality, which is not something I could honestly say about the stuff over in the DC counterpart.  

With this, I'm guessing Marvel and DC are done with crossovers for the time being (maybe), but even though I preferred oversized, prestige format works like the mammoth Justice League/Avengers crossover, for the most part, I quite enjoyed this latest batch of company crossover comics. While I think they got off to a sluggish start with Deadpool/Batman, at least Marvel finished off on a nice, strong note with this modern classic. 

10/10

A Wonderful Confection: A Review of Superman/Spider-Man #1

written by Mark Waid (main story), Tom King, Christopher Priest, Sean Murphy, Matt Fraction, Jeff Lemire, Greg Rucka, Gail Simone (back-up stories) 

drawn by by Jorge Jimenez (main story), Jim Lee and Scott Williams, Daniel Sampere, Sean Murphy, Steve Lieber, Rafa Sandoval, Nicola Scott, Belen Ortega (back-up stories)

colored by Tomeu Morey (main story), Alex Sinclair, Alejandro Sanchez, Simon Gough, Nathan Fairbairn, Ulises Arreola, Marcelo Maiolo, Jordie Bellaire

So far, I have had mixed feelings about this new wave of DC/Marvel crossovers. I hated last year's Deadpool/Batman published by Marvel, but enjoyed the DC-published counterpart, Batman/Deadpool.

Well, so far, the third crossover book, Superman/Spider-Man, is the very best of the bunch.

The main story features Clark Kent aka Superman, and Peter Parker, aka Spider-Man, going up against their long-time foes Braniac and Doctor Octopus, who have teamed up to help Braniac unload corrupted code from his system into the brains of humanity.   Doc Ock has agreed to help Braniac in exchange for the chance to travel to worlds that will appreciate his genius. The plan to dump this toxic code into people's brains, of course, will have catastrophic consequences for humanity, and must be stopped. Can Supes and Spidey save the day?

As main stories go, this one is as strong as it gets, with a tight, entertaining script by Mark Waid, who knows his way around both Marvel and DC characters, but also with some astonishing art by Jorge Jimenez, who has, in my opinion, just made the case for a regular gig drawing Spider-Man, assuming DC ever lets him go. Even though I've kept abreast of the emergence of new artistic talent over the years, Jimenez has flown under my radar for a while since he's done mainly DC stuff, while I'm mostly a Marvel guy. Like his fellow DC exclusive artists Dan Mora and Sean Murphy, this is someone I would love to see working on a Marvel book in the future.     

The back-up stories, ranging from four to nine pages, also feature Superman and Spider-Man and their supporting cast, like Mary Jane Watson, Lois Lane, J. Jonah Jameson, Perry White, Jonathan Kent, Ben Parker, Jimmy Olsen, Superboy Prime, variants of the characters like Spider-Man 2099 and Batman Beyond, other characters like Power Girl and the Punisher, and even villains like High Evolutionary and Carnage.  There's even a walk-on from arguably one of the most hated characters in Spider-Man's history, Paul Rabin. While some stories are better than others, there is not a single lemon among any of these stories.  Every single one is worth reading. 

It should be emphasized that none of these stories, main or backup, are canonical, which, as I understand it, is in keeping with the very first crossover back in 1976 (50 years ago now). There's no effort to explain how these characters occupy the same universe, which was done rather laboriously in the 1990s DC vs Marvel crossover and the JLA/Avengers crossover in the early 2000s.  Non-canonical, to my mind, is the way to go.   One story in particular (no spoilers, I promise) really runs with this non-canonical premise and delivers a tongue-in-cheek shocker that I'm frankly kind of amazed DC editorial greenlit (you'll know which one it is when you see it).

Next to the main story, which I absolutely loved and give a full 10/10, the other highlight of this anthology is some very nice wish fulfillment that's been decades in the making for me: I finally get to see Jim Lee drawing a Spider-Man story, which is something for which I have been pining since he  broke out in the 90s, even before his Image and DC-exclusive days. Sure, it's only nine pages long and doesn't have any real money shots like a two-page spread of Spidey swinging or anything like that, but at least it's an itch scratched after a really long time.  It's also worth noting that in the Tom King/Jim Lee story, Mary Jane is wearing what clearly looks like a wedding ring on a necklace, which means that in that little pocket universe, Peter and MJ are still married, so it's wish-fulfillment in more ways than one.  On that note, the brief Paul Rabin appearance (in the Power Girl/Punisher backup) is just as insulting and demeaning as it needs to be.

Comic books being as pricey as they are nowadays, it's hard to recommend to people to go out and buy one, but in my humble opinion, this one is definitely worth the money. 

9.5/10

 

Hickman's Brilliance: A Review of Ultimate Spider-Man Issues #18 to #24

 written by Jonathan Hickman

drawn by David Messina and Marco Checchetto

colored by Marcio Menyz

It's been challenging to pick up comics in the last year or so, but of the backlog I've accumulated, easily the best issues to read have been the remainder of Jonathan Hickman's Ultimate Spider-Man, which wrapped up its first mega-arc with issue #24.

So to make a long story short, Peter Parker, aka Spider-Man, and his family have survived attempts on their lives by the likes of Ultimate Kraven and Ultimate Sandman, and Peter, his son Richard and Richard's new female friend Felicia Hardy, are now ready to take the fight to the architect of all their misery, the lethally dangerous crime boss Wilson Fisk (aka the Kingpin), who is now allied with the equally deadly Martin Li (aka Mister Negative). Will Peter and his family prevail, or will the combined might of the Kingpin and Mister Negative prove too much, even for Spider-Man and his allies like Harry Osborn, Mysterio and Otto Octavius?

This series has gotten a great deal of hype mainly for its depiction of a Peter Parker who, unlike his mainstream 616 counterpart, is happily married with two children. To my mind, that feels a little reductionist; there's a lot more to Hickman's take on Spider-Man than this. At the same time though, the character is a little hamstrung by the fact that unlike his 616 counterpart, this Spider-Man picks up his powers in his mid-thirties and basically has to take a crash course in being Spider-Man so that the story can wrap up in two years. While there are admittedly some stories that don't need retreads, it's fairly clear that this particular Spider-Man is quite distinct from his 616 counterpart in that, while he is motivated by a deep sense of responsibility, he is NOT motivated by guilt, because Uncle Ben is very much alive here, with Aunt May having died through no fault of Peter's.  It's a completely different dynamic that makes the character worth exploring, which I'm sure Hickman and Marvel plan to do now that the take on the character is an established success. 

All of that said, I don't agree with all of the narrative choices that were made, such as the notion that Peter knocked up Mary Jane and dropped out of college of be a dad, which doesn't quite feel in keeping with 616 Peter's scholastic dedication. Still, Hickman has managed the difficult task of a truly fresh take on an iconic character.  It's even better still that Marvel has let this iteration of the character grow up with his readership, keeping him relatable.

It's also gratifying to see Hickman's take on Peter's supporting cast, in particular the now living Uncle Ben, who's a touch more Ben Urich than Ben Parker here, and Jonah Jameson, who is much more of a hard-boiled journalist here than he has been throughout a lot of his 616 tenure. MJ is also a markedly different character from her 616 iteration, but these have clearly been shaped by her life's experience as a thirtysomething mother. Also, this is an MJ who clearly loves Peter, and who has, fortunately, not been forced to apart from him by some hamhanded editorial mandate. There's a lot left to explore with these characters so I imagine Hickman's got a few stories left to tell.  Well, with these twenty-four issues, he was off to a very good start. 

It helps, of course, that he Hickman some truly capable artists illustrating his work, namely Marco Checchetto and David Messina.  Checchetto's considerably more experienced when it comes to drawing the webhead, but Messina holds his own whenever he takes over, and even though their art styles are visibly distinct from one another they still manage to complement each other pretty well.

I do confess that I am curious to see where Marvel takes this character next!

9/10

Absolutely Iconic: A Review of Batman and Robin: Year One

written by Mark Waid (plot and script) and Chris Samnee (plot)

drawn by Chris Samnee

colored by Mathew Lopes

One of my absolute favorite creative teams in all of comicdom is the duo of writer Mark Waid and artist Chris Samnee, whose work I first discovered in the pages of Marvel Comics' Daredevil series, on which the duo collaborated from 2011 to 2015.  I've diligently followed their collaborations, from their twelve-issue Black Widow run from 2016 to 2017, to their brief run on Captain America in 2017 and even their work for other companies, like IDW's four-issue miniseries The Rocketeer: Cargo of Doom. While some of their stories have inevitably been better than others, their work was almost always engaging, crisp and supremely entertaining, a tragic rarity in modern comics.  They appeared to go their separate ways just before the COVID-19 pandemic, with Waid doing various books and Samnee going on to co-create a comic book for Image with Robert Kirkman. 

Little did I know that they had a truly memorable collaboration still to come, for DC Comics and for arguably one of the most iconic comic book characters in existence. It was to my surprise and delight that I found out last year that they had teamed up, after YEARS apart, on a twelve-issue miniseries titled Batman and Robin: Year One, 

As the title suggests, the series chronicles Bruce Wayne's and Dick Grayson's (untold) early adventures together as Batman and his newly-minted Boy Wonder, Robin. In particular, they have to team up against a formidable threat to Gotham City, the conniving and corrupt General Grimaldi who seeks to upset the tenuous balance of power between the existing crime families in Gotham by pitting them against each other. To help him do this, he has a secret weapon: a man who can change his likeness on a whim, or none other than Clayface. To make matters worse, former District Attorney and now wildcard criminal Harvey Dent, aka, Two-Face wants in on this action. Amidst all this, will Batman and Robin be able to save Gotham City from a brewing gang war, especially since Child Protective Services is watching Bruce Wayne like a hawk to see if he's fit to be a parent for his new ward, Dick Grayson?

As someone who only sporadically reads DC Comics as opposed to my regular Marvel fare, I couldn't say if this story hasn't been told before in some other form, but it seems likely that this is the first time both Batman and Robin have gotten the "Year One" treatment, and to my mind, there's no better creative team to do it. Waid, of course, is a veteran of DC Comics, having written volumes of DC Comics for decades, including seminal work like Kingdom Come, and Samnee, I would argue, is one of his very best collaborators, whose work evokes the Silver Age brilliance of the likes of Bruce Timm and the late Darwyn Cooke. It's almost like these guys were born to tell this story, and they bring every ounce of the creative energy that made their runs on Daredevil so darn memorable.  They have a knack for marrying propulsive narrative, snappy dialogue and visual flair that just makes it impossible to put this book, which is a fairly hefty 264 pages, down until the very last adventure.  Reading this was just pure joy from start to finish.

Now, if only Marvel could lure these guys back to do a run on Spider-Man...

10/10

Meaty: A Review of Batman/Deadpool

written by Grant Morrison (main story), Scott Snyder, Tom Taylor, James Tynion IV, Joshua Williamson, Tom Taylor, Mariko Tamaki and G. Willow Wilson (back-up stories)

drawn by Dan Mora (main story) Hayden Sherman, Bruno Redondo, Amanda Conner and Denys Cowan (back-up stories)

After my distinctly unpleasant experience purchasing and reading the Deadpool/Batman crossover as published by Marvel Comics, I took my sweet time in buying its counterpart published by DC Comics, Batman/Deadpool.  I was loath to spend the premium that the crossover special would inevitably exact if it meant putting up with another anthology of stories whose creators basically sleepwalked through creating them. However, the excerpts popping up on social media showed promise, especially in terms of what they showcased of Grant Morrison's dialogue and Dan Mora's art, so about a full month after the comic book's release, I took the plunge.

Boy, I am glad I did.

To get this out of the way right now, this book, like its Marvel-published counterpart, consists of one main story and several shorter, back-up stories. The difference, however, is that, each of them is head and shoulders above the stories contained in that book.

The main story features Batman and Deadpool, whose universes collide as a result of a dalliance between Marvel's Eternity and DC's Kismet, fighting (of course) and then teaming up to investigate a mysterious presence in Greece, which may prove to be too much for either of them acting alone. The threat is so great, in fact that for all of Batman's skill and preparation and Deadpool's near immortality thanks to his healing factor, the pair of them will need help from a most unlikely source.

I have read quite a few of Grant Morrison's stories, including the breakthrough graphic novel Arkham Asylum, a good chunk of their remarkable run on New X-Men in the early 2000s, the landmark 12-issue series All Star Superman, and the brief but memorable original work WE3. This work actually showed a new side to the writer that I hadn't seen before: they have a good handle on the humor needed for a Deadpool comic books. Unlike Zeb Wells' clunky script, Morrison's jokes are actually funny, and they don't shy away from Deadpool's dubious origins as a thinly-veiled parody/ripoff of Slade Wilson, aka Deathstroke.  Unlike Wells, Morrison actually bothers to come up with an explanation of how Batman's and Deadpool's universes have managed to collide, with a somewhat tongue-in-cheek framing device involving cosmic entities Eternity and Kismet having a one-night stand. The villain, whose identity I will not spoil, is a real treat as well. 

As much as I enjoyed Greg Capullo's work on the Marvel version of this book, I absolutely adored Dan Mora's work here, and I desperately want to see him work on a flagship Marvel book sometime soon, preferably Spider-Man or Daredevil.   Mora is a bona fide superstar, and I can really see why Morrison was keen to work with him after they collaborated on a graphic novel featuring an alt-version of Santa Claus several years ago. His work is gloriously dynamic and slick in its detail at the same time. He's got a flair for visual storytelling akin to the likes of John Romita Jr., but I daresay, he draws considerably prettier pictures. 

Unfortunately, however, as with Deadpool/Batman, the page count for the main story is distressingly short at 27 pages. Given how good these collaborators are, I would have loved a few extra pages, like a nice, round thirty or forty, but it is what it is.

Fortunately, though, the slew of backup stories here, which feature crossovers between Constantine and Doctor Strange, Nightwing and the Wolverine formerly known as X-23, Harley Quinn and the Hulk (!) and Static Shock and Ms. Marvel, come surprisingly close to making me forget that this is an anthology because each one is remarkably well-done. I thoroughly enjoyed each and every one of them, because the creators involved, writers AND artists, are very obviously firing on all cylinders. Each of these stories made me yearn to see these artists strut their stuff on Marvel books. 

These anthology books, for me, are always a compromise in storytelling quality, but to draw a food analogy, if a proper story is a full-course meal, Marvel's Deadpool/Batman was the equivalent of a bag of chips, whereas DC's Batman/Deadpool was at least the equivalent of a couple of good burger sliders. Still not a fully satisfying meal, but a definite step up from the last crossover book featuring these characters.

This was worth my money; I'm just sorry there weren't more pages of crossover goodness.

8.5/10 

Crossover Craze: A Review of Deadpool and Batman (Spoiler Alert)

(Main story)

written by Zeb Wells

drawn by Greg Capullo (pencils) and Tim Townsend (inks)

colored by Alex Sinclair

25 pages. That's the most important thing readers need to know about this overpriced monstrosity of a "special edition." The story that was used to hype the first intercompany crossover between Marvel and DC in over 20 years only comes to a paltry 25 pages, despite the comic book itself sporting a hefty 7 dollar cover price, which comes to even more when it's sold overseas, like here in the Philippines.

Oh, sure, there are a whole bunch of supporting stories featuring other crossovers, like Captain America and Wonder Woman, and Daredevil and Green Arrow, but let's be frank, none of those are what people paid a small fortune of their hard-earned money for.  Truth be told, I won't even bother reviewing any of the backup stories because it's kind of insulting that they even threw them in here. Throwaway stories like that used to serve as teasers for full-sized comic books, but now they're patched together into an anthology to justify a bloated cover price. This only works, however if there's a good, solid main story anchoring everything. The question is: is there?

No.

Short version: The Joker hires Deadpool to capture Batman so that he can take part in another of his death traps. Batman outsmarts Deadpool and Joker, but it seems that he can't disable Joker's death trap, set to poison all of Gotham, without dying. Luckily, the basically unkillable Deadpool, who has turned against the Joker, triggers the trap, saving Gotham and defeating the Joker. Pretty standard stuff, and in truth, as stories go, it's not even that bad.

What's egregious, for me, is the execution.  It's been a while since I've read a script that has felt this perfunctory, this by-the-numbers. This isn't even bare-minimum stuff.  Deadpool doesn't even break the fourth wall here, even though there were a wealth of opportunities. His wisecracking is painfully unfunny, and he even manages to fumble the open-goal jokes about Batman and his succession of strapping young male sidekicks. Who wrote this crap, anyway? Oh, right, Zeb Wells, the ***hat who took Marvel editorial's assignment of splitting up Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson to new low by having his self-insert stick his d**k inside her.  For creating a character as universally-loathed as Paul Rabin has become, Wells has apparently been awarded the plum assignment of writing the first DC-Marvel crossover in over two decades...and this is what he gives us.

The only good news is that Greg Capullo's art is sensational...but then...twenty-five pages.

Save your money, folks. 

5/10 (and ONLY for Capullo's art). 

Refreshed and Rejuvenated: A Review of The Amazing Spider-Man #1 to #5

 written by Joe Kelly

drawn by Pepe Larraz

colored by Marte Gracia

As someone who has collected  comic books off and on for the better part of four decades, most of them from Marvel Comics, I have resigned myself to the reality of the periodic reboot.  I get that it's done to rekindle interest in the book, after by launching a new significant storyline or a new creative team, and while I'm generally not a fan of it, sometimes, a relaunch works pretty well for the character, and this particular relaunch just happens to be one of those times that worked.

So, following his "Eight Deaths of Spider-Man" storyline that closed out the last volume of this series, writer Joe Kelly is back with an all-new five part story pitting Peter Parker, aka Spider-Man against his old nemesis, Roderick Kingsley, aka the Hobgoblin, who has a new scheme up his sleeve involving hallucinogens, and a particularly nasty henchwoman in Itsy Bitsy.  These drugs are no joke, either; they prove to be enough to give no less than the Rhino a heart attack.  Will the help of the still-not-evil-again Norman Osborn and a newly introduced character, Pete's old friend from middle school Brian Nehring be enough to help Peter save the day, or does the Hobby really have his number this time?

 Just to be clear; though the numbers of the book have been reset, unfortunately, Peter's status quo has not been.  He ended the last volume out of work, having left his job at Oscorp, and tries out a new job at Rand Enterprises (though notably, Danny Rand doesn't show up at any point), but he still hasn't gotten back together with Mary Jane Watson, from whom he was forcibly and clumsily separated by editorial mandate during the book's last relaunch. Heck, even his current love interest Shay Marken, who was introduced during the last run, has him on "probationary status."  Fortunately, the clunky legacy of Zeb Wells' run doesn't stop Kelly from turning in a surprisingly decent and complete story that delivers both a satisfying narrative and manages to tease more ahead, which is what any truly good comic book story is supposed to do.  There's not status-quo shattering going on here, but some pretty solid character work involving Peter's childhood that manages to enrich his relationship to Aunt May and carry on the one decent thing about Zeb Wells' run; Peter's tenuous alliance with the rehabilitated Norman Osborn. 

As much as I appreciated Kelly's writing this time around, though, for me the real draw his was artist Larraz, whose work I actually remember from a few issues of Ultimate Spider-Man some years ago, but whose work has grown exponentially in quality since then.  I know this book only just had A-list artist Ed McGuinness turn in an impressive body of work, so bringing on another top-tier talent on board so soon feels almost too good to be true. I am really glad I stuck around for the post-Zeb Wells era because Larraz has blossomed into a truly sensational artist whose work is both distinct and original and yet evocative of all time Spider-Man legends like John Romita Sr.  I was particularly happy that Larraz delivered an entire, uninterrupted five-issue storyline.  If we have yet another situation of rotating artists, I think Marvel are off to a really good start this time around. 

This new run of the book, while not without its problems, is off to a rock-solid start, and I am really excited to see what Kelly and his rotating team of artists has to offer in the issues to come.  

9/10

That was...Long: a *Late* Review of Daredevil #4 to #19

 written by Saladin Ahmed

drawn by Aaron Kuder and various

colored by Jesus Aburtov and various

One of the first casualties of having to adult pretty hard over the last few months has been the meager creative juices that I need to come up with regular blog posts, as a direct result of which, this blog has been tragically neglected in favor of generating much easier, less cerebrally-taxing content like unboxing videos. Heck, even my movie review YouTube channel and has gone tragically neglected. 

Considering how many hours I had poured into this blog, that seems like a shame, especially considering how regularly I used to post here.

Anyway, I'm just going to cut to the chase here; writer Saladin Ahmed's first mega story arc on everyone's favorite blind lawyer/superhero started out strong, and I managed to review the first few issues before life got a little too busy.   Unfortunately, it has since extended into a bloated, unwieldy and somewhat monotonous story that was at least four, possibly five issues longer than it needed to be, and ruined by a chaotic rotation of artists and a resultant shifting in tone that made it hard to stay focused. Not only that, but it ended with more questions than answers. This was a mammoth nineteen issues, and it ceased to be particularly interesting after the first ten or so. 

For those of you just tuning in, this particular run began after writer Chip Zdarsky ended his run Matt literally going to Hell to save his friends. Ahmed brought Matt Murdock back as a Catholic priest, with everyone in his world having seemingly forgotten about him.  In the course of his nineteen issue arc, Ahmed has had Matt face off against demons representing the seven deadly sins, each one possessing someone close to him, or at least someone he knows, which was a pretty good pretext to have members of his supporting  cast and even the occasional guest appearance.  As it dragged on, though, each appearance felt more and more like stunt-casting or fan service and less like a compelling story, and the fact that so many different artists subbed for the original series artist, the excellent Aaron Kuder, made for a very disjointed reading experience. Ahmed's writing may have been uneven but it was enjoyable overall, but the art experience reading this run was just the pits. A decent editor would have had the sense to rotate the artists properly so that each mini story arc could have had a consistent tone and been part of a bigger, better whole.  Instead, the whole thing just has the feel of something cobbled together.

I've been a fan of this character for years and even through some of his lean years I have been able to appreciate the work of the creative teams working on him, but as promising as Ahmed's early issues were, this particular run just kind of went off the rails, which is a shame because if it had only been managed properly, these past nineteen issues could have been so much better.

It feels unfair to grade the entire storyline like this, but in truth, I'd argue Ahmed brought this on himself by stretching out a 12 to 15 issue storyline to something this long. 

6/10

Surprisingly Novel: A Review of Episodes 1 to 10 of Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man

 written by Jeff Trammell and various

directed by various

Full disclosure: the last long-form Spider-Man adaptation that I truly enjoyed before watching this series was the 2018 Playstation 4 game. When Marvel Studios announced a new Spider-Man television series, I wasn't terribly optimistic about its quality as I hadn't been a fan of the studio's only other animated series, namely What If-? In fact, I managed to ignore the series for several months, even as positive reviews started to trickle in. At one, point, however, the positivity was too conspicuous to ignore, and so I  finally dived in, and boy, am I glad I did. 

In ten episodes, showrunner Jeff Trammell and his team of directors and writers have managed something that was, while not quite  impossible, virtually unthinkable: they managed to actually put a fresh spin on one of the most known properties in pop culture.

So just to get through the obligatory and obvious questions, yes, the show does present us with the origin of Peter Parker. He still lives with his Aunt May, but unlike the Peter Parker we have long known; his Uncle Ben has already died long before he gets bitten by a genetically-altered spider. One thing that doesn't change, however, is how the spider-bite basically turns Peter's life upside-down, in every sense of those words. 

Even long time Spider-Man fans will find something to love about this show, which truly honors the characters legacy.  Yes, there's a lot that's been done differently here, from his relationship with Norman Osborn to the impact of Uncle Ben's death on Peter's and May's lives, to the changes in Peter's supporting cast, which now includes disparate, previously unrelated characters like superheroes from other titles like Nico Minoru (Sister Grimm) and Pearl Pangan (Wave), but considering how many times we have seen this character done before, I get that it was important to think out of the box. There was a rumor that this show was supposed to actually tie into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and take place between the time that Peter Parker gets his powers and the time Tony Stark recruits him to fight Captain America, but I am glad they ultimately went in another direction because the last thing this show would have needed was to be shackled to MCU continuity like that. Reference is made to things that happened in the actual MCU, like the Sokovia Accords, but this show is clearly not tethered to the MCU in any meaningful way, which opens up so many possibilities. 

Showrunner Trammel and his writers toe a very fine line between introducing fresh elements into Spider-Man's origin story and keeping the overall narrative true to the spirit of the character. Without spoiling anything, I will say that they do not always get the balance just right, but on the whole, they still make it through the ten episode first season having delivered a very respectable iteration of everyone's favorite webslinger.  

The voice cast assembled is top-tier, with standout performances from Hudson Thames as Peter Parker/Spider-Man, Grace Song as Nico Minoru, Kari Wahlgren as Aunt May, Zeno Robinson as Harry Osborn and Colman Domingo as Norman Osborn.  Voice casting was crucial here because even though this is an animated series, the actors' conviction really is a huge  part of making this new iteration of a 60 year old property feel fresh, and all of them deliver. 

I also loved the character designs and overall incredible  animation, which, unfortunately, is not necessarily guaranteed in a Marvel show.  I liked Leonardo Romero's character designs, with the possible exception of Aunt May, whom I feel should have been modeled more after her clear MCU inspiration Marisa Tomei, especially given that not only does Peter resemble Tom Holland, but Wahlgren clearly patterns her vocal after her MCU counterpart. Still, that is a minor quibble considering how consistently good the art and animation of this show are. Even though this isn't a hand-drawn show like X-Men '97 from last year, the hand-drawn designs of Romero, who gets a helping hand from Paolo Rivera and Chris Samnee, flow fluidly on the screen thanks to some sterling animation work by Japanese outfit Polygon, Inc. I have long wanted to see a Spider-Man anime, to be honest, but if this is the closest I'll ever get to that, it will definitely do.   

The show does have its flaws, and some character beats do not quite makes sense, but overall, this story really did manage a fresh and interesting take on a character that most of the world knows only too well by now, and I, for one, and am really excited to see what they can bring for season 2.

8.5/10

The Eight Deaths of Spider-Man

 written by Joe Kelly and Justina Ireland and various

drawn by Ed McGuiness, Gleb Melnikov, Andrea Broccardo, CAFU and various

inked by Cliff Rathburn, Mark Farmer

colored by Marcio Menyz, Erick Arciniega

(a review the Amazing Spider-Man issues #61 to #70, with some tie-in issues also included)

As this iteration of the Amazing Spider-Man, allegedly Marvel Comics' most consistently selling Spider-Man book, comes to a close, I've decided to review the storyline that has closed it out, the somewhat offbeat, magical tale "The 8 Deaths of Spider-Man" which was tied into the line-wide "One World Under Doom" status quo that was established just a few months ago, in which Victor Von Doom has assumed the mantle of Earth's Sorcerer Supreme. This is relevant because it lays the context for a pretty out-there story, even by Spider-Man's standards.

In a nutshell, Sorcerer Supreme Doom recruits Spider-Man for a very important task that involves defeating the children of the god Cyttorak (yes, as in "the Crimson Bands of Cyttorak" that gave longtime X-Men bad guy-turned ally Juggernaut his powers...more or that later).  In besting Cyttorak's children, Spider-Man gets Cyttorak to keep sealed a cask that guards against an unspeakable evil. This seems straightforward enough, except that Cyttorak's children are, themselves, gods and Spider-Man basically has to die fighting each one, for which he requires a magical reed to ring him back to life. As he continues to fight and die, Spider-Man finds himself wondering if this time even he's bitten off more than he can chew.

I'm on board for this last storyline because I'm happy to see off Ed McGuinness, who during his tenure has, in my opinion, brought something quite special to the book, but who also joined at an unfortunate period in Spider-Man's publication history, i.e. one of the worst written runs the character has ever had to endure, from the ultimately inconsequential "Gang War" storyline, to the utterly imbecilic "What Did Peter Parker Do?" storyline, in which Zeb Wells and Marvel editorial contrived to drive Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson apart yet again.

It's a small consolation to me that Wells is nowhere to be found in this storyline, save perhaps through his avatar, the annoying self-insert Paul Rabin, and the writing tandem of Marvel veteran Joe Kelly and relative newcomer Justine Ireland provide an interesting sendoff for Ed to draw. Unfortunately, given that the main story is ten issues long, with a number of rather irritating tie-in issues upping the total page count, there's simply no way McGuiness would be able to draw all of the issues, so he just draws the first two and the last two. Fortunately, one of the artists sharing art duties with Ed, relative newcomer, Gleb Melnikov is a notable talent in his own right.  Andrea Broccardo, unfortunately, is arguably the weak link in the chain. 

For all the inconsistency in the art quality, at least the script is quite decently solid; Kelly and Ireland make a pretty decent writing team, all things considered. We see some great character work on display, and while some writers tend to lay it on thick with Peter's hang-ups about guilt and personal responsibility, here Kelly and Ireland present a take on the trope that actually feels refreshing.

For all the brickbats I've given this book of late, I'm glad this particular run has had a decent sendoff and I'm ready to start over with the new numbering and the new artist in the form of Pepe Larraz, who'll be teaming up with Kelly and John Romita, Jr., who, I hope can recapture his mojo by drawing better stories than the ones Wells gave him to draw. 

8.5/10

Why I'm Glad It's Almost Over: A Review of The Amazing Spider-Man #55

 written by Zeb Wells

drawn by Emilio Laisio

It figures that just after the story that has had me hanging on to this book despite how many of its plot developments have made me want to just drop the book like I have nearly every other title I once collected, Marvel would come up with a story reminding once more just why I have lost interest.

Long story short, Peter Parker goes on a date with some girl who works at Ravencroft Institute. The date is threatened when Rhino and Screwball run by and Peter very nearly leaves to suit up as Spider-Man, but when he realizes he wants his date to go well, he decides to just talk Rhino and Screwball down instead, and he goes back and enjoys his date.

It's yet another badly written installment in the ongoing idiocy that is Zeb Wells' clumsy attempt to enforce Marvel editorial's wishes that Peter Parker and MJ should remain separated.  Peter going on a date with yet another character that Wells and editorial crapped out feels like yet another ham-handed attempt to get us used to the fact that he and MJ are done and that we'd better get used to the notion to that she'll be staying with Zeb Wells' avatar from now on. 

Well, sorry, I don't feel like moving on, and this issue made a pretty poor case for Peter "seeing other people" because it was a lousy story from a lousy writer.  It was crap, in short.  I really can't wait till Zeb Wells is gone from this book.  

0/10

The Reason I Stayed, Part II: A Review of The Amazing Spider-Man #54

written by Zeb Wells

penciled by Ed McGuinness

inked by Mark Farmer, Wade Von Grawbadger, Mark Morales and McGuinness

colored by Marcio Menyz

This one's for all the marbles: Peter Parker and Norman Osborn are now locked in a dark room under ground with one of the deadliest foes imaginable, the sum total of Osborn's sins, also known as the Green Goblin. This time, the Goblin's playing for keeps, and he wants a new home: Peter Parker himself.  Norman and Peter fight tooth and nail, but even their combined strength may not be enough, but fortunately Peter still has a trick up his sleeve, and an ally he doesn't even realize could help him save the day: the robot form of the Living Brain, of which only the head remains. Will all this be enough to stop the embodiment of evil itself?

When Nick Spencer ended his mammoth 75-issue run on The Amazing Spider-Man in 2021, one of the arguably most interesting story threads he left open for further development was the removal of Norman Osborn's evil side. Along with ridding the world once and for all of the narrative abomination that was Osborn's sexual tryst with teenage Gwen Stacy, the idea of Osborn heading on the path to redemption was a promising one. To Zeb Wells' credit, as angry as much of his writing has made me over the last two years, this one idea he has actually managed to run with quite effectively. Wells actually got me invested in the idea of benevolent Norman, a man struggling with the pain of his sins and now always wanting to do right by the people he has harmed.

Also, stories like Superior Spider-Man  in which Doctor Octopus took up residence in Peter Parker's body for over a year mean that there are actual stakes here, i.e. it's not exactly a given that Peter would come out on top.  So the stage, in short, has been set for a pretty exciting finale.

Of course, it helps that Ed McGuinness, who has the art chores all to himself this time around, has brought his A-game to this rip-roaring final chapter.  There's something really special about this guy's art: it's such simple linework when one looks at it, and it's evocative of some of the all-time greats like Jack Kirby and John Romita, Sr., but it's just gorgeous to look at with its dynamism and expressiveness. Like I said in a prior review, these are the years in which he establishes himself to be one of the best artists ever to draw Spider-Man, and fortunately, this particular story is certainly worthy of his talent. 

10/10