New Warriors (Vol. 1) #67

Background

To discredit the Scarlet Spider, the female Doc Ock and the Master Programmer created a holographic clone of the web-slinger and had him go on a rampage. The real Scarlet Spider put an end to both the phony and Ock's plans, resulting in the destruction of her lair. That destruction had fused the hologram to the body of the mind controlling it, that of Federal Agent Joe Wade, and turned him into the cybernetic Scarlet Spider. Returning to his rampage, he was confronted by Firestar who mistook him for her former teammate. That mistake allowed him to get the drop on her and leave her vulnerable for the killing blow.

Story Details

Justice arrives to prevent Scarlet from blasting the fallen Firestar, allowing her to recover while he tangles with his foe. All the while, he berates her for allowing the thing before them to join the team. Firestar defends her position, but not before Scarlet hits them with a sonic blast and sends them flying, allowing him time to escape. Before Justice and Firestar can go after him, the damage he did to the bridge during his rampage mixed with their fight causes the supports to finally give out.

Justice snags the bridge while Firestar welds it, and fortunately they're joined by Powerhouse and Turbo who save a bus they couldn't catch. Justice tells Powerhouse to help them and sends Turbo after Scarlet. She goes, wondering why she decided to go full-time with the Warriors when she has other ambitions. However, Turbo's hunt would be in vain as Scarlet had dropped down to become Joe Wade once more.

Meanwhile, Ben Reilly bails for an early "lunch" from his job at the Daily Grind to change into his new Spidey gear so he can resume his hunt for the other Scarlet Spider (also his former identity). He gets Firestar's emergency signal on his Warriors combadge and takes off to follow it, wondering what he's going to say to his former teammates.

Meanwhile at FBI Headquarters, the agents are briefed on the situation and the possibility of Joe still being alive. Stephanie Briggs, Joe's former partner, suspects Agent Stone's new desire to find Joe comes from reading her personal files and his wanting to study the nanotech embedded in Joe's body. Steph pulls stakeout duty on Joe's house and gets there in time to meet Joe before he passes out from his transformation. Steph ponders what her move should be, do her duty or help her friend?

Spidey arrives at the George Washington Bridge where the Warriors greet him. He tries to balance the lies, keeping his familiarity with them hidden while also playing up the angle of their last encounter with the other Spider- Man. Somehow, he manages to do that tap-dance while nonchalantly inquiring about Speedball's whereabouts to ensure he was fine (in case you missed the last few issue reviews, there as a prophecy depicting Speedball's death, which the real Scarlet Spider knew about). Justice shows him a piece of skin that Firestar burnt off Scarlet, informing him they plan to analyze it to find a way to track him down. Firestar asks Spidey if he'd like to join them and pool their resources, ticking off Justice a bit.

Elsewhere, Speedball returns from his trip home with Niels, the former bouncing cat, to figure out why his powers were going wonky. The recent recruit to the Warriors and soothsayer of his impending doom, Timeslip, meets him at Grand Central Station...which he's less than happy about. She tries to smooth things over, knowing they haven't gotten off to a great start what with her saying he's going to die and all. He decides to give them a chance to be friends and invites her back to his place to watch his mom on TV. While there, his speed bubbles go nuts and age his fridge into one giant rust heap, as well as eliminating all the food within.

Elsewhere at the Warriors' Crash-Pad, Justice has Friday examine the material and the ship deducts it will take 2 hours to track other elements like it in the whole of the city. Spidey realizes he can't stick around and asks to borrow one of their comm.-badges so they can call him when they find the impostor. Justice wonders how he knew about them, and Spidey tries to feign guessing about it. Fortunately, he doesn't have to hold Justice off for long as Friday reveals he's located the Scarlet Spider.

Apparently, while watching the show Speedball's mother was on, Joe transformed back into Scarlet, knocked out Steph, and rushed to the TV studio to take hostages and have fun making the world guess who he was going to kill first. With his mother now hostage, Speedball pulls up his costume and heads out despite Timeslip's warnings this might lead to his death. It doesn't matter, nothing will stop Speedball from saving innocent lives and his mother!

General Comments

A good follow-up chapter with excellent artwork. The new Scarlet design was pretty cool and the character offers a lot of interesting possibilities if given a chance to be explored. There's that whole Jekyll & Hyde dynamic there. I liked how they wrote Scarlet's wisecracks as coming off like just pure insanity.

However, a couple of nitpicks. Firstly, over in Web of Scarlet Spider #3, Firestar only gave Scarlet a powered burst to the face, exposing a RED metallic chin. In this issue, ALL of his outer layer was burnt off to reveal the silver and red body beneath. Also, it's convenient that the TV in Joe's apartment was turned on and to the same channel on which Speedball's mother was on. A cliched way to get Speedball into the fight.

Overall Rating

4 Webs. Good, but lost points for nitpicks.