Amazing Spider-Man (Vol. 1) #372 (Story 1)

Background

Invasion of the Spider-Slayers part 5! For parts 1-4, see my last 4 reviews!

Story 'Arachnophobia Too!'

Smythe, who has been sending killer robot after killer robot after Spider-Man starts out the story by revealing that he has been transformed into a superhuman being, dubbing himself "the ultimate Spider-Slayer." Max Young, a split personality scientist had created a robot for Smythe that had failed to kill Spider-Man. Smythe kills Max Young through an intense electric charge for this failiure.

Meanwhie, Peter Parker and Felicia Hardy arrive at Aunt May's house where they see Charlie Shaddock herding Peter's parents, apparently still alive after years of being thought dead, into a car. Peter recognizes Shaddock as an FBI agent he had ran into earlier, in issue #368 or thereabouts. He throws a tracer onto the car so he can track it if he needs to, and then calls the FBI for information on Shaddock, but they keep putting him on hold. So he changes to Spider-Man, and along with the Black Cat, embarks to trace the car and find his parents and rescue them from their kidnapper. However, while following the signal, they are attacked by a giant robotic black widow spider that attacks from above on a webline. The Black Cat severs the webline and the robotic spider drops several stories to the ground. However, they are immediatley attacked by a giant robot tarantula and a giant robot scorpion. Spider-Man tricks the robot Tarantula into jumping toward him, but then moves and lets the robot fall several stories to the ground below them. Meanwhile, the Black Cat is gripped in the claw of the robot scorpion, but Spider-Man rescues her and knocks the scorpion away. But then, the three giant robots combine into one giant robot. The Robot seems unstobbable, but the Black Cat manages to expose some of its circuitry with her claws, and then Spider-Man takes a live wire and sends a flow of electricity into the robot, rendering it inoperative. The Black Cat was injured in the fight, so Spider-Man continues tracing the signal from his tracer alone, tracing it to an old meat processing plant. He changes into Peter Parker and goes inside, where he hears that Shaddock was a crooked FBI agent who had worked for the communist Red Skull and encountered the Parkers in the past. He revealed that he planned to kill Richard and Mary Parker and dispose of their bodies in the meat processing plant to make sure they don't incriminate him. Peter watches the conversation from the ceiling, but then the ceiling breaks and Peter falls on a conveyer belt and can't move because a busted pipe released a lot of Freon that he inhaled. Shaddock turns on the conveyor belt and Peter goes toward the fire in the processing plant, unable to move as his parents watch in horror. To be continued!

General Comments

The fight scene was rushed because several pages were dedicated to a backup story. It wasn't bad but it could have been a lot better. I still like the developments with Richard and Mary Parker.

Overall Rating

Not too good. Not too bad. I like the developments with Richard and Mary. I hate biweekly sagas. They take potentially good plots and rush them and compress them.