Spectacular Spider-Man (UK Magazine) #102

Background

Ever wondered what happened to the Spider-Man of the 90's TV cartoon series? Well, he's alive and kicking in Spectacular Spider-Man Magazine, currently being released every three weeks in the United Kingdom. Each issue features a swag of puzzles, posters, letters, and general all-out Spidey fun - all aimed at the young at heart. Plus, there's an 11-page original story featuring more of Spider-Man's Adventures.

Story 'Robot Rampage!'

First we see a mystery figure walking towards a computer console. He does some mumbo jumbo. The screen reads, Boot Sequence Initiated. He turns round to see a big giant killing type machine (!) standing there. The machine, of course, is the one you can see on the cover.

Later that day... Peter and MJ are at a camera shop buying film for Pete's camera. Pete's spidey-sense goes off, and he runs off without MJ. Using his senses, Peter realises that the danger is coming from the sewers, so he climbs down and changes.

Turning round a corner, the robot from earlier jumps out at Spidey and grabs him. Spidey manages to throw the robot off him and web him up. Unsurprisingly, the robot rips up the webbing. But from the darkness come more robots. Spidey decides to get out of there. Going back up to the surface, he steals someone's phone and calls the Avengers. No one's home, so Pete's in a little bit of a pickle as the robots have surfaced, and are scaring the people of New York.

Turning around, Spidey sees a giant screen turn on, revealing the one and only Doc Ock! He is revealed to have been the one to construct the robots to take over New York. Wham! One of Ock's robots slams into Spidey's back, making him crash onto the ground.

Next thing he knows, Spidey's got a ton of those pesky robots on him, which are knocked off by a flying hammer... You guessed it--Thor has just flown in and gotten rid of them. And he's not alone! The next panel is a brilliant shot of Daredevil, the Avengers, the Fantastic Four and the X-Men. Iron Man explains that the call Spidey made earlier relayed to his helmet. Cap then says that it sounded serious, so they called the other teams and got them down here. We then see them all running into battle, shouting out their famous team mottos. We're then given an amazing splash page of the battle starting (though Gambit, Beast and the Scarlet Witch are already down).

After that brilliant page is done with, there's a huge letdown... the words: The Battle Rages On Until. I'm sorry, but that disgusts me. This could have been one great battle, but no, it has to be skipped. Anyway, the problem is that half the X-Men are down, and some of the Avengers. Iron Man suggests that they take out Doc Ock to end the battle. Mr Fantastic and Iron Man have located Doc Ock at the top of the Statue of Liberty. Iron Man and Spidey say they'll go take Doc out, but Wolverine insists he tag along. Tony drops Spidey and Wolvie off at the statue's head, where Doc has a giant ring around the head. Ock picks up Wolvie and bashes his head on a wall while he also grabs Spidey and slams him on the floor. Behind Ock's back, Wolverine leaps again and cuts off something mechanical on Doc's head.

What does the swipe do? Well, it cuts off the Doc's control of the robots, and they start attacking Doc Ock himself. Now that Doc's down, Peter heads off back to MJ, where he finds that she has taken some pics for him. Now that's the kinda girlfriend that thinks!

General Comments

A nice little issue. The guest stars were great. The art was, well... nice. One flaw: I wanted a really big battle, but we only got a splash page.

Overall Rating

The best Spectacular issue in a long time.