Web of Spider-Man (Vol. 1) #59

 Posted: 2005
 Staff: Kerry Wilkinson (E-Mail)

Background

In Spectacular 158, Spidey gained great power in an experiment that went wrong at the university. Also, a bunch of Marvel Universe bad guys (Kingpin, Magneto, Dr Doom etc) got together and decided to fight each other's enemies.

Story 'With Great Power'

  Web of Spider-Man (Vol. 1) #59
Summary: Acts Of Vengance/Cosmic Spidey (Puma, Titania)
Arc: Part 3 of 'Cosmic Spider-Man/Acts of Vengeance' (1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10)
Editor: Jim Salicrup
Writer: Gerry Conway
Pencils: Alex Saviuk
Inker: Keith Williams
Cover Art: Alex Saviuk

Doom sends Titania out after Spidey as part of the new bad guys' arrangement to fight each others' enemies. She has previously been defeated by Spider-Man in Secret Wars 7. Meanwhile, at the Bugle, new owner Thomas Fireheart is speaking to all the staff. He tells them the paper is going to be more neutral over the Spider-Man reporting.

Shortly after, Titania rips up part of the building looking for Spidey. Fireheart changes into Puma (out of sight of the staff). He goes after Titania but is thrown out of the window. Spidey saves him, then squares up to Titania. He gets knocked off, falling 30 storeys.

With his new powers, he is fine though and is more surprised himself. Puma tries to help but is again overpowered. Spidey doesn't really want tohurt Titania but ends up blasting her with his new-found powers. Dr Doom watches on via a monitor…

General Comments

I quite like the idea of major villains swapping enemies and fighting different heroes. It gives a nice change to the standard-fare that you often end up with. Spidey's new powers and interesting too and you can see him ending up in a lot of turmoil over whether he can defend himself without seriously hurting his opponent.

Again, this feels a lot more like a set-up tale than anything else. From the way it reads, Dr Doom is going to be the big battle … it just won't be happening in Web.

The downside, of course, is that things are going to generate into a 'villain of the week'-type scenario where Spidey fights (and beats) a succession of other books' characters until things reach some sort of conclusion and he loses his special powers.

What would have been better would have been if Spidey had to get past these other characters with his regular abilities. It doesn't say too much about him if he has to beat a nobody like Titania using extra powers, let alone any other villains.

Overall Rating

Promising in theory but the execution could be better.

 Posted: 2005
 Staff: Kerry Wilkinson (E-Mail)