This is a good week for my pull list. We got my highly anticipated next issue of MacKay’s Avengers (with his free “Blood Hunt” preview), Ultimate X-Men, the next book from Hickman’s rebooted Ultimate Universe, a Giant-sized Spider-Gwen, and more. But how could anything else be my number 1, when the ONE BOOK I’ve seen asking for, for years has finally come to pass…
Comic Book of The Week:
The Spectacular Spider-Men #1
Weisman / Ramos
I’m not gonna lie.. when I found out they were finally making this book, I was super stoked. If you read the preview Spider Team up books (Spider-men in 2012, and Spider-men II in 2017), you know the ‘quips’ and the ‘thwips’ together make for one hell of a good comic book time. Giving us the third go-around for Peter and Miles is Greg Weisman, who takes over from Brian Bendis seamlessly as we’re dropped directly into the action to see how these two street-level legends work together. But the real draw for me is one of my favorite comic pencilers, Humberto Ramos drawing the action. The last time I saw the Spiders looking this good and fluid in action was Chris Bachalo on Joe Kelly’s Non-stop Spider-Man, and Joe Madureira on Zeb Wells’ Avenging Spider-Man.
Recently in the Marvel Comic Universe, there have been tensions between Spider-Man and the rest of the heroes from the moment he went rogue and ghosted his friends to dedicate his time to saving Mary Jane stuck in another dimension (I know, I know… comics…). Now that he’s trying to get back to normal, he’s finding a lot of his relationships being a little strained. One of the most strained was between him and Miles Morales, who took his mentor ghosting him personally. So the plan was to get their relationship back on track, Pete set up a weekly meeting between him and Miles to just decompress and play catch-up. The goal is to just connect at Peter and Miles.. no web-slinging or crime fighting. But you know things will never go according to plan.
Not a mind-blowing first issue, but very entertaining. It was less about the story and more about showcasing the friendship between the Spider Heroes. There’s a nice set up for the first arc, but the real showcase is Ramos’ artwork. He’s still got it.
Rating: 4/5
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