A Week Of Firsts, part 2

It’s been quite a while since Peter David first started out in comics with his Spider-Man stories. The Sin-Eater Saga and its sequel remain two of my favorite ‘80s storylines; after growing used to Wieringo’s style I quite enjoyed his art on Sensational Spider-Man during the late ‘90s. By virtue of mixing these two together, I was originally quite enthused when their new ongoing series, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, was announced.

I was far less enthused when I found out that the first four issues would all be tangled in a crossover revolving around a J. Michael Straczynski storyline that I wasn’t very fond of, to say the least. Luckily this issue ignores most of the crossover bits for now and focuses mainly on Spidey’s new status as an Avenger and on the new villain, Tracer. Despite his fairly ugly design I find him a quite fun addition to Spidey’s foes, a bit of a mirror image of Peter in that he likes to use snark and acts like a goofball, only in a villainous way. Oddly refreshing. He apparently has the ability to send bullets after specific targets—they won’t stop until they hit what they were meant to.

In that respect, I don’t think it was all that intelligent of Spider-Man to just turn around and try to freaking catch speeding bullets with his bare hands. While it was good to see that it backfired on him (mainly to get us to the crossover plot though, where something is wrong with his blood, no doubt related to the radioactive spider-bite), I’m left wondering why he didn’t try deflecting the bullets with, oh, I dunno, webbing perhaps? A manhole cover? Anything that would stop a mini-missile from tracing you, other than your own unprotected hands?

By having him wounded, we get introduced to a new character: the doctor treating him, an old acquaintance of both Reed and Captain America. Kind of odd that, as Spidey says, we’ve never heard of her before, but oh well, guess it can’t always be Curt Connors who he turns to. According to this doctor Castillo, Spider-Man “dresses up like something icky”. I always thought his name was ickier-sounding than his get-up, which is darn bright and colorful and fun-looking, rather than scary; now the black suit I can see being scary, but the red-and-blue one isn’t all that spideresque, is it?

Back on the home front, it felt like MJ was slightly overreacting (once again—they never learn, do they?) in her unwillingness to let Peter go out and find Tracer. If he can survive powerhouses like Doctor Octopus and Venom, why would a guy with “magic bullets” be that much more dangerous? It’s not as if Peter doesn’t know his gimmick now and can prepare for it. It comes across as a way to insert some cheap drama in the story. I can totally see her being worried, but more in an “I’ll send Captain America on his trail” rather than a “You’re insane!” kind of way. Good-looking MJ by Wieringo though.

Speaking of Wieringo, his J. Jonah Jameson is quite sharp-looking too. And so is his Spidey, of course. I’ve seen complaints that it’s too cartoony but I’m very fond of it, as I prefer an iconic representation over the more realistic yet more boring work of other artists. Kesel brings the right kind of quality to Wieringo’s pencils, so I hope they’ll stay paired for some time to come. The coloring by Paul Mounts is fresh and slick as well. It’s a nicely produced package (I even like the crossover banner’s design), but I do wonder if it wouldn’t be better for me to wait until the inevitable trade of the entire storyline and start picking up Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man monthly once PAD and ‘Ringo can forge their own direction.

I’ll see what the next two parts do for me, but I’m very much not looking forward to the acts written by Hudlin and JMS, two writers who have annoyed me more than anything else. I’ll probably sit the crossover itself out, since I can’t get worked up at all over Morlun or anything totem-related, but I’m genuinely looking forward to #5, when we can get on with things and see what this team can do on its own.

To end: the neatest image of the issue, apart from Spidey accidentally pounding on JJJ, was Kraven in a tutu (!). Very nice quirky dream image, and also very fitting since of course Kraven once “killed” Spider-Man and actually buried him in yet another one of my favorite storylines, “Fearful Symmetry”, aka “Kraven’s Last Hunt”, back in the mid-‘80s. Mmm, those were some good comics right there. I think those issues merit a reread very soon!