By: Dan Slott (writer), Richard Elson (art), Antonio Fabela (colors), Chris Eliopoulos (letters), Ellie Pyle (assistant editor) & Stephen Wacker (editor)
The Story: It’s like Freaky Friday except that one of the bodies isn’t very healthy.
Review (with SPOILER): This issue troubles me as a comic fan/reader/reviewer. It’s no secret that I’ve been drifting away from the Big 2 superhero comics for a period of time because I get sick of the sameness of it all. It’s like watching a dog chasing its tail most of the time. Yet, when a comic does something new as in this issue, I kinda yawn and say, “Big deal….”
1). This is something new. – Has a super-villain ever swapped consciousnesses with Peter Parker before? Not only does it raise questions about Peter and when precisely did this happen, but it is interesting from the perspective of Doc Ock. His downward spiral over the last 3-4 years of comics has been interesting to watch. In an era where there are way too many 6-issue story arcs that have nothing to do with each other, it’s kinda refreshing to see a 100+ issues of comics have a coherent story thread. This is what we say we want.
2). It’s still lame. – It smacks too much of the Clone Saga and very few people like that story. How long has Peter Parker not been himself? Does this go all the way back to ASM #600? Has “Peter” been so successful at Horizon Labs because he was infected with the persona of his arch-enemy? Was he Peter or Doc Ock during The Gauntlet? The Grim Hunt? One Moment in Time? Big Time? Spider-Island? Or Ends of the Earth? Is it Doc Ock’s fault that Peter was such a lousy mentor to Alpha? There have been a lot of good Spidey stories recently and this kinda casts all of them in a different light, and not in a good way either. It’s one thing to give the readers something unexpected, but to make them feel like everything they’ve read for the last several years might really be a Doc Ock story is just shabby.
3). Very non-heroic ending. – Superhero deaths are cliche because we just assume that they’ll come back (and that usually is the case). But, they usually get a heroic death. Usually when they “die” they are making some kind of heroic last stand in the defense of something: the world, innocent children, etc. In this issue, we find out that Peter has been erased at some undisclosed time in the past. Why not just have a villain break into his apartment and smother him with a pillow and show us a dying Peter losing control of his bladder and bowels? A very lame death.
4). Big change in Spidey in this issue. – Not knowing when Doc Ock “infected” Spidey makes it tough to evaluate Peter’s behavior. But he just seemed all over the place here. What’s with this sudden need to get back together with MJ? MJ has been back for a long time. Heck, she and Peter have had mature discussions about their relationship being more “good friends and confidants” now. Is this sudden “get back together” desire coming from Doc Ock because Ock just thinks that Peter and Mj should be together? And the storytelling seems a real change of pace from what we’ve gotten in the pages of ASM recently. Rather than screwing around the the Alpha storyline and this lukewarm Hobgoblin tale, why not put more effort into building this story?
5). The art is fine. – There’s nothing here that’ll make you go “WOW!”, but there aren’t any screwed up panels either. Rich Elson does pretty standard superhero illustration. It’s hard to argue with it, but it’s hard to praise it too much either.
6). Let’s hope there’s more to the story. – Even though this issue is mediocre, let’s have a moment to consider the creative voices involved. We’re talking about writer Dan Slott and editor Stephen Wacker. Neither of these guys has a propensity for telling bad stories. They probably have something clever up their sleeve and if they’d tipped their hand a little more in this issue, this would probably have been a kinder review.
Conclusion: I hate to pee on something that some people will doubtless find “very cool”, but this just wasn’t very good.
Grade: C+
– Dean Stell
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