We're reading the Superior Spider-saga! Catch up here!
Superior Spider-Man Volume 5: The Superior Venomby Dan Slott, Christos N. Gage, Humberto Ramos and Javier Rodriguez
collects Superior Spider-Man #'s 22-26 and Annual #1
Ever since Volume 1, Otto has been flirting with the darkness inside him. Starting here, he embraces it. Annual #1 is at the back of this paperback, but really it should be at the front. The Annual acts as a stand-alone on what happens when someone messes with Peter's family. The half-demon Blackout kidnaps May and threatens Peter's family -- a trigger for Otto-as-Peter, who will do whatever it takes to protect his loved ones. The broad strokes of the story are as you'd expect, but Christos Gage has a really good handle on the new Superior Spider-Man that makes him such a compelling person to read about.
One of my favorite lines is when Blackout finally concedes, after Otto-as-Spidey has taken some unspeakable measures of torture to Blackout:
Tell all your misbegotten ilk--tell ANYONE WHO WILL LISTEN--that Peter Parker is off limits.
If he, his aunt, anyone else associated with him--or associated with ME--is harmed, harassed or inconvenienced in ANY WAY--
If they are killed in a mugging, or a car accident...if they die from what seems a natural heart attack...if they get so much as JOSTLED ON THE SUBWAY...
I will find out who is responsible. And what I do to them will make what I've done to you seem the most tender of mercies.It's such a chilling monologue. After seeing the awful things he's done to Blackout, and to see him call it "the most tender of mercies" tells you to what end Otto-as-Peter will go to protect what's his.
Anyways, the main story is that of the "Superior Venom," what happens when the symbiote takes over Otto-as-Peter-Parker. It's very much a classic Spider-Man story -- but with Otto instead of Peter. It's a four-part epic that involves Peter's friends, family, girlfriend, and even the Avengers! Dan Slott jumps back and forth between the point of view of both Peter, and Flash Thompson, bouncing from different subplots to the main plot, in a masterful way that moves the story along for the next trade paperback. A hoot to read.
Humberto Ramos on pencils does a superb job with the tendrils and anatomy of Spider-Man and Venom. There are some action scenes with blur effects that get a little confusing though.
Issue 26 is a stand-alone story -- important particularly in "reviving" the mythos of Peter Parker, Spider-Man, and Norman Osborn, the one and only Green Goblin. There are three "substories," the Goblin war between Goblins Green and Hob-, drawn by Humberto Ramos, Peter's "revival" in his body's subconscious, drawn by Marcos Martin, and the Superior Spider-Man's voluntary departure of the Avengers, drawn by Javier Rodriguez. Solid on all fronts.
BONUS PANEL:
After the symbiote possesses Otto-as-Spidey, Otto demands of himself to prove that he's in control, by stopping crime at a heightened rate. Here's one of them -- hilarious!
No comments:
Post a Comment