Miles Morales: Ultimate Spider-Man #7 Review
Okay, we’re entering the climax of the whole Norman Osborn and Peter Parker subplot. Read my review and recap of Miles Morales: Ultimate Spider-Man #7!
It starts with Osborn telling Miles he can tell him the secrets of his father if he listens to him, but Maria Hill tells him not to listen. Osborn then goes from a rant about how he and they are immortal, he would kill everyone to avenge what’s been done to him, someone is pulling their strings, and then state’s he’s their father again before transforming. So we can see that he grows progressively insane the longer he’s without shock treatment.
Peter and Miles jump into the fray once again with Maria Hill providing support fire to drive him off. Miles, unwilling to let him run and pull this crap again since he knows all of their secret identities, gives chase and brings him down to the ground, impressing all parties involved except Norman, who gets back up only to get put down again by both of them.
Maria Hill tells all of them to leave while she handles the police. Once they’re out of sight she puts three rounds into Osborn’s head, which JJJ did only to get killed for it afterwards. She takes it a step further and sets him on fire just to make sure he stays in hell this time and apparently that worked.
At the warehouse where Miles met with them before and received his web-shooters from Aunt May Peter gives them back to him and gives him his blessing before telling the others he’s going soul-searching to discover what he’s there for and who bought him back. In truth he’s leaving with MJ and going someplace far away. As the comic ends we see that Katie’s parents are Hydra and Miles’ father has returned to talk to him as the comic ends.
Okay, review time…
Good art, good story, but there are some times when I feel that they mixed up the panels and it got confusing. Also Fridge Horror kicks in here when you realize that Peter running off by himself will likely get him killed by Morlun’s family once Spider-Verse reaches here, unless it takes place before this but short of mass memory wipes that seems unlikely.
I give it a 4 out of 5.
Miles Morales: The Ultimate Spider-Man #4
Holy Hell, this issue was something special since even I don’t know what’s going on. But, I’ll do my best to review Miles Morales: The Ultimate Spider-Man #4.
The comic picks up with Katie making it back to her home, where her older sister Misha is, crying. When her sister asks what’s wrong, she tells her Miles is Spider-Man. Now, this is the exact type of thing you don’t want happening and the reason I called Miles an idiot for blabbing about it.
But what’s more concerning is the fact that her sister tells her to break up with him for both of their sakes, because if their parents find out they’ll kill them both. What type of parents do they have? Uh, anyway, the sister states the best case scenario is that he gets killed by a super-villain, which is all kinds of messed-up, but considering everything else she’s said it fits.
It’s just her luck then that Osborn decides to make his kill-count 2 for 2 on Spider-Men. Miles learns the hard way that fire burns, but he has more tricks at his disposal than Peter and can go invisible long enough to bean him with something heavy. Still, he’s out of his weight-class and the police pretty much gets toasted as the news reports Miles almost imminent demise.
It’s then that Peter Parker shows up in the Spider-Man suit, where he got it I don’t know, and everyone stares in stunned silence as Osborn, like me, wonders how the hell is he alive. I’m still going with the shape-shifter theory, but a clone might be on the table now.
The surviving police open fire, and promptly get fried for it, but it buys enough time for Peter to web his face and Miles to give him the poke of doom. Venom Blast + Fire Demon = Big Boom. Osborn flies off and the police decide they’re going to try and take in the two Spider-Men. Aunt May thinks she’s going insane, while Gwen reasons it’s someone else, but Aunt May says she knows it’s him as the comic ends.
Okay, Review Time…
First, I’m still on the fence if this is the real Peter or not. I want his casket exhumed, I want a lie detector test, I want a DNA test, and a psychic reading to boot before I believe it. Second, I’m not sure it’s a good thing he’s still alive. I mean, his death was the pinnacle of the Ultimate Universe.
You can’t top that, especially not by ruining it by bringing him back to life all of a sudden. This is a Hail Mary that can blow up in their faces. But, knowing Marvel, if they think it would save the series and boost sales, he back.
The art was top-notch and the whole damn issue was sweet. Full 5 out of 5.
Miles Morales: The Ultimate Spider-Man #3 Review
Well, after Miles did what may have been the dumbest thing I could think of at the moment, I can’t wait to pick up where we last left off. So here’s my thoughts and opinions as I review the third issue of Miles Morales: The Ultimate Spider-Man.
The story starts out at the Daily Bugle where one of them is trying to pitch a story about Spider-Men when JJJ shuts him down, citing he doesn’t want any half-truths and that he wants the whole and real story. He does this while there’s a plaque of his old Spider-Man story claiming him to be a menace, which he lampshades and then states he wants a story about heroes being heroes or something he could use. Right on cue, he gets reports on Norman Osborn being alive.
At the police station some crazy guy dressed as Ms. Marvel is spouting about how the Earths are converging and will soon be one, which was the rumors going around last year about Cataclysm and the Ultimate Line ending, so touché Marvel. Maria Hill gets notice that one of the men the spider guys had beaten died in the ER, making it a murder. She then gets a note about Miles’ parents and sets off to find him.
Back with the idiot, by that I mean Miles this time, he just dropped the bombshell of his secret identity on his girlfriend and she bails out. Ganke gets on his ass about it, but before he can catch up to her Maria Hill just comes up and tells him to get in the car. He straight up runs and switches to invisible mode despite Ganke telling him not to, only to wait until she’s gone to uncloak himself. Then they learn that Osborn is alive and Miles goes to Aunt May’s house because that’s the first place he’ll visit and cause damage.
Speaking of Osborn, the FBI fucked up so they call in former SHIELD director Monica Chang and storm Osborn Industries to catch him. They find the man in his secret lair, dressed in a nice suit and haircut. He basically calls Monica a patsy, citing she’s just not as good as Nick Fury was, and then he sets her face on fire, kills the guards, crashes a helicopter on top of her, and blows the place up. Dick.
Miles finally makes it to Aunt May’s house, learning the hard way that having no web-shooters makes things far more difficult to travel. Thankfully Aunt May and Gwen aren’t around at the time. Not thankfully, Green Goblin shows up and it’s looking like we’re getting a repeat of the Death of Spider-Man as the comic ends.
Okay, review time…
Well, I loved this issue. The art was nice for the most part, not as crisp as before but still decent, and we have a redux of the most critical point of the last story while both a “Peter Parker” and Green Goblin are around. Here’s hoping that someone actually shows up to help, otherwise the death of a second Spider-Man by the same villain is going to look really bad.
5 out of 5!
Miles Morales: Ultimate Spider-Man #2
Our story begins with Norman Osborn returning to his defunct company, Oscorp, only to find his office robbed of almost everything important except for a picture of a stallion. Why this sole painting was left hanging isn’t clear, but it’s revealed to have hidden a retinal scanner that leads to a secret lab that must’ve been operating with one massive hidden power source given the lights work after over two years. He finds whatever he’s looking for there and gets to working on whatever he has in mind for the next issue.
Meanwhile Miles touches Peter in ways that are almost inappropriate while trying to figure out how he’s alive. Peter keeps asking for the web-shooters and states that he’ll leave once he gets them, but Miles calls his ass out on why he hasn’t told anyone he’s alive. The fact that this guy tries to skirt the issue alone is sending up alarm bells.
Eventually Peter tries to take them and gets a reflexive Venom Blast for his trouble, which if he had his Spider-Sense he would have dodged because it takes about three seconds to work on contact. Then again it worked on 616-Peter…anyway, he shakes it off long enough to knock Miles on his ass and then knocks him out, taking them while he was out cold. When Miles gets up he thinks to himself that it must be a clone, which honestly isn’t that far of a stretch when you consider that Scorpion is still around as far as we know, and runs off to tell Ganke.
The imposter Spider-Men show up at a Stark facility and beat the crap out of the guards while bantering with each other, with one guard calling for back-up. He comes out when the rest are down and tells them he doesn’t get paid enough to get his ass-kicked and just tells them to take what they came for. They tell him to help get something from the boat labeled “Latveria”, which can’t be good.
Miles and Ganke talk about the Peter Parker he just ran into, with Miles dropping the bomb on Ganke that Jessica is a female clone. The boy thinks Peter must have had a great tush. Puberty hit him hard given how he seems to go after every hot older woman he knows. Anyway they discuss the merits of telling May about this or not, since she’s been so good to him and through so much pain that he doesn’t want to trouble her if he’s wrong. It doesn’t help that Jessica’s phone is off.
The discussion derails the moment Miles’ girlfriend shows up. Both of them suck at lying, so she quickly figures something is wrong and asks if he’s breaking up with her. The comic ends as he decides to just come clean.
Okay, review time.
Not much progress other than the fact that “Peter” is being secretive and kind of a dick, shocker. Good art though. I’ll give it a 4 out of 5 for the time being.
Superior Spider-Man #28 Review
THE WILD CARD APPEARS!
Well, it’s going down as the Green Goblin has declared war on the Superior Spider-Man in issue #28, so let’s get it on.
The comic begins with civilians in the distance watching Spider-Island burn as the attack begins. The Green Goblin gave him a chance to join up, but since he refused all he can do is retreat or die, which he reluctantly does after his favorite henchmen, #23, gets killed off in an explosion while the rest of the Spiderlings up top are getting slaughtered. He orders the ones still alive to hold the line while he escapes with his robot, so they’re all dead I’m sure.
Inside his noggin we have Peter Parker, who tried hiding in his memories and got sucked into seeing just what type of life Otto has lived. An abusive father and a smothering mother, bullies outside and only science as a bastion against the world, it’s really no wonder he turned into a villain. But for all their similarities, Peter had Aunt May and Uncle Ben, and that allows him to hold onto his sense of self as he continues to ride out Otto’s memories…for now.
Back to the Goblins, they destroyed Spider-Island in less than ten pages and the Goblin King has come in for a report. When they report Otto has gone missing, he’s not really worried since he knows his every weakness and orders his men to seek out the people important to him in order to draw him out. Namely the people important to Spider-Man, since he doesn’t know that Otto is wearing Peter Parker’s skin, as you may recall when he first got his hands on the journal and questioned Carlie one it.
At Alchemax, Mayor Jameson has called together the media and informed them that he’s transformed the Anti-Spider Patrol into Goblin Slayers, to which MJ states he’s out of his mind from her living room. She’s with her new boyfriend, who isn’t part of the inner circle, so he doesn’t see why it’s a bad thing. Before she can explain why, the little goblin kids who threw her off a roof and then bombed her club make a third play for her and she busts out the web-shooters.
MJ proved goddamn genre savvy after being the damsel in distress enough. She knows what’s going on and knows what her role in this is, the Wild Card. So the first damn thing she going to do is remove all the pieces off the board.
Back to Otto, he finally arrives at Parker Industries, where his partner is waiting and furious that he’s been missing for a month and tells him the police have been harassing them since Carlie went missing. That’s when Wraith showed up and tried to make him talk, but he knows about her tricks with fear gas and lets her get knocked out by Carlie, who has arrived for him just as a couple of the Ninja Goblins try to kidnap Aunt May and Jay Jameson, only for them to have been take away to safety by MJ already as Peter Parker loses himself in the memories of Otto in the mindscape.
Carlie chases Otto around, making it clear she knows who he is without saying his name as she cuts through the robot butler and defense system of mechanical tentacles. To this end he splits up with Sanji Jaffrey and confronts her alone, willing to defend his legacy now that Spider-Island is gone and kill all the Goblins. Luckily he kicks her right in the earpiece, which allows them to talk in private. Carlie reveals she’s still somewhat sane and needs Otto’s help in holding onto it before she loses control again, cryptically mentioning that he has no idea what the Goblin King has in store for him and the world.
As the comic ends, we see that Carlie’s sister was the only one who managed to get a piece on the board as she finds and kidnaps Anna Maria without her even knowing it by claiming to have been sent by MJ to retrieve her….crap…
Okay, review time.
So the plot moves again as Otto’s first line of defense has been breached. We see a good portion of the people who have been involved in Otto’s time as Spider-Man acting reasonable with more on the way, including MJ doing a magnificent job as the Wild Card. As for Carlie and Anna…well, damn. One’s going to have to live with the fact that she has killed people while on the Goblin Formula, so I feel bad for her, and the other is getting the Gwen Stacy treatment like I feared because the Goblin King wasn’t an idiot. I’ll give the dude credit, he plays hardball.
The art didn’t pop as much as it did in the past, at least to me, but the darker tone probably matches the mood as this is taking a dark turn already. So I won’t hold it against the artist.
A perfect, must have issue that gets a 5 out of 5.
Twilit Dreams Circle 