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Spider-Man Crawlspace Reviews: @Marvel Thunderbolts, Scarlet Spider, Spider-Man


Here are today's Guest Reviews from the guys at Spider-Man Crawlspace for Marvel's; Thunderbolts #13, Scarlet Spider #19, Superior Spider-Man #14, and Superior Spider-Man Team-Up #1. I have also added my rating after each review. If you have any questions about my rating or want to discuss anything just leave me a comment.


See the Review Rating Overview page for more information on how I rate each comic.


Thunderbolts #13


First, a look at the Punisher's role on the team...does he trust his teammates?


Then, delve into the secrets of the most mysterious thunderbolt...Mercy!


Preview



Who Is She?


Flash Thompson discovers that the woman he has been hunting is aboard the submarine headquarters of the Thunderbolts. He confronts her and she explains she was interested in him after the loss of his legs, when he wanted to die, but he’s found solace in the symbiote so she no longer has any interest in him.

After this encounter, Flash corners Ross and demands answers. Ross finally opens up to Flash and explains how Mercy is probably his biggest regret from his past and the Thunderbolts exist to fix his past mistakes.

When Ross was in the military, he began hunting down the military’s little secrets and tried to get his hands on them to defeat Bruce Banner/The Hulk. He discovered Mercy locked away in a withered husk and one of the men he had serving with him had just lost his family and wanted to die. Mercy feed off this desire, killing the man and restoring herself to life. She escaped after that and Ross spent years trying to track her down, but didn't know how to find her since her means of method could be passed off as suicide. After becoming the Red Hulk, he heard rumors about a temple in India where people go to die and decides to investigate it. Ross discovers that she is posing Am Kali, their goddess of death. She has been feeding off their desire to die and when Ross attacks her, she easily overpowers him. Faced no other option, he offers her the chance to join a team he is putting together, with the promise of as much death as she could ever want; she accepts.

Back in the present, he reveals to Flash that she is neigh unstoppable and doesn't follow his orders; he admits they’re lucky she hasn’t realized she can run things. The issue ends with Ross and Flash trying to think up ways to stop Mercy.

I’m Open To Suggestions: Wow, congratulations Charles Soule, you just made Way’s run a little bit better. Looking back at the run with the context of what Mercy is, it makes the end of Thunderbolts #11 better, where she realizes she can take charge and starts setting up her puppet (The Leader) for leadership of the team. Under his leadership and her control, I can’t imagine how bloody the team’s escapades could get, since she seems solely focused on death… or as she calls it ‘Mercy’. I’m excited to see where this plot line is going to go. I’m also excited to see someone with Mercy’s power go up against the forces attacking earth in Infinity, since she easily handles the Red Hulk when they fight. We also continue the dysfunctional team dynamic as now Flash and Ross have set aside their differences (somewhat) to figure out the solution to the Mercy problem. This book is coming to a boiling point already, after only two issues under the pen of Charles Soule and now we’ll see soon if it’s going to be a slow boil or if it will explode during an earth-shattering event like Infinity.

Read the rest of the Review on Spider-Man Crawlspace

My Rating


Cover & Solicit - 3/5
Art, Colors & Inking - 3/5
Layout & Flow - 3/5
Story - 3/5
Verdict - 3 - 
(Buy Thunderbolts #13) SAVE 10%


Scarlet Spider #19 - Wrath Part 3


Superstar artist Carlo Barberi's first arc on Scarlet Spider might be Kaine's last as the Red Death comes for everyone.


Has Kaine made a deal with the devil? No, not Mephisto.


More Scarlet Spider and Wolverine action than you can shake an adamantium claw or spider stinger at.

Preview



Wolverine Team-Up


THE STORY:

The Red Death who came to kill everyone at the end of last issue is someone named Candra who was apparently a nineties X-Men villain who was supposed to be dead but is immortal. As she lays the smackdown on Scarlet Spider and Wolverine, the Assassins Guild mostly stands around sucking their thumbs and wetting themselves until Candra starts picking them off to power herself. This prompts most of the Assassins to join the fight against her, except for Belladonna who would rather attack Kaine for daring to fight the lady trying to kill him. Once they take out Candra, it seems for a second that our heroes have just left the fire for the only slightly more comfortable frying pan of the Assassins Guild, but the Kingpin’s “Arranger” shows up to tell Belladonna to stand down. Kaine reveals that he made a deal with the Kingpin to wipe his debts to the Guild if Kaine made it easier for Fisk to acquire. Wolverine is not overly happy about this.

MY THOUGHTS:

The short version is that this is a very pedestrian issue of Scarlet Spider. And by that I mean it’s still better than any issue of Venom ever even aspires to be, but for this series it’s a bit below what I've come to expect. And really, that shouldn't be much of a surprise when you look at the credits page. This issue was put together by 2 writers, 2 pencilers, 3 inkers, and 3 colorists. One wonders, frankly, what in the heck was going on behind the scenes for that to come to pass. My guess, primarily because this is the first time Yost has needed a co-writer, is that this one may have had to be thrown together quickly to keep the schedule on track for the more important Superior Spider-Man Team-Up crossover issue coming up next. But I must stress, that is only a guess and it’s only based on the same information you guys are looking at. Either way, whatever the explanation, it certainly seems from that amount of creators involved in trying to get one issue out that we may have actually lucked out in getting an issue as good as “pedestrian.”

The main thing, I suppose, is that this issue is a fight scene. Not a terrible fight scene, but nothing more than that, either. There’s a lot of slashy-slashy, back-stabbing (literally), and indignance going on for 20 pages, and that’s pretty much it. The highlight of the issue, though, has got to be the 3/4 page panel of Kaine leaping at the reader with Wolverine and the Assassins Guild behind him, his stingers popped and ready for action. Never been a fan of the Tron costume, but this looks genuinely cool and is probably the most badass this outfit will ever look.

Candra is definitely a disappointing resolution to the whole Red Death thing. This is a woman who was built up as terrifying even a hardass like Belladonna, but she’s just an old X-villain that doesn't really seem too special when stacked up against that lot. This issue also doesn't give a whole lot on her, just a quick flashback of when she ‘died’ previously (and the X-Men’s costumes in that flashback panel tip you off that it was a 90s comic) but it spends more time reinforcing “Belladonna looks like she’s going to wet herself” (that is a quote from Kaine, I swear), which runs into something I feel like we've been saying a lot lately here at the Crawlspace – show, don’t tell. Stop telling me how much this woman terrifies someone else and show me why. I just didn't get enough of that here.

Read the rest of the Review on Spider-Man Crawlspace

My Rating



Cover & Solicit - 3/5
Art, Colors & Inking - 5/5
Layout & Flow - 4/5
Story - 5/5

Verdict - 4.6 - (Pre-Order Scarlet Spider TPB Vol. 3 Big Leagues) SAVE 20%


Superior Spider-Man #14 - A Blind Eye


It's SUPERIOR SPIDER-MONTH as the biggest new book of the year brings you its biggest twist yet!

The Superior Spider-Man takes down Shadowland.

All of it. To the ground.

Preview



Wacky!?


PLOT POINTS:

The Superior Spider-Man (Otto Octavius’s mind in Peter Parker’s body) leads an army of spider-themed paramilitary troopers and giant spider robots into Shadowland, the Kingpin’s stronghold in Hell’s Kitchen. This spider brigade guns down a lot of ninjas.
Blackmailed by Spider-Man, Mayor Jameson must unwillingly sanction this operation.
The Kingpin fakes his death by killing a body double and flees in a one-man submarine. The Hobgoblin (Phil Urich) must fend for himself. Thanks to the Green Goblin’s tampering with Spidey’s tech, the spider-bots cannot detect Goblins, so Hobgoblin escapes.
The surviving ninjas join the Green Goblin’s underground army. Dubbing himself the “Goblin Kingpin of Crime,” Green Goblin announces that he now controls 52% of New York’s organized crime.

OPINIONS!

This issue is about Spider-Man and a death squad of robots and soldiers slaughtering ninjas. After you’ve read that sentence, you either want to buy this comic or you don’t. I honestly don’t think any review can add or subtract from that basic truth.

Superior Spider-Man #14 tickled me in a good way. I can’t help but crack a grin at Slott and Ramos’s to-the-maxness and the sheer in-your-facemanship of their craft. Even as someone who often prefers stories emphasizing character development and relationship dynamics, I can dig an issue like this every now and then, especially when they are this well-executed.

To great effect, the issue begins from the perspective of a Hell’s Kitchen resident and his son, whom we meet again toward the end of the main sequence. Hearing the repetitive “TOOM” sound effect of the Imperial Spider-Walkers rattle their apartment, and seeing the massive machine’s leg through their window grants the reader a ground-level feel for the scale of Spider-Man’s urban assault. That sense of enormity stuck with me throughout the shock and awe of the insane massacre to follow.

Read the rest of the Review on Spider-Man Crawlspace


My Rating


Cover & Solicit - 3/5
Art, Colors & Inking - 3/5
Layout & Flow - 3/5
Story - 4/5
Verdict - 3.4
 - (Buy Superior Spider-Man #14) SAVE 10%


Superior Spider-Man Team-Up #1 - A Day In Someone Else's Life


Superior Spider-Month just got a whole lot more superior with brand a brand new ongoing!

Challenge them, of course!

Preview



Octo-Spidey is Attacking New York’s Superheroes


The Plot:

Cloak & Dagger are taking down some muggers when Octo-Spidey arrives and punches Dagger in the face. We then see news reports of Spidey attacking Daredevil, Gravity, Power Man & Iron Fist, Sun Girl, Moon Knight and Dr. Strange in succession.

This causes Captain America to decide that Spidey is breaking his Avengers probation and he assembles the team. Spidey meanwhile is just finishing with the Fantastic Four B-team when the Avengers arrive: the six heroes from the movie plus Captain (Ms.) Marvel and Hyperion.

Spidey is easily subdued by Thor and Hulk. Spidey tries to warn Iron Man to seal his faceplate because there is a virus on the loose. As they talk Hyperion is infected—for those who don’t know he’s a Superman analog, and he attacks the Avengers taking down the powerhouses first. We learn the Carrion virus has been jumping from superhuman host to host all day and has now found the perfect body. Only Cap and Hawkeye are left to buy time for Octo-Spidey to concoct an antidote. That doesn't go well but Thor recovers in the nick of time, followed by Hulk and Marvel. Together they keep Hyperion busy long enough for Ock to blast him with some science doohickey and end the threat.

Cap tries to tell Spidey he was wrong to put him on probation but Ock blows him off. In his sea-lab Ock decides he needs a team of his own and we reference the imprisoned Sinister Six. And then in the most horrifying single comic page I've seen in over a decade Carrion reforms in the Jackal’s secret base where we see he is growing batches of clones again.

Read the rest of the Review on Spider-Man Crawlspace


My Rating


Cover & Solicit - 3/5
Art, Colors & Inking - 3/5
Layout & Flow - 3/5
Story - 4/5
Verdict - 3.4
 - (Buy Superior Spider-Man Team-Up #1) SAVE 20%

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