Essential Defenders volume 4

Essential Defenders volume 4 contains issues #61 to #91. The writing is mainly by David Anthony Kraft and Ed Hannigan with other contributions by Mary Jo Duffy and Steven Grant. The art is mainly by Herb Trimpe and Don Perlin with other issues by Ed Hannigan and Sal Buscema.

This is an odd volume with Defenders enjoying an overall period of membership stability and yet at the same time it sees the team disband for a period, the originals reform and probably the largest single influx of members a team has ever known. At its heart is the long running question over whether the "non-team" is a grouping of heroes who come together to protect the world from menaces or else a club of heroes with an open door policy. Historically it's clear that the former is Namor the Sub-Mariner's view of the Defenders whilst the latter is Nighthawk's. But the series works best with a core group of characters who want to be with each other and spend time together when they're not saving the world. There's room for other heroes to join them for adventures - and this volume sees the likes of Moondragon, the Wasp, Yellowjacket, the Black Panther and Daredevil all working alongside the team although Spider-Man's involvement is more clearly an accidental encounter - but at it's core are the regulars, the Hulk, Valkyrie, Nighthawk and Hellcat. That's not to say there aren't some other Defenders within these pages though.

The nature of the Defenders as a very loose association of heroes and Nighthawk's problems leading them are both explored to the fullest extent in issues #62 to #64 which contain the "Defenders for a day" storyline. Dollar Bill produces a documentary about the team that includes their address and a declaration that anyone can be a Defender simply by declaring themselves so. The next day this is put to severe test as Nighthawk steps outside to meet new recruits Black Goliath, Captain Marvel, Captain Ultra, Falcon, Havok, Hercules, Iron Fist, Jack of Hearts, Marvel Man (later known as Quasar), Ms. Marvel, Nova, Paladin, Polaris, Prowler, the Son of Satan, Stingray, Tagak, Torpedo and the White Tiger. It's possibly the single largest membership expansion of any established team in the history of superhero comics. But it also exposes the mess that can come with such a loose set up as the new heroes start messing about with each other, try to impose Hercules as the team's leader and decide to attack the Hulk without realising just how important the Defenders are to keeping him calm. Then things get worse as Iron Man drops by to announce that a whole load of villains have also declared themselves Defenders and are causing chaos in New York. Nighthawk's Defenders split into multiple teams to tackle the rival group, consisting of Batroc, the Beetle, the Blob, Boomerang, Electro, Joe the Gorilla, Leap-Frog, Libra, the Looter, the Melter, Pecos, Plantman, Porcupine, Sagittarius, the Shocker, the Toad and Whirlwind, but the results just add to the chaos. It rapidly becomes clear that there are too many heroes to be able to effectively work together and the new members all quickly decide to leave. The whole thing stands as a good exposure of many of the spare and lesser heroes in the Marvel universe at this time but also demonstrates how many of them just aren't able to fit into any team at random. I don't know if the heroes featured reflect any demands in the contemporary letters page but it wouldn't surprise me if the whole storyline was a rejoinder to those who believe a non-team can literally include absolutely anyone for no particular reason and show why some of the heroes just can't work well with the regular membership. It also shows the mess of loose organisations that allow anyone to proclaim themselves a member without any process of approval or verification. Maybe this was a subtle dig at certain real life groups who seek various organisational protections and benefits whilst allowing anybody at all to access them, with the result that chaos can ensue as they exercise these rights.

Much of the rest of the volume follows a similar pattern of somewhat oddball adventures against some bizarre foes. It kicks off with a continuation of the low key battle with Lunatik, initially presented as a vigilante killer but subsequently revealed to be multiple beings who are the fragmented parts of Arisen Tyrk, the banished ruler of another dimension from the Man-Wolf stories, now serving the Unnameable. The role of mad killer is taken over by the Foolkiller, this being the second one from the pages of Omega the Unknown after the original appeared and died in Man-Thing. This is followed up by the wrapping up of threads from Omega's series but it feels very confusing if one hadn't been reading that title and so it's just a confrontation with some aliens and a lot of flashbacks, plus Moondragon getting angry with the Defenders over the way they handle the situation. Elsewhere Doctor Strange assembles the original Defenders, the Hulk and Sub-Mariner, to journey to Tunnel World to deal with the threat of the Unnameable and his minions, commanded by the humanoid buzzard Ytitnedion. Meanwhile back on Earth the other Defenders encounter first the Mutant Force, a set of old Captain America foes, and then the all female Fem-Force, working for Daredevil's old foe the Mandrill. There's also a return of the Omegatron where a man has somehow become lied to it to become the Anything Man. Tensions flare between Atlantis and Wakanda due to the intervention of a rogue Wakandan stealing technology and selling it on behalf of the Mandrill, leading to a rematch with Fem-Force.

Early on Valkyrie gets some interesting material as she is taken back to Asgard to take part in a war in the afterlife realm of Valhalla between the Norse god of death, Hela, and Ollerus the Unmerciful. In the process Valkyrie comes up against her own body animated by the soul of Barbara Norris, who kills the other Defenders to bring their souls to the afterlife. Eventually Hela banishes the invaders and restores the Defenders to life but the story adds to the confusion and mess with Valkyrie that it's unclear just how much of a past she actually has whilst she is still occupying the body of another woman despite one of her own existing and no opportunity is taken to put her back in her own body. Later she briefly leads the Defenders in Nighthawk's absence against the Foolkiller but the result is the destruction of the riding academy and the disbandment of the team, though this ultimately proves only temporary.

Hellcat gets mixed developments with some abilities little used and even phased out whilst there are some appearances from her past from before her days in the superhero community. Noticeably little used is her Shadowcloak despite its potential to boost her abilities and provide key protection at critical moments. Maybe it's just because of the black and white but there are times when she's wearing it and so similar to Batgirl that I'd be amazed if someone didn't start getting copyright jitters. Her mental powers are also little used except for an accidental discharge that hurts ally as much as foe and drives off a number of the "Defenders for a day" recruits. Later on Moondragon absorbs them out of necessity when injured in battle, leaving Hellcat with her acrobatic skills and her convoluted past. It becomes clear that she's trying to avoid it, with a letter from Millie the Model taking a while to reach her. Later on we find out that she's been avoiding her mother for a long time and they don't reconcile before the latter's death. After the funeral we learn how the Patsy Walker comics were a fiction-within-fiction created by her mother who sheltered the real Patsy from the world. Many a real life child star endured an awkward childhood with their parents more concerned to display them and maximise the returns rather than helping them develop properly and Patsy seems to have similarly suffered, which probably explains her woman-child light hearted approach to the world. The recasting of her comedy and soap era also allows for alterations to those around her, with Buzz Baxter now her jerk of an husband whilst the age gap between Patsy and Millie has noticeably widened since their encounters in the 1960s, with the latter now a friend of Patsy's mother and head of her own modelling agency. Millie's guest appearance is a reminder of how many of us move on in life and looks back on hopes and ambitions, whilst some, like Patsy, are left contemplating the future.

There are other threads that go nowhere. Early on there's a subplot in the Soviet Union as the Red Guardian and the Presence battle a giant amoeba but after defeating it they decide to live together and it isn't followed up on; with no interaction with the rest of the title it just feels like an unfinished idea. This may, however, be down to a change in writers.

This volume encompasses the entirety of Ed Hannigan's run. And the whole thing is a rather stumbling mess. Plotlines drag on for ages, particularly one about Nighthawk being investigated by the FBI for a number of alleged personal and corporate offences, with the result that on more than one occasion he is barred from operating in his costumed identity. The precise charges are never made clear and by the final issue the whole thing has got no further than a bail hearing. Tax and corporate cases in the real world may well drag out for years before ever reaching a courtroom, but it doesn't make for especially good drama. Worse still there's no real indication as to why he is now being investigated or whether some foe is behind it all. It's as though Hannigan had no idea where he was going with the storyline and so just dragged it out for as long as possible until something could be done with it. Eventually the court appearance coincides with an attack by the Mandril and an extended appearance by Daredevil but it's impossible to believe that this had been the plan all along. There are also odd moments such as the Hulk's encounter with a beached whale that he returns to the sea complete with the address for Greenpeace in one of the most blatant pieces of campaigning yet seen in a regular comic book, though it's followed up in a later issue when the Defenders save a herd of whales from Russian whalers.

Overall this volume is a complete disappointment. Other than the "Defenders for a day" there are no particular striking stories and much of the book is an endless search for direction. Too many of the foes are rather abstract and make for not very understandable threats, compounded by the growing gulf in focuses between Doctor Strange and Nighthawk. There are too many plotlines that either ramble on forever or just get forgotten about and the overall result is just a dull mess.

Essential Defenders volume 3 - creator labels

Yet again we have a volume with a lot of creators, so here's a separate post to carry the labels for some of them.

Essential Marvel Horror volume 2 - creator labels 2

We have a volume with a huge number of creators, so here's a separate post to carry the labels for some of them.

Essential Man-Thing volume 2 - creator labels

Yet again we have a volume with a lot of creators, so here's a separate post to carry the labels for some of them.

Essential Power Man and Iron Fist volume 1

Essential Power Man and Iron Fist volume 1 contains issues #50 to 72 & 74 to 75, comprising the first third of the merged series. Issue #73 is absent, due to it featuring a guest appearance by Rom whom Marvel no longer holds the rights for. Bonus material consists of a couple of in-house adverts for the series but it's clear from the advertised prices that these come from later on. The writing sees the end of Chris Claremont's run on the characters, a brief stint by Ed Hannigan and then an extended run by Mary Jo Duffy with the odd plot contribution by Bob Layton or Steven Grant. The art takes a while to settle down with a brief run by Trevor Von Eeden before an extended one by Kerry Gammil; other issues are drawn by a mixture of John Byrne, Sal Buscema, Mike Zeck, Lee Elias, Marie Severin and Alan Weiss.

The idea of merging one weak selling title into another series has been common place throughout the history of publications, not just comics. However, often "absorption" would be a better term because one title would make little contribution beyond a small addition to the cover logo and maybe the odd feature that wouldn't last long. But occasionally the fusion would be on equal terms, with both halves at the forefront throughout the rest of the series's life. Power Man and Iron Fist was one such series.

Taking a streetwise product of the blaxploitation genre and pairing him with the rich but other worldly product of the martial arts craze was not the most obvious of moves. Indeed I'm not certain who came up with it, though as the merger coincided with a run on Power Man by the Iron Fist creative team of Chris Claremont and John Byrne there's an obvious place to start looking. But whoever had the idea, there was little to lose as both characters were slumping in sales as their respective crazes were dying and the alternative was most likely cancellation. Instead an odd couple teaming up permanently was tried. It wasn't without precedent at Marvel - there were some similar themes and half of the locations in the teaming of Captain America and the Falcon, whilst Iron Fist's solo title had already teamed up a practitioner of oriental fighting methods with a streetwise black in the form of Colleen Wing and Misty Knight, the Daughters of the Dragon. But it was still an awkward pairing. What makes it credible is that it takes a number of issues before the two are in permanent partnership and even then the differences between them are brought up from time to time. But wisely the series isn't played for laughs even though odd couples from very different backgrounds with all the problems and conflicts that arise from them are staple fare for sitcoms. We get the odd lighter moment, such as Power Man having to crash at Iron Fist's place whilst his own home is rebuilt, only to find his partner's place just makes him uncomfortable. Or when we see how Iron Fist's upbringing as first a pampered rich child and then a member of a hidden civilisation have left him lacking some basic knowledge about and skills for life such as the value of money or how to control a vehicle. But these are individual aside moments and instead the focus is invariably serious. Indeed this is a book that doesn't shy away from pain, with some especially brutal maimings and deaths shown with all their consequences. The Heroes for Hire have noble motives but they inhabit an increasingly gritty world.

The early issues in the volume are surprising in that it takes a while, and several writers, before a permanent partnership is established between the two. I'm informed that the legally registered name of the series did not switch from Power Man to Power Man and Iron Fist until issue #56 (although the legal info on the inside front cover of this collected edition draws no such distinction; either I'm misinformed or whoever prepared the Essential's information made a mistake), which almost matches the fictional solidification of the partnership. Were Marvel's editors nervous about the combination even after the launch and so hedged their bets so that they could quickly return to a solo Power Man series if needs be? That's more plausible than it being a deliberately planned story arc running over seven bimonthly issues and a variety of creative teams. But once Mary Jo Duffy arrives the series quickly finds a firm footing for the rest of the volume, cementing the series as her defining title.

If there's one particularly awkward aspect to the series, it's the whole "Heroes for Hire" concept. It made sense for Power Man on his own to be working as a mercenary as he was a man of limited means and whose criminal status meant it was impossible for him to find a sufficient paying day job that would supply the funds needed to be a hero - in particular to keep up a constant supply of shirts. But Iron Fist is independently wealthy and the co-owner of a business even if he hands over the day to day running to his co-owner Joy Meachum once they've resolved some personal matters. He has so much money he never wants for anything and indeed at times just doesn't know the meaning of it. So why does he need to earn money through super heroics, a vocation traditionally provided for free, and where the jobs can wind up as being little more than glorified security guards? It's an aspect to the series not really cleared up - perhaps this is why Power Man is initially placed working instead for Colleen and Misty's agency, Nightwing Restorations - but as the series progresses there's a steady diminution of focus on big corporate hiring, although as Power Man maintains his old office above the cinema there is still an outreach to the ordinary person on the street. They also make a point of going off duty at 5pm each day to maintain their principles.

The series maintains many elements from both characters' solo titles, starting with the supporting casts. Because Power Man maintains his office above the cinema, we still get to see D.W. Griffith and Toby, and even the occasional appearance by the notorious soft drinks machine or its replacement. Iron Fist is still seeing Misty Knight and in turn her partner Colleen Wing is also around a lot. Misty was a police officer before losing her arm to a bomb and the impact of having a cybernetic arm is explored several times, including when she chillingly relives the moment. Her former police partner Rafael Scarfe is the series's most regular cop, and he often works in conjunction with Assistant District Attorney Bill Hao under DA Blake Tower. Elsewhere Iron Fist often works out with Bob Diamond, formerly of the Sons of the Tiger. He and Colleen eventually become an item but they seem to rapidly going from tensions hiding attraction to dating that I wonder if the missing issue #73 has a key scene that resolves this. Colleen also gets a memorable reunion with her father as he recovers his memory. Meanwhile the Heroes for Hire business is managed by lawyer Jeryn Hogarth, creating tensions over some of the contracts he accepts, with the office itself managed by executive secretary Jennie Royce. The most notable character to disappear is Power Man's girlfriend Dr Claire Temple who has been kidnapped one time too many and decides that she can no longer handle Luke Cage's life and he cannot give it up so they go their separate ways. Luke subsequently settles with fashion model Harmony Young. Also dropping away is Dr Noah Burstein who no longer has to give Luke support but he returns when his honeymoon is interrupted by an old foe. Then there's the return of Power Man's lawyer Big Ben Donovan, but now trying to steal drugs for himself. Another Power Man ally to reappear is Thunderbolt, only to die from accelerated growth. Also dying is Tony, the projectionist at the cinema. This is a much darker world than that inhabited by the average Marvel series from this time.

The enemies are drawn from a mix of each characters' solo titles, other Marvel universe books and some new creations. Old Power Man foes who reappear include Stiletto and Discus, plus some new incarnations of foes such as Senor Suerte. Coming from Iron Fist's side are Princess Azir, caught up in intrigues related to her home country of Halwan, Sabretooth, now allied with the Constrictor from the Incredible Hulk and many other titles, the Golden Tigers under the leadership of a new Chaka, and then a variety of longstanding foes in the return to K'un-Lun storyline. And the two jointly contribute Bushmaster, who seeks a cure for his condition only to turn to metal and crumble away in a chilling sequence. Meanwhile from other titles we see Boss Morgan, Nightshade, the mobster Bull, all from Captain America and the Falcon or the earlier Tales of Suspense stories, the Living Monolith from the pages of X-Men, complete with much of the team as well, or Maggia boss Caesar Cicero and his henchman Man Mountain Marko, both from Amazing Spider-Man. New foes include the Incinerator, a bank robber in a flame suit, Senor Suerte, the vengeance seeking younger brother of Power Man's old foe, El Aguila, a vigilante who later allies with the Heroes for Hire, Colonel Eschat, a mercenary wiping out his old colleagues, Supremo, a would be military dictator of a Latin American country who actually hires the heroes to locate the existing regime's money supply via the drugs trade, and Montenegro, a mountain climbing crime boss pursuing a piece of technology hidden on a coin.

The final couple of issues feature probably the most obvious Iron Fist storyline not yet done - a return to the lost civilisation of K'un-Lun with a number of old foes returning. Rather than waiting ten years in real time, he and Power Man get there when transported in battle with the wizard Master Khan, who is also the deity of K'un-Lun. In the mystical city Iron Fist discovers and relearns a number of key points about his life and family, clarifying for certainty that his father was originally from outside the city but found his way there, and that Miranda was his half-sister. In conflict with variously the plant race the H'ylthri, the mysterious Ninja, Iron Fist's uncle Nu-An and Master Khan, Iron Fist proves himself worthy of his legacy, and Power Man as a worthy ally. But it also leads to Iron Fist standing up to all the strange customs and practices of K'un-Lun and taking the opportunity to return to the outside world. It's a journey of self-discovery that reinforces the character and the partnership, boding well for the future.

On paper this is a series that shouldn't work. Taking two heroes who had been created to jump on the bandwagon of passing fads and sticking them together should have resulted in a mess that either got demerged or cancelled within a handful of issues. But instead something happens to make it work. The two characters with their very different resources and background prove to be a highly effective odd couple, with the partnership being one of true equals and both heroes getting their fair share of focus. The differences between the two make for some fun asides and occasional disagreements but don't prove insurmountable and so the pairing is fully dynamic, helped by a gradual build-up before the two formalise their partnership. Add in a strong supporting cast that makes use of the best of both books and the series is rapidly firing on all pistons. But what's also a surprise is just how gritty and dark the series is, with some quite brutal deaths and dark psychological moments. It is a much more gritty and down to earth series than many of its contemporaries and a surprisingly strong read even today.

Essential Marvel Horror volume 1 - artist creator labels

We have a volume with a huge number of creators, so here's a separate post to carry the labels for most of the artists.

Essential Luke Cage, Power Man volume 2 - creator labels

Yet again we have a volume with a lot of creators, so here's a separate post to carry the labels for some of them.

Essential Spider-Man volume 11

The next in line is Essential Spider-Man volume 11 which reprints Amazing Spider-Man #231-248 and Annuals #16-17. In addition we get Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe entries for Captain Marvel and the Hobgoblin.

All the issues are written by Roger Stern, apart from #237 and annual #17 which are plotted by Stern and scripted by Bill Mantlo. The bulk of the regular issues and annual #16 are drawn by John Romita Jr, with a fill-in by Bob Hall and a back-up story by Ron Frenz. Annual #17 is drawn by Ed Hannigan.

This is a remarkable degree of stability for the title which hasn’t experienced it for a while, and it fortunately combines two of the best creators to ever work on Spider-Man. Stern and Romita Jr produce a high octane run that not even an individual weak entry can detract from, and it’s not hard to see why this era of Spider-Man remains so popular with many. By far the most lasting contribution comes in about the middle of the volume when we get the introduction of the Hobgoblin. Rather than putting Harry Osborn back in his father’s costume, or creating yet another Green Goblin, we instead get a variant on the theme, allowing for an intriguing new character. Wisely he’s built up steadily and we see his evolution as he first obtains the Green Goblin’s equipment and costumes and starts adapting them for his own, and then his ruthless quest to obtain the first Goblin’s super strength formula in a form that won’t have the dangerous side effects of explosives and madness. Despite appearing over four issues, the real Hobgoblin only clashes with Spider-Man on just six pages, instead using surrogates as he builds and consolidates his power base. He is a careful, scheming foe who plans ahead and seeks to learn from his mistakes, adapting whenever he can. He’s also ruthless, casually killing off his underlings once they’ve served their purpose. And there’s the mystery of his identity.

A huge amount has since been written about the Hobgoblin’s identity and the behind-the-scenes problems that resulted in it eventually being revealed the way it was. But nearly all of that relates to later periods. For now we have a straightforward mysterious villain with only a few clues to his identity – he’s clearly got contacts in the underworld, he already has the money to afford a country mansion and hi-tech (for the era) computers, he already holds some shares in Osborn Manufacturing and he doesn’t appear to be an old enemy of Spider-Man’s. Oh and he also knows how to adjust and dye clothes and create a new mask. Back in the Silver Age it was a cliché that villains were usually able to do this regardless of their powers or other skills. Did this rule still apply in 1982 or was this another clue? There are only a few suspects at this stage though it’s hard to imagine J. Jonah Jameson could be seriously considered one even if he was unusually wandering around with a new sports bag. Otherwise Lance Bannon and Blake Tower seem to be in one place at a time when the Hobgoblin is in another but beyond that the mystery itself isn’t really developed. It’s easy to see why it gripped readers so much at the time.

The other story from this run that’s much acclaimed is “The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man”, which is also Ron Frenz’s first work on Amazing Spider-Man (he had previously drawn a few issues of Marvel Team-Up and one of Spectacular). Frenz’s art is quite different from what had been the standard for Spider-Man since the late 1960s. Whereas most other artists had been following the style of John Romita (Sr), Frenz’s art owes a great deal to the style of Steve Ditko. It makes for a pleasant bit of variety. As for the story, this is one of a small handful of tales that probably more has been written about them than within them. It also appears on numerous lists of “best ever Spider-Man stories”. It’s not hard to see why. The tale is wonderful in its simplicity with a real punch at the end. A newspaper column has featured Tim Harrison, a young boy who is a huge fan of Spider-Man and collects things related to him, who wants to meet his hero and here he gets his wish, with his hero even unmasking in front of him. It’s a wonderful piece but then on the final page we learn the sad reason – “Tim Harrison has leukemia, and the doctors only give him a few more weeks to live”. That’s brought tears to many an eye. It’s also a reminder of how in the real world many sports stars, actors and other celebrities have found themselves similarly granting terminally ill children their greatest wish just by meeting them – a sign of the celebrities’ core decency but few would ever fulfil a wish such as this. The story was presumably commissioned as part of “Assistant Editors’ Month”, one of the earliest and most unusual Marvel line-wide events (which I’ll talk about more when Spectacular reaches it), but nothing on the cover showed it as such. Whilst radically different from the norm it just wasn’t part of the more general madcap approach that month.

In terms of long term impact on the wider Marvel universe, annual #16 is probably the most significant issue in this collection but as a Spider-Man story it’s a real oddity. It primarily exists to introduce the new Captain Marvel, yet another female superhero who owed her existence largely to Marvel’s desire to secure key intellectual property (in this case the trademark on the name). It also at times rather forgets just whose annual it actually is, especially as pages 9-25 are the detailed origin of the new hero, told in flashback, without a sign of the character whose name is on the logo. Indeed those seventeen pages could easily be extracted to be reprinted on their own, though I don’t know if that option was ever taken up. Following that she goes searching first for the Fantastic Four and then for the Avengers to seek help to contain her power, with Spider-Man following at a distance. Eventually he arrives to lend a hand as Iron Man succeeds. After all of this Captain Marvel (by whatever name, she’s gone through a few as superior claimants to her original name appear) would rarely be seen in the Spider-Man titles again, certainly no more than most other titleless forgotten Avengers. This debut should have taken place in Avengers, especially as only a couple of months later Captain Marvel was being accepted into their ranks. The annual also has two single page back-up features. One is a guide to the Daily Bugle staff and the other is “The Many Loves of Peter Parker!” Curiously the latter includes both Liz Allen and Glory Grant, despite nothing ever really happening between either of them and Peter and indeed their speech bubbles try to row back, telling us that Liz just had a crush and Glory didn’t get to know him better before moving out of his building. Was this a case of the art being drawn first, possibly from a confused list, and the text added afterwards to try and limit the error?

The other annual is surprisingly more conventional, despite having a less regular creative team. However the story is rather rambling, telling of the Kingpin’s attempts to neutralise information held by a sleazy publisher, whilst Peter Parker attends a high school reunion and comes across one former classmate being blackmailed by another over his links to the publisher. It’s a rather dry tale of down to earth crime and subterfuge and when compared with the regular issues at the time it just feels rather out of place and forgettable.

But the remaining regular issues are anything but that. We get a strong mixture of villains with some familiar Spider-Man ones like the Vulture, Will O’ The Wisp and the Tarantula, but also several more familiar from other Marvel titles including the Cobra, Mr Hyde, the Mad Thinker and his Awesome Android, Stilt-Man (who realises that by now no-one takes him seriously and tries to change that) and Thunderball. Many of these external foes seem out of Spider-Man’s class at first but that just adds to the tension as he has to find ways to bring them down. With Thunderball, Spidey winds up way out on the depths of Long Island and discovers his biggest problem isn’t defeating his foe but dealing with irate drivers furious that the road’s been brought to a standstill! The mixture of tension, pathos and comedy that is so vital to Spider-Man’s success remains present throughout this volumes and never lets up.

There’s also a willingness to develop existing villains rather than simply bringing them back for yet more rounds of the same, and this is most prominent with the Vulture. After twenty years we finally get to learn his origin as he comes out of hiding to get his revenge on his crooked ex-business partner. Whilst the precise scenario feels a little too close to that of Mendel Stromm the Robot Master for my liking, there are original elements such as how the flying harness was developed in the last days of the partnership and how the Vulture’s initial attack on the business pushed him into crime. It’s a strong origin for the character that has since lasted and shows a good sign of a writer willing to help enhance a previously underdeveloped villain. But all writers have their off days when they produce poor ideas and we get a major one here with the Tarantula being turned into a real giant man-spider and then being killed off. The Tarantula had been a relatively minor foe whose main point of interest is the spider motif, and he hadn’t appeared in the Spider-Man titles for over five years, so one could easily justify killing him off without much loss to the series overall. But his whole fate feels utterly out of step with his normal pattern, even if he is seeking a power upgrade, and just plain silly. The story also involves Will O’ The Wisp and the Brand Corporation, a subsidiary for Roxxon, Marvel’s usual hi-tech Evil Corporation that carries out unethical and illegal actions in many a story. But they’re just window dressing to the final fate of the Tarantula.

There are also a few developments in Peter’s civilian life of which by far the most significant is his decision to take a leave of absence from graduate school, with many expecting that he will ever return. And frankly this major decision, and the handling of it are in the wrong series. Up until now the bulk of Peter’s graduate school activities, and his supporting cast around him, have been featured in Spectacular as part of a wise move to allow each title a distinct focus. But here we get the sequence of events from Peter’s concern about his exam results through to his decision to leave, and the comedy as he has to navigate the endless queues and absent administrators who have to sign off his forms, in Amazing and it just feels out of place, particularly as one of his key motivating factors is the cost of the Black Cat’s hospitalisation, again something that happened in Spectacular. (Oh and just in case you were worried, Marvel Team-Up wasn’t left out of this either. In issue #134, which is quite some way off in the Essentials, it got to carry the epilogue to the graduate school days by showing the story where Peter cleared out his locker and said a final goodbye, as well as getting caught up in yet another crisis on campus.) And earlier on there’s a short scene where Peter clears out his desk after giving up his teaching duties (this decision actually was taken in Spectacular), but his luck runs true to form and he misses the surprise party held for him by his office maters. Whatever the reason for telling these stories where they were, it’s a worrying indication of a trend away from keeping each title distinctive and instead seeing the books slowly fuse together to the point where burn out and redundancy is risked.

Peter’s romantic life also sees some developments. At first he has to fend off the unwanted attentions of Amy Powell as part of her complicated relationship with Lance Bannon, Peter’s main photographer rival at the Bugle. Peter’s involvement in the whole thing is quite short as he manages to evade and avoid Amy at first, and then soon learns what’s going on and does his best to get Lance to sort it out. However there is the uncomfortable moment when Amy turns up unexpectedly at his flat and starts kissing him strongly, then suddenly Mary Jane walks in!

It’s quite clear that a lot of people think Peter and Mary Jane should be together, and soon there’s no end of attempted matchmaking as friends and relatives lure them separately to meals to find the other already there – by the time he arrives at a table to find just Aunt May and Anna Watson, Peter is expressing relief at the change. Then Mary Jane arrives with Nathan! We also learn that there’s seemingly more to Mary Jane than we’ve previously thought, particularly when Aunt May tells Peter that both he and MJ have “both lost so… so very much”. And in one interesting issue we see Mary Jane daydreaming and imagining herself a successful actress who even has a play dramatising her own life starring herself – and then she’s interrupted by the appearance of her sister, a working class single mother of two, and something about the thought freaks her out. Together with the odd other moment that suggests there’s quite a serious side to her as well as her ever outgoing, funloving personality, it’s clear that there are greater depths to the character but at this stage it remains uncertain whether she and Peter will rekindle their romance. At this stage Peter has an alternative in the form of Felicia Hardy, the Black Cat, currently hospitalised following contemporary events in Spectacular, which is where nearly all the developments in their relationship occur. However in the daydreaming issue we see Felicia imaging a glamorous adventure with Spider-Man, who unmasks to reveal… Cary Grant. (Well Grant at his prime – when the issue, #246, was printed he was 83.) It’s a sign of just how great a gulf there is between Felicia’s hopes and the reality of Peter’s life, which she has not yet been introduced to.

In general this volume shows the series in one of its best periods. The writing and art complement each other well, whilst the stories put both Spider-Man and Peter through a quite diverse range of situations without once stepping into the ridiculous. Apart from some minor slippage in allowing the boundaries between the two titles to blur at points, and an annual where the title character is reduced to a supporting guest star, there aren’t really any lapses. Most of the individual stories are at the very least good to very good, and there are some individual tales that really stand out, whether for what they do with the villains or how they go in a very human direction. This is definitely one of the best runs in Spider-Man’s history.

Essential Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man volume 3

We come now to Essential Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man volume 3, containing Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man #54-74 and Annual #3.

The writing is quite consistent with Roger Stern handling issues #54-60 and plotting #61, then Bill Mantlo scripts that issue and writes #62-74. The only other writer is David Anthony Kraft on the annual. However the art situation remains unstable, with Ed Hannigan handling nine issues between #60 and #72, and others being drawn by a mixture of Marie Severin, Luke McDonnell, Jim Shooter, John Byrne, Greg LaRocque, Bob Hall, Rick Leonardi and Al Milgrom, whilst Jim Sherman & Alan Weiss handle the annual. For those wondering, yes that’s the Jim Shooter who was Marvel’s Editor-in-Chief at the time. The art can be a little variable but the whole run is held together by some strong writing, with both Stern and Mantlo having a strong grasp on what makes Spider-Man work best.

Several themes run throughout this volume with a major one being Peter’s relationship with various women. The Black Cat reappears right at the very end but otherwise the focus is on Debra Whitman and Marcy Kane, both of whom are largely confined to this title as the focus remains primarily on Peter’s graduate school work (with perhaps a few too many raids on the campus but fortunately there are no more menaces being directly caused by lecturers), albeit with some notable appearances by the Daily Bugle side of affairs and the inevitable clashes of the two’s demands. It’s these clashes that are the main wedge between Marcy and Peter even as other barriers between them fall, especially after she is humiliatingly revealed to be a fake blond now forced to wear a wig because dye is destroying her natural hair. Peter’s sympathetic shoulder makes her start to reconsider her view of him as does his saving her life when the department is attacked by Moonstone, and she offers to help him study, leading to his attempts at a come on one evening with “Come here beautiful”! But it all comes to a crashing halt when he runs off to fight Electro and her harsh critical attitude returns. It’s hard to tell if there was ever that much potential for a proper relationship between the two without making major changes to Marcy’s character to what was originally shown. It’s true that many a real life ice-queen has melted and long term development could have shifted her over time, but at the core the basic conflict between them was Marcy’s single-minded focus on her academic career and Peter’s inability to commit in such a way because of all his other obligations and responsibilities. No amount of pleading about his financial circumstances could change that, and there would only have been one way that Marcy could have accepted he had higher purposes. But it would have been Catch 22 – a relationship could never have become serious enough for him to reveal his identity without him having already revealed it! (And remember he had proposed to Mary Jane without doing so.)

It’s not just any chance with Marcy that founders on this problem but also Peter’s teaching assistantship, with Dr Sloan sharing the view that Peter isn’t committed enough to devote the time required for his duties. Was this also an attempt to youthen Peter? His teaching duties hadn’t been that prominent but might there have been worries that by putting him on the far side of the lectern he was being made “inaccessible” to the perceived readership? It’s hard to say for sure and it would be wrong to assume that the recurrent belief amongst creators in the 1990s and 2000s that Spider-Man had “aged” and was “too inaccessible” was necessarily the prevailing concern of the early 1980s. But what this development definitely doesn’t share with the later decades is a sense of being suddenly forced upon the character. Instead it comes across as an entirely natural development of the problems that had been plaguing Peter for many issues.

There’s more development of Debra Whitman, and again it shows one of Peter’s worse sides as he fails to realise what’s going on around him and comes out with sharp comments that hurt her far more than he realises or intends. Debra is nervous and insecure but also clearly full of affection and seeking someone to give it all to. Instead she winds up obsessing over a guy who seems out of her league, repeatedly rushes out on her and who can be rather dismissive at times, whilst her alternative suitor Biff Rifkin seems to care more for her than she does for him. But whilst Debra may have difficulty when she tries to understand a physics text book in the hope that she can pull herself up to Peter’s level, she does demonstrate herself to be one of the most intelligent people in Spider-Man’s entire world when she puts together all her observations of Peter’s running off and his incredible strength as she follows him up a staircase and sees Spider-Man swing away. It’s a bold step forward for one of the supporting cast to now be in the know and there were no end of story possibilities – to take just a few, Debra could have confided her discovery to Peter and it became the spark for their relationship to really take off, or Peter could have tried to convince her that she was mistaken as he’d done whenever other got close in the past, or Debra could have kept the secret to herself and provided Peter with support and cover without him realising it, (though the latter is a bit close to Pete Ross and Superboy). We do at least get the realistic scenario of Debra’s initial reaction being sheer worry that Peter is out there constantly risking his life and her confiding her fears in a therapist, but then the story takes a very silly and rushed turn in order to wrap everything up before the return of the Black Cat and issue #75.

I don’t know what standard operating practices and ethics in the field of therapy were back in 1982 but I seriously doubt they involved breaching patients’ confidentiality to the objects of perceived delusions, or having third parties listening in on sessions, let alone the deliberate engineering of treatment designed to shock a person out of their delusions. But this is precisely what happens as the therapist tries to get Peter to pretend to be Spider-Man in order to convince Debra she’s deluded. Peter to his credit wants nothing to do with the plan, even when the therapist arrogantly assumes that this means he doesn’t care, but does try to help in his own way. This leads up to issue #74 where we get the major revelations about Debra, namely that she is a battered wife who has run away from her husband with help from Biff. This could have led to some further significant developments such as Peter helping to coax Debra out of her fantasies and face up to her past, perhaps even a trip to the mid-west to settle things with her husband. But instead we get one of the most simplistic cures of mental problems imaginable. Peter, to his great credit, decides to reveal to Debra that she’s not deluded at all and that he really is Spider-Man, so he visits her at her flat and lets her unmask him. And suddenly in an instance, everything is made right again. Debra realises that Peter couldn’t possibly be Spidey and has only done this to help her, and suddenly her delusions, fantasies and insecurities fade away. The next day she boards a bus to head back to the mid-west to divorce her husband and start over, with a hint that she will eventually settle with Biff (who also gets a one issue turn around as we learn that he’s been devoted to Debra since they were undergraduates but her delusions prevented her from realising it). Debra wouldn’t be seen again for over two decades (although she appeared in the 1990s cartoon where she was turned into Peter’s lab partner and scientific equal, who took to dating Flash Thompson!) and the whole thing just feels like a long-term plot plan was suddenly rushed through in a few issues when big changes were looming and Debra had become surplus to requirements.

It’s not the only rapid change thrown on us. In another issue we learn that Peter has had limited contact with Flash Thompson of late – okay good friends do often drift apart when their life courses no longer bring them into regular contact – and that both have drifted away from Harry Osborn and Liz Allen, who’ve disappeared off to the suburbs and got married with neither Peter nor Flash present. It’s an astounding revelation considering how close all four had been for years even if Harry did want to sever his ties to the past. It’s hard to know who to blame for this one as Harry had basically drifted out of the titles with his last major storyline some four years earlier and only a handful of background appearances since then. But it would have been better to actually show the wedding as a sign of the character evolving and make that the happy ending moment. Instead we get a glimpse of married life in New Jersey suburbia, as Liz’s past catches up with them in the form of the Molten Man. The story itself is a straightforward tale of Spider-Man blundering into a difficult situation and causing the Molten Man to go on the rampage, but in the course of it we see Harry showing more strength than in a long time as he stands up to his step-brother-in-law and fights back. The Osborn home may be burnt down but the ending of the story shows Harry and Liz have found their happily ever after as the neighbours come to their aid. Spidey’s comments that it’s a paradise in which he and his villains don’t belong helps to underline the sense of final closure.

That story also ends with the Molten Man seemingly transformed after being shoved into a swimming pool causes him to revert to his premolten form. It may be typical comic book science but it’s one of a number of cases in these issues of villains undergoing transformations of one sort or another. We also get a closure for the Man-Wolf as the moonstone is finally expelled from John Jameson’s system, whilst Will o’ the Wisp is restored to his form, the Smuggler and the Gibbon both seemingly go straight, the Beetle gets a new set of armour, the Robot Master is sort-of revived as a robotic duplicate, and Silvermane is transformed from an aged man in a broken body to a psychotic cyborg. For some villains there’s a sense of closure, for others their threat level is enhanced, particularly the Beetle whose previous costume always looked rather goofy. Silvermane’s transformation is the one I’m least comfortable with. Whilst the character when first introduced was initially seeking to revitalise his ageing body, his more recent appearances had shown him with a young enough body to be credible as a senior crime lord. And yes non-costumed crime lords are quite common in the Spider-Man stories, with the Kingpin standing at their apex, but Silvermane was the second most important one and didn’t really need to be transformed to maintain his threat level. The new cyborg body initially sees him as a rampaging creature, which could be a familiarisation factor, but it just feels like a new creation tacked onto an existing character when they could have been made an independent entity without drastically altering the story.

There aren’t many new villains introduced in these issues, but there are several brought in from other Marvel titles such as Moonstone, Nitro and the Ringer, whilst the Boomerang, Killer Shrike and the Owl had all  previously fought Spidey in Marvel Team-Up but now make it over to his headline titles for the first time. By far the most significant of these imports for the long run is the Jack O’Lantern, brought over from the pages of Machine Man (where he was co-created by Steve Ditko), who would later go on to assume the mantle of one of Spider-Man’s main foes. He gets but a single issue here though it establishes some of his key features including strategic thinking but also a willingness to turn tail and run when he realises he’s outclassed.

Some of Spider-Man’s more traditional foes make appearances, including Electro, Kraven and Doctor Octopus. The last comes at the end as part of the build-up for a major storyline that sees him in conflict with the Owl, which is best covered in the next Essential Spectacular volume, but we do get the touching story of Ollie Osnick, a lonely child who idolises Doc Ock to the point of getting his own tentacles and forming his own supervillains’ fan club. It makes for an interesting and comedic prelude to the main event as Spider-Man tracks down Ollie in a city nervous about the real Doc Ock being on the loose. It’s fortunate that Ollie abandons his worship of Doc Ock and never meets the real thing, who at the end passes a bin with the artificial arms and ripped up posters… and couldn’t care less. The Electro story is more conventional but shows Peter developing a special suit to tackle a particular foe. Whereas Iron Man or Batman can easily just have a new special costume manufactured to spec, Spider-Man has to take an old rubber mattress to create a special insulated suit that’s not 100% protection and is boiling hot to boot. Kraven’s story adds a bit to the character, showing how much honour means to him and that it is not enough to have Spider-Man dead but that he can only be satisfied if he does it rightly, a point that eludes his mistress Calypso.

The main creation in these issues are Cloak and Dagger. The two survivors of horrific experiments with drugs, they find their bodies transformed into powerful weapons and they now launch a war on drug dealers, showing a willingness to murder. This willingness brings them into conflict with Spider-Man in both their stories, but he isn’t always able to stop them in time. Wisely, the anti-drugs message isn’t overdone, nor is the debate over vigilante execution against criminal rights. However, another issue is less reserved on a controversial matter. Issue #71 focuses on the issue of hand gun control with Peter and Robbie as the voices of control – Robbie comes out with so many statistics that it’s not credible even for a newspaper editor to have off the top of his head – whilst Lance Bannon mutters the anti-control arguments of self-protection and Jonah is surprisingly balanced, ending the issue by asking what’s to be done about illegal guns in a city that already has one of the strongest control laws in the country. The presentation of the characters are rather one sided although the narrative aims at more balance by showing a number of gun deaths in breakout panels, including cleaning accidents, a father accidentally killing his son who is make a surprise visit, two parents gunned down in the street by a mugger whilst their child watches (a homage to Batman – wisely we don’t get a reminder of Uncle Ben’s death as it would have been the third time in a dozen issues) and a couple murdered in bed by a burglar. In the main story we get further killings, including a shopkeeper gunning down a robber (who had already been neutralised by Spider-Man) and a policeman dying taking on gun smugglers. Gun control is an awkward enough subject to write about at the best of times (and I’m merciful that the debate in the UK is tame compared to the US) but this issue feels rather preachy whilst at the same time trying to present itself as a more balanced take on the subject. There’s a credit of “Additional dialogue by Tom DeFalco” – was this a case of a writer and editor bringing different political perspectives to the issue? (Whilst I’ve heard that Mantlo’s politics were generally liberal and progressive I’ve no idea about DeFalco’s – or for that matter if he was adding on his own initiative or to orders from on high.)

As I mentioned, the gun control issue doesn’t touch on Uncle Ben’s death, probably because other issues do. Issue #68 sees Peter and Aunt May visiting the cemetery, with Nathan watching from a distance (a nice subtle sign that Nathan has been fully accepted into the family by Peter), whilst issue #60 is a double-sized issue celebrating five years of Spectacular and includes a seventeen page retelling of the original story from Amazing Fantasy #15 (including previous additions from Spectacular Spider-Man magazine #1 and Amazing Spider-Man #94). Much of the retelling matches the original story but there are some individual additions and enhancements to scenes. Amongst the most significant additions are an announcement that the demonstration is showing just how safely radiation can be controlled, hence the openness that allows the spider in; Peter actually killing the spider after it bites him (so there’s no possibility of anyone else having got powers at the same time); and there’s some more fleshing out what I feel is the most awkward part. Far too often in comics a special accident gives a character great power... and the ability to make costumes, to manufacture special equipment and to somehow obtain all the raw materials necessary without anyone noticing. Here we get the addition that the Spider-Man costume is adapted from a suit thrown away by a dance class whilst Peter now develops the web fluid in extra time in the school labs (and it’s credible the school über science geek would be allowed to do this) and has been studying polymers for two years. Whilst it’s still not perfect, it’s probably the best that can be done with the material available that has long established that Peter has no supporting help and uses artificial webs (with all the problems he’s had with weakened formulas, empty cartridges and badly maintained webshooters over the years). It’s easy to understand why so many latter day versions of Spider-Man, including the alien costume, Spider-Man 2099 and the Sam Raimi movies, have instead gone for built in organic webs but it’s impossible to retcon this in the original comics. Otherwise this retelling is pretty standard – maybe it’s a few pages too long but it shows that the original story can be retold without having to add too many layers (for instance there’s no mention of the Burglar’s motivations as this is primarily about the birth of Spider-Man). The only slight discontinuity is the same as in Amazing#94, namely that Peter is shown committing himself to use his powers to protect others immediately, when in the original comics it took a few more stories before that became his primary purpose.

In general, this is a solid run on the title but there isn’t anything that really leaps out as truly awesome. But sometimes spectacular highs are matched by equally spectacular lows and a solid consistently good run is overall more preferable. Both main writers have a strong grasp of both Spider-Man’s character and his past, and all the elements are respected to show the character at his classic best, fighting to help others despite the gruelling toll it takes on his alter-ego’s life.