Written by: Christopher Yost
Art by: Marco Checchetto
Colors by: Rachelle Rosenberg
Published by: Marvel Comics
Fresh off of a team up with the Avengers that was less team up and more Superior putting the Avengers in their places, Peter’s clone Kaine A.K.A. Scarlet Spider makes his way to Manhattan. Before we can find out his intentions, Ock goes all PTSD on Kaine after drudging up some bad memories from Otto’s past. It also turns out that some baddies from both Kaine’s and Peter’s past are on the prowl.
Books like this I have always been a little wary of simply because they usually don’t deal with the story going on in the character’s main book. However Superior Team-Up is a book that delivers great stories, great action and great art, the comic trifecta.
On the story side of things, bringing Scarlet Spider into Superior’s world was a stroke of genius that opens everything up to some really unique story telling, and I think we got that in spades here. Seeing Octavius lose himself and forget that he’s actually Peter Parker was brilliant. He has a huge score to settle with Kaine and it was interesting to see him act not as Peter or Spider-Man, but as Otto Octavius. Admittedly, though Spider-Man has always been one of my favorite heroes via cartoons, I have never read much of him in the past, so when Kaine showed up I wasn’t aware of the history between him and Ock. All it took was Ock uttering the name Kaine and a single solitary flashback panel to get the gist, then I was off and running. The action that coincides between the two was great, starting with a panel of Kaine crashing through Peter’s apartment window.
Of course there’s also that pesky villain that’s out there transforming clones into spider-mutants. It seems that he’s teamed with the villain from Team-Up #1 and they are out to cause havoc. The only thing that throws me off about this arc is that we have to cop Scarlet Spider #20 to finish it off. I get it Marvel, sell more books, and in this instance it will probably work because I want to see how this plays out, but still, f#@k you Marvel. I really hate that maneuver simply because the story’s end is now up to a different creative team, and that’s not always a good thing.
On the art side things were pretty great overall, the pencils are clean and the colors are on point. As a writer I don’t have a lot of favorite artists or anything, but Rosenberg’s colors are always a treat for the eyes. The only set back here is that the action panels were a bit confusing in certain panels; it was just a bit difficult to tell what was going on. Sometimes I had to stare at a panel for a bit and flip it around a little just to be able to tell what I was looking at. This didn’t take away from the overall experience of the book; instead it was more of an annoyance then anything.
Overall this is a book that any Spidey fan should be reading. With a great story and art to boot it was already a winner, but add in the fact that this brings Peter and Ock’s histories around again makes it an even more interesting read. If it weren’t for the confusing action panels this issue would’ve scored a lot higher.
3 out of 5 nerds
Marc
Marc is a self-confessed nerd. Ever since seeing Star Wars for the first time around 1979 he’s been an unapologetic fan of the Wars and still believes, with Clone Wars and now Underworld, we are yet to see the best Star Wars. He’s a dad of two who now doesn’t have the time (or money) to collect the amount of toys, comics, movies and books he once did, much to the relief of his long-suffering wife. In the real world he’s a graphic designer. He started Following the Nerd because he was tired of searching a million sites every day for all the best news that he loves and decided to create one place where you can go to get the whole lot. Secretly he longs to be sitting in the cockpit of his YT-1300 Corellian Transport ship with his co-pilot Chewie, roaming the universe, waiting for his next big adventure, but feels just at home watching cartoons with his kids….
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