By Dan Slott, Christos N. Gage, Giuseppe Camuncoli, Humberto Ramos, John Dell, Terry Pallot & Victor Olazaba (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-556-7
Over the years the Wondrous Wallcrawler has undergone a plethora of radical evolutions, refits and even backsliding revisions, but his latest evolution – springing out of the landmark Amazing Spider-Man #700 – was certainly the most striking and compelling character carve-up of all the MarvelNOW! relaunches.
In that issue, the personality of Peter Parker seemingly died when Doctor Otto Octavius took over his body, arguably becoming a wholly Superior Spider-Man.
Parker’s mind had been transferred and trapped in the rapidly failing body of the fading super-villain where, despite his every desperate effort, in the end Peter perished with and within that decrepit, expiring frame.
Now the coldly calculating Octopus is permanently installed in the Wondrous Wallcrawler’s body and successfully living Peter’s life, albeit with a few minor but necessary alterations, upgrades and improvements…
The situation is not completely hopeless. At the moment of the monster’s greatest triumph Parker made Octavius relive and experience every ghastly moment of tragedy and sacrifice which combined to make Spider-Man the compulsive do-gooder that he was.
From that enforced emotional turmoil came understanding. Otto had a change of heart, and swore to live the rest of his stolen life in tribute to his enemy; honestly endeavouring to carry on Spider-Man’s self-imposed mission and equally guided by the abiding principle “with great power comes great responsibilityâ€â€¦
However the ingrained monomania within proved hard to suppress and the usurped web-spinner incessantly worked to prove himself a better man: augmenting Parker’s gadgets and methodology with millions of spy robots to patrol the entire city at once, constantly adding advanced tech and refining new weaponry to the suit and even acting pre-emptively rather than merely reacting to crises as the original had…
Otto went back to college because he was appalled Parker had no doctorate and even tried to rekindle his new body’s old relationship with Mary Jane Watson.
The new, ultra-efficient Spider-Man became New York’s darling and even Mayor J. Jonah Jameson embraced the Web-spinner; all but appropriating the Arachnid as a deputy – to the utter incredulity of an imperceptible psychic shard of Peter Parker which lurked within the deepest recesses of the hero’s overwritten mind…
The helpless ghost was an unwilling passenger, unsuspected by Octavius yet increasingly privy to the villain’s own barely-suppressed memories. Moreover, some of Parker’s oldest friends began to suspect something was amiss…
Police CSI Officer and ex-girlfriend Carlie Cooper knew Peter’s secret identity and recalled the last time Spidey fought Doc Ock, when the killer broke her arm. He claimed then that he was Peter trapped in the villain’s body…
Everybody accepts Spider-Man has changed. Not only is he exceedingly more efficient these days, but far more brutal too: practically crippling bad-guys Boomerang, Vulture and Scorpion. This new hard-line attitude actually increased his public approval rating and, after a deadly hostage siege, the hero’s status peaked after the webslinger executed the psychotic perpetrator Massacre…
Once more scripted by Dan Slott (with Christos N. Gage), No Escape collects issues #11-16 of the fortnightly Superior Spider-Man (August-October 2013) and details the shocking events following the denouement of the previous volume.
In that stunning game-changer Octavius, having finally detected the niggling ghost of Parker’s sentience inside their head, performed cyber-psychic surgery to exorcise the fragmented remnants of his hated nemesis and now gloatingly basks in the triumph of a super-powerful body and life all his own…
A nasty new day dawns with ‘A Lock for Every Key’ – illustrated by Giuseppe Camuncoli & John Dell – as Jameson “invites†Spider-Man to accompany him on a trip to soon-to-closed super-penitentiary The Raft. The discredited prison is almost empty now and one of the last official functions will be the execution of Alistaire Smythe, the cyborg Spider-Slayer who slaughtered Jameson’s wife Marla…
The Mayor is dead-set on watching the killer die and expects the tough new Spider-Man to ensure nothing interrupts proceedings. “Parker’s†civilian life is again spiralling downward: sitting through college classes taught by morons simply to gain a doctorate is excruciating, he’s shunning all Peter’s old friends, and is being harassed for lack of productivity by employer Max Modell at technological think-tank Horizon Labs.
At least his blossoming romance with brilliant Anna Maria Marconi is still progressing satisfactorily…
When the skeleton security staff on the Raft are unable to cope with Smythe’s startling escape bid, Spider-Man is smugly convinced he has covered all the bases, but even Otto was unprepared for Spider-Slayer upgrading three villains on life-support and, as the Wallcrawler clashes with Smythe, technologically augmented Scorpion, Vulture and Boomerang are unleashed to kill all the people trapped on the island.
Worst yet, uncontrollable, voracious man-eating monster The Lizard is also loosed to stalk the jail’s darkened corridors…
The drama escalates in ‘Lockdown’ (with additional inks by Terry Pallot) as the vengeful Jameson grabs a gun and goes after Smythe himself. When he meets Spider-Man the Mayor orders the Arachnid Avenger to kill Spider-Slayer at any cost, much to the delight of the ruthless new landlord in Peter Parker’s skull…
Unleashed at last, Octavius soon cleans house and brilliantly, mercilessly ends the affair in ‘The Slayers and the Slain’. Better yet, because he recorded a certain conversation, he now has enough dirt on the Mayor to force Jameson to hand over The Raft…
Humberto Ramos & Victor Olazaba return to render ‘A Blind Eye’ as the new owner of “Spider Island†designs a new costume, builds giant war-tanks and hires a gang of arachnid henchmen to help him clean the city for the decent, law-abiding citizens.
First target is the embarrassingly public Shadowland: unassailable citadel of Wilson Fisk, Kingpin of Crime. Always logical but supremely innovative, the Superior Spider-Man and his army assault the Kingpin’s Keep head-on in full view of the astounded citizenry of Hell’s Kitchen…
Forcing Jameson to back his plan post-hoc, Octavius and his Spider-gang raze the fortress to the ground, apparently killing Fisk in the process and driving his chief enforcer Hobgoblin into hiding… and all to great public acclaim…
Unfortunately this just clears the way for covert mastermind Goblin King (a former Green Goblin) to accelerate his own plans to take over the underworld with his Goblin Army Cult…
The 2-part ‘Run Goblin, Run’ concludes this chilling compilation as ‘The Tinkerer’s Apprentice’ sees young Phil Urich, latest iteration of Hobgoblin, frantically trying to recoup his losses after the fall of Shadowland only to become the patsy for malevolent underworld armourer Ty Stone, a subtle manipulator with a deadly agenda all his own…
Forced to rob banks for ready cash, Urich becomes a priority on Spider-Man’s To-Do list and is forced to take hostages at the Daily Bugle when the web-spinner “outs†him on live TV…
Meanwhile, Carlie Cooper has shared her suspicions about Spider-Man with her Captain Yuri Watanabe (who secretly moonlights as vengeful costumed vigilante The Wraith). Together the women begin gathering definitive proof of their suspicions regarding the wallcrawler…
The convoluted machinations culminate in a bombastic battle as ‘Goblin Season’ finds Phil Urich soundly defeated only to be liberated by The Goblin King’s forces and co-opted as the crime-lord’s latest living weapon: a Goblin Knight to lead his armies to inevitable victory…
To Be Continued…
This up-to-the minute tech-heavy reinvention of course comes with 21st century AR icon sections. These Marvel Augmented Reality App pages offer access to story bonuses once you download the little dickens – free from marvel.com – onto your smart-phone or Android-enabled tablet.
Spider-Man has been reinvented so often it’s almost become commonplace, but this iteration – for however long it lasts – is one no lover of high-octane adventure should miss: smart, shocking and incredibly addictive.
™ & © 2013 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. Italy. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.