Reviewer: Daron Kappauff
Story Title: The Hunger part 3
Written by: Paul Jenkins
Penciled by: Humberto Ramos
Inked by: Wayne Faucher
Colored by: Studio F
Lettered by: Randy Gentile
Editor: John Miesegaes
Publisher: Marvel Comics
When I realized I was going to be reviewing Spectacular Spider-Man #3 this week, my first thought was, “oh great another not so happy review.†After having now read the issue, that statement couldn’t be farther from the truth. Before I get into it the details, I must say that this week’s issue of Spectacular is probably the best nonUltimate Spider-Man issue I’ve read since before the Clone Saga.
“Wow, that’s a bold statement,†you might be saying. “Yeah, I know,†I’d reply.
“Well, why is it so good?†I’m not even sure where to begin, so I’ll start with a few words on the last couple issues.
When I first heard about this new series starting up, everyone kept telling me how excited they were about the series. The hype didn’t affect me much though, since I heard that same hype over Amazing, and after having now read that title for a year or more…I must say I’m not at all thrilled with how it’s going. But not wanting to shoot a book down before it even came out, I decided to give Spectacular a try.
I must say that while I liked the first 2 issues of the series, I didn’t think they were anything to write home about, and I probably wouldn’t have rated them as high as my two predecessors. (I would have probably given both issues a 7.0 – not that that’s a bad score or anything.) With this week’s issue though…all that changes.
This week’s issue starts with not one but two recap pages. The first, the standard “Previously†page found in all of Marvel’s titles. And the second is a great one page splash of Spidey sitting on the front steps outside an apartment building with Detective Neil Garrett; going over not only the events of the last couple issues, but through the history of the alien symbiote as well. And let me just say, it’s pretty amusing watching Spidey trying to explain that whole mess to a normal police officer.
From there, we get a bunch of nice interspersed scenes of Peter (without the costume) and Eddie Brock (similarly, without the costume) until the last 7 pages…when we get the big fight. The 1 and 2 page scenes dealing with Brock, spread out through the issue, are definitely the highlight. Without giving too much away…the whole point of this story is that the symbiote has decided that it’s taken all it can from Brock and is in search of a new host. All the while, we see Brock going through withdrawals because the symbiote has left him, and the scenes therein are powerfully dramatic.
As a counterpoint, the scenes with Peter are much more on the touching side. After he helps Aunt May paint her house (in a way only someone who can walk on walls can), he helps Liz Osborn move Flash Thompson into a new place. And I must say, once the two college buddies are left alone for a bit the scene moves from touching to heartrending, without being cheesy or overdramatic. (Some really nice stuff, and my favorite scene of the book, if not of the series…)
The issue ends with a battle royal of the Spider-Man kind, humorous quips and all. And there’s a great cliffhanger ending that’s truly reminiscent of Geoff Johns, “the greatest last page in comics writer,†as he’s come to be known. Many of you can probably already guess at what it is…since it wouldn’t be the first time that we’ve seen a story like this, but for those of you who can’t I’m not going to ruin it.
