Eisner-award winning writer, Terry Moore (Strangers in Paradise, Echo, upcoming Runaways), and artist Craig Rousseau (The Perhapanauts) come to Marvel and give us a brand new limited series starring everyone’s favorite redhead!
When I first heard that Terry Moore was writing this title I wasn’t so sure. Ok, I liked his SiP but I didn’t know if he could give us the fresh look & the comedy, drama, fun plots on these characters that Sean McKeever and Takeshi Miyazawa (and later David Hahn) gave us. Well, I can stop worrying now, Terry Moore and Craig Rousseau’s new version of the series maybe isn’t quite the same but it’s really close and it’s a very nice beginning. Terry Moore had me from “Spidey Kong”
The issue opens with a dream Mary Jane is having about being carried to the top of the Empire State Building by a gigantic version of Spidey called Spidey-Kong. Then she wakes up and heads off to school for the first day of her sophomore year, giving her the chance to meet up with (and introduce to us) her friends from the last series and even some new members of supporting cast: a gruff vice-principal, and a girl in the drama club who might be having problems. It’s pretty much a setup first issue: necessary, but not necessarily boring.
Craig Rousseau’s art is different than his predecessor, Takeshi Miyazawa. Maybe it doesn’t have the same flair as Miyazawa’s but it can make you care for the characters and their lives. And maybe Guillem Mari’s colors are a little pastel and missing Christina Strain’s candy-colors to the original series but the end result is just as sweet.
I believe that Moore and Rousseau might manage to build the series into something special, but even if they don’t it will be good reading.
Rating: 7.5/10
