Amazing Spider-Man #642: “Origin of Species Part 2″
Written by: Mark Waid
Art by: Paul Azaceta
Part 2 or Origin of Species, begins where the last issue ended, with little Goblin Junior in the hands of a newly disfigured Doc Ock who’s also got Spider-man, Mary Jane, Harry Osborn and Carlie Cooper in his clutches. Spidey does some quick thinking, snatches the baby from his longtime foe and heads off into midtown where are chase really begins.
Now it’s during this chase that we see common plot devices trounced out which I feel really hurt the story. First we get to see J.J. Jameson doing his usual editorializing. Spider-man’s swinging around with a baby while a bunch of supervillains chase after him and wreak havoc in Midtown Manhattan. He must have kidnapped it. Better get all the police in the city to chase him down in their copters.
Then we see the classic “bad decision on which the entire action of the story hinges.” Tell me people, I’d really like to know what you would do in this situation: All of your enemies have seemingly teamed up to capture the baby of one your greatest foes (and one of the most evil men in the world.) You get the child out of the clutches, you start to escape, they chase you…does it make any sense to heads towards a hospital?
Yes, you are caring a newborn who most definitely should receive some medical attention, but why the hell would you try and go to a hospital with bad guys chasing you? That’s not just a bad decision, it’s borderline retarded. It was nice to see Peter juggle other options when that didn’t work out (Doc Ock predicted Spidey’s stupidity and had Electro AND Sandman waiting for him) – he considered going to both the Baxter Building and Avengers Mansion…but of course the F4 were away and the Mansion was a bit too far. I have no idea why he didn’t just swing to Avengers Tower. Maybe my Marvel geography is a little rusty but I don’t think it’s that far from the Baxter building.
Then we get what’s probably my least favorite Spidey plot-device in the whole wide word: The empty web-shooter. Pete runs out of webbing and him and baby goblin take a bit of a tumble. Instead of what you’d expect, something like, Doc Ock coming and taking the baby from him, we see Spidey down for two panels before hopping up and out the window, swinging away again (because only one of his shooters was empty.) This occurrence is basically just filler for this weak story.
Oh and while all this is happening, to up the drama levels, Carlie Cooper is desperately searching through the wreckage of the Coffee Bean for any signs of Peter, despite Mary Jane’s assurance that he got away okay. And then we see Tombstone creep up behind her. Uh-oh.
Overall Rating: 4/10 More weak narrative devices, same lack of action or semblance of any real plot. Only reason this issue gets a higher rating than the last one is because we have to spend less time looking at Azaceta’s terrible Mary Jane and Carlie Cooper’s.
