Thursday, July 26, 2007

Emo Spidey? Great starting point! Amazing Spider-Man #542


Hey comic book fans! This week's Book of the Week will be short and sweet. (Awww, sweet!) Mostly because I can't tell you much about the book without spoiling it. Plus, if you have ever picked up a comic in your life (and I assume you have, or you wouldn't be reading this), I don't need to explain anything about the basic concept of Spider-Man to you.

Recently, times have been tough for Spidey and his alter-ego. Peter went and outed himself as Spider-Man during Marvel's Civil War, and that hasn't really turned out to be a very good idea. Not only are Iron Man and the Super Human Registration Act crowd out to arrest him, but all the nefarious folks he has crossed in the past know who Spider-Man is. More importantly, they know who his family is. Consequently, Aunt May has taken a bullet and things look pretty bleak. Bleak enough that Spidey dug out his emo black costume again.

When Spidey finds out that tubby old Wilson Fisk, AKA the Kingpin of Crime, is the guy responsible for Aunt May's shooting, he's pretty upset. Upset enough, in fact, that he swears to kill Fisk. The Amazing Spider-Man #542 is the issue where Spidey finally catches up with the Kingpin, and we see how that confrontation plays out. I don't want to give anything away, but this scene takes several turns that regular Spider-Readers might not be expecting. As a long-time Spidey fan, I declare it awesome!

Not only is this issue great on it's own, it is a prelude to a lot of big stuff down the road for our hero. J. Michael Straczynski's excellent run on Amazing Spider-Man is coming to an end soon, and there will be some big events in the life of everyone's favorite Wall-Crawler coming with it. This is as good a place to start as any, so don't miss Four Color Fantasies' guaranteed Book of the Week, Amazing Spider-Man #542! Just keep your secret identity to yourself, we really can't be trusted with that information.

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