The Superior Spider-Man # 31/ The Amazing Spider-Man # 1

By Mark Rodriguez

Doc Ock's final act before dying was switching bodies with Spider-Man, starting a whole new life as a young and energetic Peter Parker, while his foe died in his aging diseased body. Now as the Superior Spider-Man, Otto went out fighting crime his way, murdering people like Massacre and gravely injuring others like the Vulture and Boomerang, which affected his status as a member of the Avengers. He also earned a Doctorate, opened Parker Industries and has a new girlfriend named Anna Maria. But along came the Green Goblin, who's been amassing a massive army underground all along. Not only did he discover that Otto was Spider-Man, he also attacked all the people he cared about. With his beloved Anna Maria's life at stake, Otto admits that Parker was the better Spider-Man and erases his memories, bringing back the original Peter Parker. Now back in the classic red and blue, The Amazing Spider-Man has to save the day.... and also adjust to all the new changes in his life while he was 'away'.

Let's take a look at the end of the Superior Spider-Man series... and the first issue of the return of the Amazing Spider-Man, just in time for the movie!

Superior Spider-Man # 31 opens with Anna Maria being woken up by the Green Goblin, who shows off how he turned New York into his 'Goblin Nation'. Elsewhere, Peter finds out that Carlie was infected by the Goblin Formula, but as Otto managed to cure her. He leaves Sajani to make more while he talks to Carlie alone. Carlie Cooper had already figured out that Otto was in Peter's body and he convinces her that he's back to normal. She explains that was Otto was in control, he covered the city in spider robots to help him fight crime, but the Goblin hacked them to be blind to anything wearing a Goblin mask or logo.

As Spidey swings out throughout the city, he calls Aunt May to make sure that she, and everyone else is alright. Spider-Man arrives at the Empire State University and helps Spider-Man 2099 defeat the last of the Spider-Slayers. Unlike Otto, Pete does recognize Miguel O'Hara and enlists his help. They both arrive at mid-town and help the Avengers take down the Hobgoblin. Captain America appreciates the helps but says he thought Spider-Man quit the Avengers. Spidey considers it nonsense, and goes off with the future Spider-Man. They finally found the place the spider-robots' signal is coming from... Oscorp.

Spidey is confused that Oscorp is now Alchemax, and Spidey 2099 reminds him that it's the evil corporation that runs Nuevo York in his era. Just then another goblin attacks the Spiders. Menace seems sure that Spidey will abandon Spidey 2099 to find the Goblin King, but is surprised when our classic hero sticks around.. and sticks him with the antidote to the Goblin formula. They hear laughter from the other side of a door and check out the room.

They see Normie, looking evil and admiring that the city will be his someday. Liz and Stone are there and Spider-Man tells her not to trust him. Stone activates a jammer that knocks Spider-Man down, and Spidey 2099 socks Stone out. Liz tells them that the building is wired for explosives and that the Goblin is on top of the building. Pete leaves Miguel to watch the others while he goes to save the day.

The Green Goblin arrives and taunts 'Otto' for pretending to be a hero and asks him what he'll have left after he dies trying to save the girl. Spidey says at least he'll have the dignity of never having use a man-purse. With a wisecrack like that, Goblin knows the real Spider-Man is back and flies off, but our hero won't let him get away that easily. Goblin says he would never leave Anna Maria to die, but Spidey points out that she can take care of herself, as she's already using one of the Goblin's blades to cut herself free.

Spidey tries to inject Goblin with the antidote, but the villain slaps his hand away. Spidey yanks off the mask.. and doesn't recognize the guy. Norman Osborn says it IS him, but he had to change his face since he is so well recognized already. He wants to make Alchemax a legacy for his grandson. Spidey asks why he's bombing it, and he says it can't be the only building not attacked by the Goblins, so it will be collateral damage. Spidey points out that without the Goblin mask on, now all the Spider-bots he brought with him are attacking and biting Osborn. Each spider bite is loaded with Goblin cure.

Anna Maria leaps off the building and Spidey manages to catch her in time. He also catches the Goblin who now falls off the glider since he lost his strength. Spidey hands walks back to Liza with 'Mason Banks' on hand, and she 'accidentaly' pressed the spider-jammer again that affects Spider-Man long enough for Norman to get away. Spidey 2099 accuses her, but Spidey knows she's an old friend and didn't mean it... though he will keep an eye on her and her weird kid.

As Norman escapes, he feels his mind clearer than it's been in years. The madness of the Goblin is gone and he can think clearly. He swears to return with a new face and with a new plan, and they'll never see him coming.

Spider-Man makes sure that Anna Maria is alright, and she was very concerned about Peter. Spidey swears Peter is safe and she is so relieved. Spidey sees that she really did love Otto... and feels bad that he had to die for him to come back.

The next story 'Actions have Consequences' deals with the aftermath of the series. Peter hugs his Aunt May  and is glad she's alright. He also apologizes for how he treated her (as Otto he yelled at her after she acted awkward around Anna Maria being a little person) and says he quit working for Spider-Man and will devote himself to Parker Industries. MJ tells him she has to live her own life without him, since she's always being dragged into whatever evil plans the villains have for him. Peter sees Jameson on TV and remembers that Otto was blackmailing him, so he goes to set things right.

Carlie overheard the convo with MJ and shows her the Goblin eyes left behind from when she was a Goblin. She's moving out of town while her body fully recovers. MJ says she wants to live her own life, but Carlie reminds her that even if she's seeing Pete or not, the bad guys will still come after her.

The only problem is, despite everything, the bad guys will still come to you to get to Spidey. Live your live if you want... but please stay the hell away from bridges and other high areas....

Spidey tells Jameson he shouldn't have to take the rap for Goblin hacking the Spider-Slayers and using them against the police. He also tells him he won't blackmail him anymore and wasn't going to follow through on his threat anyway. After he leaves, Jameson reveals he had just resigned as Mayor a half hour ago, so he couldn't stay even if he wanted.

Now that Spidey defeated the Goblin and ended the Goblin Nation storyline... let's continue with The Amazing Spider-Man # 1 and see Pete's first official day back on the job as the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man.

The comic starts with..... one of the stupid retcon things that comics always use.... Remember how that radioactive spider bit Peter and died shortly afterwards.... Well it looks like a split second after it bit Pete, it also crawled on some girl's ankle and bit her too... and then it died. It's like 'I'm radioactive and dying anyway, might as well take as many of these humans with me that I can before I go!'. Douchey spider. But also stupid retcon.

"If I'm gonna die, I'm taking you with me!!!"

Present day and we see some rookie villains, the White Rabbit with a Panda and Hippo themed villain  as they run through the crowds of people. She bumps into a guy carrying a baby and he's about to fall over and land on his baby... but Spider-Man catches him with a web. Rabbit girl is surprised that Spider-Man is still after them, and he webs her up. The Hippo tries to throw a car at Spidey, while the web-slinger tosses wisecracks. The crowd is happy to see Spider-Man back to his jokey self, but are also surprised that he's basically naked, only wearing his mask and webs around his privates.

Four hours before all of this happened, we see Pete holding a press conference explaining that he will stop all connections with Spider-Man and will focus more on running Parker Industries. Aunt May and her husband are proud, and Pete is happy to see Aunt May walking again due to Otto's technology. Elsewhere, Anna Maria arrives at the apartment, looking for Pete and finds an engagement ring that Otto was planning to surprise her with.

Jameson watches TV as he sees headlines of Electro destroying a prison and the Avengers talking down the last of the Goblin followers and Spider-Slayers. Jameson feels bad after watching himself resign from his position as mayor... and decides he can always return to the Daily Bugle and run it again.

At Parker Industries, Sajani is showing Pete all the specs of 'his' latest creations, and he feels completely lost since Otto was the cybernetics genius... not him. He considers accessing Otto's memories... but stops himself not wanting to risk another mind-swap. Sajani shows him all the Spider-Man costumes that were also being made and she says it all has to go. Pete is also surprised that the Living Brain is his robot butler... and that it keeps calling him 'Doctor'. He tells him to stop that until he sees his Doctorate on the wall and realizes he IS a doctor now.

Probably my favorite line/sceme in this issue.

Pete swings through the city, happy to be Spider-Man again... and notices the citizens hate him now. He's sure he can regain their favor after Otto tarnished his image. He then hears an alarm go off, as the White Rabbit leads Hippo, Pandamania and Gypsy Moth on a crime spree. Spider-Man shows off and Gypsy Moth uses her powers to control threads and fabrics to unravel his costume. Spidey manages to sock her out before he could lose his mask.... but now the crowds are taking pics of him and tweeting it.

The Avengers watch this on TV and Spider-Woman tells the Cap that Parker is back to normal cause stuff like this only happens to him. Spidey tries to cover up for the cameras telling them he doesn't need his friends and family to see this, especially the Human Torch. Too late Pete, Johnny is already laughing his ass off. Mary Jane also watches this on her laptop and calls him an idiot.

Really Spidey.... the Marvel Universe is laughing with you.... not at you.... right?

Spidey ties up Pandamania, and with that wraps up this caper. The audience is far from pleased. One lady asks if kids should be watching 'a half-naked man in a mask trying up a woman in a fuzzy animal suit' and another old lady says he's acting as indecent as Miley Cyrus. Spidey wants to leave a 'courtesy of your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man' notes but the people just want him to cover up and leave already.

Spidey returns to the apartment and is surprised to see Anna Maria there... since she has a key. She asks him why he never told her he was Spider-Man. Pete says it could be anybody since the guy on the video still has a mask on. Anna Maria recognizes his body and Peter realizes that as Otto, they've seen each other naked. He finds himself at a loss and Anna Maria asks him again.

Totally busted... though this opens a whole line of questions....

The rest of the issue has smaller stories, the main ones are one about Electro and the Black Cat... it seems Otto experimented on him to mess with his powers... and when he tried to free people from a prison, he accidentaly blew it up and killed everyone inside. This ruins his reputation since people would think he killed everyone ruthlessly due to his super villain stature... and he now wants revenge on Spider-Man.

Geez, even his teeth are electric???? The funny thing is, Spidey faces Electro in 'The Amazing Spider-Man # 2.

 As for Black Cat, she manages to escape during Electro's attack, and reminds the readers about her little run in with the Superior Spider-Man, which if you read the last article basically had Otto just sock her out and arrest her like a bitch since he was completely unaware of the little Catwoman/Batman thing she has going on with Spidey. Now she wants revenge on him as well... but after she plays with his heart a little....

There was also a more cartoonish and cutesy story about Spidey explaining how his web-shooters and powers work. And we also have a short story about Miguel Morales, now trapped in present day, so yeah, pick up his new series. LOL.

My Opinions:

Superior Spider-Man # 31-

Not much to say about this issue except it's good to see Spidey back and clean house. There were a few funny moments, like Pete's family thinking he's a scizo due to the sudden mood swing... and the extra story with Spidey having a talk with Jameson... after he already resigned.... and I love when Miguel grabbed Peter and said 'you left me to fight the Slayers along just so you could change costumes???'

In the end, the Doc's biggest fault was his supreme arrogance in everything he did. He became so obsessed with ending all crime, and making sure that HE took all the credit for it, he almost became Batman. One person he never mistreated was Anna Maria. I guess I kinda see what's going on... he never grew up with Aunt May the way Pete, he's just not as attached to her. She was part of Peter's life not his.... But Anna Maria is someone new he met during his college studies and he loved her so much more because it was someone he on his own and she did not in love with him only because he was Parker or Spider-Man.

This issue was fun, but the real thrills come next issue as Spidey adjusts to his life after Otto tinkered with it.

The Amazing Spider-Man # 1 2014-

It was fun yo see good ol Peter Parker back in the saddle and taking down the bad guys. The White Rabbit and her cheesey goons were perfect for this one. I did like how 'Gypsy Moth wanted to change her name to Skien' and the Rabbit refused because it would ruin the animal theme they want to go for.

Besides everything else that was evident... I want to bring up two major points in this issue. First off we have the case of Anna Maria, in love with Otto... not knowing that he was using the body of Peter Parker and now he's back again.  was discussing this with one of the Bent Wookie guys and we agreed that now the shoe is on the other foot. Back when Superior Spider-Man # 2 came out, it was all about Otto trying to seduce MJ. The fans raged hard due to the fact that had MJ slept with Otto-Pete it would count as a form of rape since she was tricked and only consented into doing so because she thought she was sleeping with Peter Parker... not Dr. Octopus. Soooo now that Anna Maria doesn't know that the man she really loved as Doc Ock and he's gone.... Peter can't touch her because it would also count as a form of rape. What's going to happen? Anna Maria is a great supporting character, it would be a shame to see her go, but how long can Pete keep this up before he has to tell the truth?

The second thing is the kind of stupid 'was always there since day one, but we never knew about it' retcon. This like TMNT New Mutation saying there were always 5 Turtles in the Ooze all along... they just lost one.... or the 80's cartoon saying there was a gecko mutating along with them all along. Or saying that Dick Grayson was hand-picked to be a Talon since he was a kid, and that his grandfather was always one. Now we have this comic saying that on that fateful day, the same radioactive spider that bit Pete also bit someone else before it died. So now we have a mysterious female Spider-Man (not Jessica Drew, I do believe her powers work differently despite being called Spider-Woman). Of course the mystery lies in asking who was this woman he bit, and how will this effect present day? It is intriguing but grrr... I still hate those tacked-on day-one retcons that went and made what you saw before untrue.

Anyways...we'll see what happens. Oh and hey, for more Spider-Fun, here's our review of the Amazing Spider-Man 2. guest starring Fatima, a fellow Yotuber I collabed with before. The movie's been out for a while but I still wanr you it will be long and might compare spoilers.

The Superior Spider-Man # 4

by Mark Rodriguez

There was a time when classic Spidey, you know, Peter Parker went on a 'NOONE ELSE WILL DIE' rampage and tried to make sure noone else would die, even super villains. One of the villains he saved, the psychopath Massacre, has returned in this issue.... but how will the Doc Ock version of Spider-Man deal with him?

'The Agressive Approach ' opens with the Superior Spider-Man watching over the city with the Spider-Bots as his eyes. He thinks to himself that Peter Parker lacked ambition in his life, but the Doc won't commit the same mistake. As well as fighting normal crime, he also continues to capture the rest of Vulture's children henchmen that escaped during the last issue. There's even a scene of a lesser criminal, the White Rabbit, that quickly surrenders because she doesn't want to end up like Boomerang and the Vulture. I'm loving the continuity.

After stopping enough crimes, the Doc decides he has other things to do and has his robots rewire other calls to the authorities. Ghost Pete follows and reminds him that as a superhero he has to keep going and fight all the crime he can.

The Doc visits Aunt May in the hospital, who at this point has finally reached the age where she needs a cane to walk. I swear, for being one of the oldest women in the Marvel Universe, she sure has lasted forever. The Doc asks a doctor for any kind of surgery that can repair her legs, but he says she's too old for that kind of radical surgery. The Doc shrugs it off and thanks him for his 'opinion'.

Back at the mad lab, Octo-Pete spends an all-nighter creating  a special kind of exo-limb that will be grafted to a person's brain and spine, enabling them to walk. He plans to use this on Aunt May, which freaks Pete out, and his bosses also think this is going too far and is much too soon to use on human trials. Doc snaps at them reminding them that he is Dr. Peter Parker. His boss reminds him that he has no such title. The Doc looks into Pete's memories and discovers that he has never earned such a title while he was in college. The Doc is furious at this since he earned his doctorate when he was 16, being and evil genius and all. He storms off determined to rectify this.

Meanwhile, at Ravencroft (Spider-Man's Arkham), Dr. Kafka is walking with a guard as they go see Massacre. The guard asks why she is so worried since Massacre doesn't have any super powers. She is still worried due to his complete disregard for human life. When they open his cell, they find a dead security guard. Massacre was the guard she was walking with all along, and he kills another guard. Kafka tries to reason with him, saying he needs her to leave Ravencroft. Massacre says he doesn't need ALL of her...

Doc Ock re-enrolls into college, which is the same one he went to when he was younger. The girls seem to like him and he flirts back, as Peter reminds him that he's too old for their mothers. Pete is worried since earning a degree will take him away from his duties as Spider-Man and as one of the Avengers. Although... considering he's also with the Future Foundation he should just plain give up living a normal life and be Spider-Man full time...

Watch out ladies.... he's older than he looks and he's into tentacles....

Doc Ock recognizes the teacher as one of his former classmates from back in the day (how is that for weird??). He calls him 'The Schnoz' (I assume whatever nickname Otto had for him back then) which surprises him since he hasn't been called that in years. The teacher is not too happy and tells the Doc that his thesis better impress him. Some girl (she's off panel) says Ock is gonna need to be tutored and gives him her card, but vanishes before he could see who it was. Just then, he gets called in for duty.

At Ravencroft, Spider-Man and Jameson discuss Massacre's escape. Jameson calls him out on having saved Massacre's life and promising he would never escape to kill again. Otto and Pete see that Massacre had taken out one of Kafka's eyes to get past the retinal scanner. Pete wants to regain control of his body and stop Massacre once and for all... but the Dock wants to outright kill him.

Massacre is holding all the people at a small diner hostage. He tells everyone that he wants everyone to toss their mobile devices and money on the floor. He will lock them in the back and escape in their cars, and noone has to die. One of the employees activates the silent alarm. Massacre tells everyone that man broke the rules, and he shoot up everyone. He leaves a lady and her child alive for the time being since he needs them as hostages.

Spider-Man shows up at the lab and tells Jackson (on of the lab partners) that he knows he once gave Facial Recognition Software to The Wraith to help her track down criminals. He now needs that software installed into his Spider-Bots so he can locate Massacre before he kills anyone.

At Times Square, Massacre lets the woman go, but warns her that if she makes a scene, he will kill her and anyone else in the area. She agrees and leaves. Massacre head off wondering where to go now.

Elsewhere, the leftover Vulture kids are worried that they'll be eventually captured by Spider-Man and the cops already know about Vulture's hideout. They panic when they spot one of the Spider-Bots, but suddenly someone stomps on it. The Green Goblin shows up and tells them that he can keep them safe from Spider-Man since he knows all his tricks.

This is an interesting issue, and I have to say again that I'm loving the continuity. It feels like I'm watching a new tv show, each episode following up the next. It was mostly a set up issue, showing some of the aftermath of last issue and foreshadowing an epic battle next issue. I'm enjoying Otto's life as Peter. He sometimes forgets that he's supposed to be Peter and 'breaks character'. We've seen him monologue to himself 'accessing memories' whenever he needs to remember something Parker did before him. Now he's actually saying it out loud making his lab partners think he's nuts.

 The whole scene where he realized that Peter never had a 'Doctor' title and is like 'screw that, I'm going to finish college and earn my doctorate right now!!!' was funny, as is seeing him go to college and recognize a teacher as a former classmate back when he was young. I do find it amusing how both Peter and Otto went to the same college, at different time frames of course... but still.

Massacre is also an interesting character. I never read his past story but the comic does explain that he lost all human empathy after suffering brain damage in the same car bombing that killed his wife. Spider-Man saved his life from a SWAT Team because he didn't want anyone to die, not even a super villain. I do wonder what his deal is. I honestly think he would have let the hostages in the diner live if the employee didn't trigger the silent alarm... just like he let the woman live after she drove him to Times Square. But he also didn't have any problems cutting Kafka's eyes out. He's hard to figure out, and now that he's free, even he doesn't seem to know what he's gonna do.

I really want to see what happens next issue, which I hope to get soon. But I also wonder how the Green Goblin is going to factor in all of this. I can't even begin to wonder what the hell he's been up to lately. All I know is that he was killed by his own Glider waaaaay back then... and then came back to life and was somehow behind the whole Clone Saga mess that never seemed to end. Let's see what happens next.