Amazing Spider-Man #2 Review: A Surprising Character From Spider-Man’s Past Returns

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The following contains spoilers for Amazing Spider-Man #2, on sale now from Marvel Comics.

I have a feature called I’ve Been Here Before, which is about what I call “nepotistic continuity,” which refers to the way that comic book writers sometimes evoke their past work in their later work. It’s not an insult, it’s just interesting. In the first issue of this new run, Joe Kelly made reference to his acclaimed work with the Rhino in his first time working on Amazing Spider-Man as a member of the “Brain Trust” (a group of writers who would rotate story arcs until finally Marvel decided to just make one of the members of the group, Dan Slott, the sole writer on the series after about 100 issues of sharing the book together), and now, we see Joe Kelly returning to his work on Spider-Man/Dedpool for a major character in the series.

Amazing Spider-Man #2 is from writer Joe Kelly, artist Pepe Larraz, colorists Marte Gracia, and letterer Joe Caramagna, and picks up from where last issue left off, with Spider-Man investigating the Rhino’s apartment after the villain went on a mad rampage in New York City, and then had a heart attack. A mysterious villain was talking to the Hobgoblin, and apparently the Rhino was given SOME sort of drug, which causes him to go on the rampage (and give him the heart attack, which was intended to kill him, but Spider-Man saved him with some super-strength CPR). Spider-Man was doused with the drug himself at the end of the issue, and sees all of his supervillains attacking him at once.

What is the major problem for Spider-Man in this issue?

Pepe Larraz and Marte Gracia are an excellent team, and this is especially true when they’re doing action sequences, and so Joe Kelly smartly comes up with a plotline that causes Spider-Man to hallucinate throughout the issue, which allows Larraz and Gracia to do these AMAZING action sequences as Spider-Man is attacked by villains through his hallucinations.

Who is the character that returns from Spider-Man/Deadpool?

We soon learn that the villain behind the gas is Itsy-Bitsy, a character who was a combination of Spider-Man and Deadpool in Joe Kelly’s Spider-Man/Deadpool series (to mark how Kelly is one of the most famous Deadpool writers ever, and so following his Amazing Spider-Man stint, he launched a Spider-Man/Deadpool series with his old Deadpool collaborator, Ed McGuinness). Itsty-Bitsy was trying to become a hero, but a hero who killed, and that was not what Spider-Man and Deadpool were about at the time (Deadpool had promised Spider-Man that he would stop killing). Itsy-Bitsy began killing in Spider-Man and Deadpool’s name, which obviously freaked Spider-Man out. He did everything he could to stop her, including trying to kill her himself (which was, yes, kind of ironic). Ultimately, he couldn’t, but Deadpool DID. However, after she was seemingly killed, we saw that she survived as a small spider version of herself, and obviously, over time, she has grown back to normal size.

At the end of the issue, she is trying to kill Rhino, but, well, I assume we’ll see Spider-Man trying to deal with that next issue (while also, you know, dealing with all of the hallucinations).

Source: Marvel

“}]] In a CBR review of Amazing Spider-Man #2, see how a surprising character from Spider-Man’s past has returned in this new run  Read More