Adam Graham's Blog: Christians and Superheroes - Posts Tagged "spider-woman"

Essential Spider-Woman, Vol. 1 by Marv Wolfman

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This book collects 31 comic books related to the first Spider-Woman Jessica Drew from the late 1970s including her debut in Marvel Spotlight #32, and her crossover in Marvel Two in One #29-33 and the first twenty-five issues of her own magazine.

There's a lot to like about the character and the magazine. She's a woman who has reached adulthood without a past. When she first appears, she's an assassin for HYDRA sent to kill Nick Fury but she realizes she's been brainwashed and turns against evil Hydra only to be recaptured and attack the Thing and then help him in the five part Arch from Marvel Two in One. Then in her own magazines, she fights all kinds of evils.

There's a lot to like about this Spider-woman. The first 19 issues of her magazine are pencilled by the great Carmine Infantino, best known for his work on the Flash. Superhero comics are notorious to shoving women into the most bizarre costumes and poses but Spider-woman may be the best designed superheroine with a costume that's classy, well-designed, and functional.

The character also has a mix of courage and curiosity, but also a great deal of naivete which makes for an interesting character. Plus she has a serious problem that gives people (other women in particular) a serious dislike for her which makes finding a job problematic.

The big downside of the book is that they really don't seem to know what they want her to be. The original slant would have indicated a lot of SHIELD like Spy capers and indeed one issue in her series did have her help her boyfriend Jerry stop a terrorist attack. But mostly she faded into horror comic-like stuff. There was nothing magical about her powers though perhaps they thought the color scheme would indicate horror, but whatever the case in her first 19 issues she had two encounters with Werewolf by Night, several with the Brothers Grimm, Morgana LeFaye among others. These were mostly D-list Marvel characters. Nothing incredibly stupid happened in these stories, the book just seemed to drift.

The only truly dumb thing was her relationship with Jerry which began instantaneously for no reason and ended because she kept saving Jerry. Thankfully by the 1970s, Marvel was no longer making us suffer through break ups that lasted a year, but the entire thing was pointless.

Spider-woman went through three writers after Archie Goodwin wrote the origin story, Marv Wolfman wrote the story arch from Marvel Two in One and then the first eight issues of the comic, Mark Grunewald took over for issues 9-20 and 21-25 by Mark Fleischer.

Issue 20 brought the inevitable meeting between Spider-man and Spider-woman which was a fun little jaunt that included her thinking Spider-man had ripped off her identity. It was nice to see Spider-man guest star in a book without being a jerk. Fleischer took the book in a new direction for the last five issues establishing Spider-girl as a bounty hunting crimefighter. I have mixed feelings on her falling in loved with the Gamesman, the first big time crook she snags, but I was satisfied with the conclusion.

Overall, this is an okay book. I give it 3 stars but I consider it to be towards the higher end of that rating. There's not a whole lot bad about the book, but there's nothing amazing, spectacular, or sensational about it either. It's solidly written in most parts with a few above average stories thrown in.



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Spider-Women by Robbie Thompson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Spider-women is a crossover between Spider-woman, Silk, and Spider-Gwen. It begins with Jessica Drew (aka Spider-woman) travelling with Cindy Moon (Silk) to Spider-Gwen's Earth 65 for brunch when there's a monster attack which serves as a distraction for stealing Gwen's Inter dimensional travel watch, thus stranding Cindy and Jessica on Earth 65, this particularly hard on Jessica as it puts her a universe away from her baby.

What follows is a story filled with action, evil other dimensional dopplegangers, not so evil dimensional dopplegangers, powers lost, and all sorts of amazing revelations. Mostly though, it's a marketing attempt to get readers of one Spider book interested in all the other ones.

Overall, it's fun. The book showcases each character's strengths. The book collects two issues of each character's book and also Spider-women Alpha and Omega as the beginning and end of the series. There are one or two weaker issues. The first Spider-Gwen issue was the one that stands out to me. It's not a classic, but it's for what it is.



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