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The Spider #4
The Spider, Master of Men! #4: City of Flaming Shadows
The Tarantula diverts the city's power into a tool that slices open banks, looting the city.
Paperback
First published January 1, 1934
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
December 15, 2021
Richard Wentworth is called into action once again when a new villain, the Tarantula, threatens all the money in the banks of New York City by figuring out how to cut out the power to the areas he wants to rob. To complicate things, he has also figured out that Wentworth is the Spider and kidnaps his girlfriend in an attempt to sideline the Spider from interfering with this plans. Naturally, this doesn’t work, so he also tries to frame Wentworth for his crimes.
One of the great weaknesses of this series is that in each novel the police all suspect Wentworth is the Spider, but never manage to prove anything against him. In this volume, one cop also suspects he’s the Tarantula but even though he washes disguise makeup off of Wentworth’s face, he only comes up with another disguise underneath. I felt like I was reading an episode of Scooby Doo when the villain wears two masks.
Yet the novel is still fun. There’s plenty of action in these stories, if not a lot of brains driving the action. That is true not only of Wentworth but the police as well. Still, it’s a lot of fun watching this hero out of the 1930s try to save civilization all by himself.
If you liked this review, you can find more at www.gilbertstack.com/reviews.
One of the great weaknesses of this series is that in each novel the police all suspect Wentworth is the Spider, but never manage to prove anything against him. In this volume, one cop also suspects he’s the Tarantula but even though he washes disguise makeup off of Wentworth’s face, he only comes up with another disguise underneath. I felt like I was reading an episode of Scooby Doo when the villain wears two masks.
Yet the novel is still fun. There’s plenty of action in these stories, if not a lot of brains driving the action. That is true not only of Wentworth but the police as well. Still, it’s a lot of fun watching this hero out of the 1930s try to save civilization all by himself.
If you liked this review, you can find more at www.gilbertstack.com/reviews.
August 17, 2015
Pulp novel featuring the Spider. I love the evocative titles, despite having no bearing on the stories whatsoever.
July 28, 2010
Good pulp action. The best of the pulp heroes. Better than the Shadow or Doc Savage.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews