Amazing Spider-Man: Worldwide vol. 9
Man, what a run! After starting as part of the “Brand New Day” writers team in 2008, Dan Slott took over writing “Amazing Spider-Man” solo in 2010 and kept writing it until late last year. That’s an impressive, almost unimaginable, run by modern superhero comic standards and what makes it even more remarkable is that the writer never lost his momentum. He kept finding new challenges for the character to face and *ahem* and spun many memorable events in the process. (One of which provided the name and premise for a really good movie you should go see while it’s still in theaters.) I only came in towards the back half of his run, when things got “Superior,” but even with its occasional miss Slott’s run has been one of the most consistently enjoyable things to come out of Marvel in recent years. Which is why it shouldn’t surprise anyone that the writer sticks the landing in his final volume.
It certainly helps that the buildup to it has been handled so well. After Norman Osborn escaped back in vol. 6, he’s been trying to find a way to become powerful again. Not just to regain his old powers as the Green Goblin, but anything else that will give him an edge against his most hated foe: Spider-Man. In the previous volume he found exactly what he needed. That would be the Carnage symbiote which, when paired with Osborn, gives rise to the Red Goblin which adorns this volume’s cover.
Now that he’s back in the game, the villain has two objectives. The first is taking Spider-Man out of commission. That’s something he gets a big leg up on after kidnapping one of the hero’s allies who makes a really big blunder when making a big defiant speech to Osborne at the end of the first issue. It leads to the Red Goblin being able to target everyone important in Spider-Man’s life. Good thing that Peter has got plenty of super-powered friends to help cover all the bases there. Will it be enough when he’s facing a combination of two of his most powerful foes with all of their strengths and none of their weaknesses?
That’s the thrust of this final arc as it follows the conventional storyline of having the hero’s archnemesis come back to face him bigger and badder than before. Combining Osborn and Carnage is certainly something that hasn’t been done before, the catch being is that it’s done in service of a plot that follows convention pretty well. If you think you know how this story is going to play out from my description of it then I’m here to say that your assumption is probably right.
However, Slott’s time on “Amazing Spider-Man” hasn’t distinguished itself for its unconventional plotting. It’s because of the clever details and character work that he invests into the stories that make them memorable. Like Osborn’s interrogation which opens the first issue and how the hostage’s identity is kept secret until the very and, and how the hostage’s slip up hinges on a key part of Spider-Man’s history that the villain was party to. Or when Osborn shows Peter what he’s really up against in the second issue. Then there are the A-list villains who show up in the climactic issue in ways that are expected and not. Best of all, though, is when Spider-Man is at the Goblin’s mercy and pulls out a smart bit of lateral thinking to turn the tide.
That last bit is the kind of cleverness, the “How’s he going to get out of it THIS time?” that I live to see in superhero comics. The ending of this storyline may never have been in doubt, but Slott invests so much character in everything which proceeds it that you can’t help but be swept along with its momentum. There are so many characters each with their parts to play, lots of dangling plot threads to be wrapped up in a bow, and some real emotional catharsis to be had with this storyline. It has a lot to offer and stands as a very satisfying wrap-up to Slott’s run.
Oh, and it’s got plenty of fantastic art to show off as well. Stuart Immonen illustrates the majority of the storyline as well as the Spider-Man/Goblin showdown in the climactic issue. It’s all up to his usual standards, which is to say that it’s fantastic with lots of energy and effortless style on display. Joining in for the climactic issue are Giuseppe Camuncoli and Humberto Ramos, who have each illustrated a good chunk of Slott’s run. They turn in some stellar work as well with Ramos serving up some vivid supervillain-on-villain action and Camuncoli mixing in some satisfyingly tense human drama amidst the action. Nick Bradshaw is here as well and, while his presence was likely a last-minute addition, we don’t see enough of his interior work at Marvel these days as we should so it was still great to see him here.
Marcos Martin handles the final few pages of the climactic issue and he navigates the tricky transition from tragedy to better days as well as you’d expect someone of his talent can. He also handles the final issue which hardly features Spider-Man at all. Which is appropriate since it’s a story about the good Spider-Man does. It’s told with a focus on one Kenneth Kincaid who’s working late one night until he gets a call from a hospital saying that someone close to him only has a few hours to live.
What happens next to Kenneth would normally only take up the first couple of pages in a random “Spider-Man” comic. What follows is really special as we get to see what happens to him after that encounter and the life he was able to have thanks to it. The meaning of all this is spelled out for the reader in an (admittedly really nice) two-page splash towards the end of the issue, but Slott and Martin deserve a lot of credit for just showing it in the preceding pages. It all conveys a surprising amount of emotion, more than I’d normally expect from your average superhero comic these days. All of the familiar “Spider-Man” conventions are here in some form as well, but the way they’re moved around and pushed aside to tell this story is what makes it special.
“Amazing Spider-Man: Worldwide’s” opening story may have been pretty conventional yet it still delivers a satisfying wrap-up to Slott’s run. Then he caps it off with an epilogue issue that hits you right in the feels — in a good way, I swear. I’ll admit that after all this time reading the writer’s run now would seem like a good jumping-off point for the character. Except that the incoming team is Nick Spencer with Ryan Ottley, and Ramos back again, and I’d like to see what that team has to offer. Same goes with Slott’s work on “Iron Man” and “Fantastic Four,” because after all these years on “Amazing” he’s shown me that he’s someone whose superhero work I should keep following to wherever it leads.