Amazing Spider-Man: Family Business
This title, the second in Marvel’s new line of original graphic novels, has a low bar to clear in terms of quality after Warren Ellis and Mike McKone whiffed it in “Avengers: Endless Wartime.” So it’s nice to report that writers Mark Waid and James Robinson have given us an enjoyable, self-contained Spider-story that distinguishes itself in ways other than being about Peter Parker at a time when “Superior Spider-Man” is winding down. The problem is that part of its appeal to me, specifically, is in the way the story and the way it’s presented come off as a throwback to something Marvel and DC used to do a lot more regularly a decade or so back. Then you’ve got the price of the whole endeavor coupled with the shocking revelations that go nowhere and I find myself wondering if this would really appeal to anyone without my sense of nostalgia.
The story starts out innocuously enough with the Kingpin recruiting C-list telepath Mentallo from an asylum and Peter Parker trying to pay his electric bill before his power gets cut off at midnight. After the infamous Parker Luck kicks in and he suits up as Spider-Man to foil the antics of some laundry detergent thieves, the hard luck hero finds himself back at his power-less apartment. This is just in time for a group of professional mercenaries to burst through the wall and attempt to kidnap Peter, who uses his skills to fall right onto the car of the woman who’s coming to save him. Why is this stranger out to save our protagonist? Because she claims to be Teresa Parker — Peter’s long-lost sister and a secret agent just like their parents.
It’s Teresa’s involvement that leads the story into ground you don’t often see trod by Spider-Man, who rarely leaves the confines of New York. Instead, we get a globetrotting adventure more in line with the kind that James Bond and Jason Bourne have experienced. As the wall-crawler is the main character here, the tone is much different. You get more jokes, with the miss-to-laugh ratio being about 50%, and a lot more action as Spidey throws down with the supervillain Cyclone in a Monaco casino and a giant WWII-era mecha outside of Cairo. I wouldn’t say that the execution is strong enough to make me want to see a new “Spider-Man” comic dedicated to Peter’s global adventures, but its uniqueness in relation to the source material and its inspirations is at least refreshing here.
As for the main thrust of the story, the idea that Peter has a long-lost sister is one that only the most impressionable and least cynical of readers would be able to take seriously. Fortunately, Waid and Robinson seem to realize this and have the character being as skeptical as his average reader would be about such a connection. After being introduced to Teresa, Peter’s first thought is a collection of names of shape-shifters and illusionists who would be able to pull off such a ruse. Yet it’s easy to go along with this setup as the character simply sees the situation as protecting a stranger who is in as much trouble as he is. Even if Peter turns out to be one step ahead of the villain’s plans when the big reveal is made, it still doesn’t change the fact that this whole business with Teresa plays out pretty much as you’d expect right down to the double-twist epilogue that leaves the door open for the story to be followed up on at a later date.
So it’s certainly not a game-changing “Spider-Man” event, but it’s still quite readable regardless. There’s even that throwback appeal I mentioned earlier even though I’m not sure how applicable it’ll be to anyone beyond myself. You see, Marvel and DC used to publish lots of one-shot prestige format books, usually 48 to 64 pages in length, where you’d get to enjoy a self-contained story featuring a specific character or team without having to worry too much about how it fit into continuity. Alan Moore and Brian Bolland’s “The Killing Joke” was published in this format, and you had artists like Kent Williams and Bill Sienkiewicz giving us takes on Wolverine that you’d never see in his monthly title.
My point is that “Family Business” really captures the feel of one of these stories. It has a unique hook, does something that can’t be done with the character in current continuity, and an art style that sets it apart from the monthly series. Marvel could’ve published this story in the 90’s and it wouldn’t have seemed out of place with other stories in the prestige format. Helping matters in that regard is Waid and Robinson’s style which hasn’t changed a whole lot from their heyday… Feel free to take that last bit as a compliment to or criticism of the writers as you will. Still, the format and execution of the story wound up indirectly appealing to my sense of nostalgia and I appreciated that.
However, those stories usually cost around $5 to $7 back in the day and this one will set you back $25 if you get it at cover price. That’s enough to put a damper on my nostalgia as well as the title’s modest charms. One expects much more than these things, especially when you consider the volume’s relatively modest page count, at this particular price point. I didn’t bring up price as an issue with “Endless Wartime” because I thought that title wasn’t worth anyone’s time even before price factored into my evaluation. Here, it’s a much bigger issue particularly when you can go out and buy something like Dan Slott’s “Spider-Man: Big Time — Ultimate Collection” volumes and get a collection of stories that feature a well-done traditional interpretation of the character at a much more appealing price-per-page ratio.
This volume does have some pretty impressive art from Gabriele Dell’Otto and Werther Dell’Edera to make it stand out. Where the former provides the pencils, the latter puts his distinctive painted style on top of them to create some very distinctive work that really sets it apart from what we’ve seen in the character’s monthly series over the past few years. Even if has a more realistic and grounded look to it, the art still feels quite vital with the characters looking like they were drawn by a real artist instead of being traced without thought from photo-reference. Corners are cut in some of the smaller scenes — there’s probably a good drinking game to be had in taking a shot every time you come across a character that Dell’Otto painted without “eyes.” Yet in the half-page and the full-page shots in particular, there are some truly stunning scenes where this team really shows you what they’re capable of and left me impressed with their work.
Even though they have their merits, the writing and art aren’t consistently excellent enough to overcome the cover price on this original graphic novel. Now convention season is coming up (for me at least) with Wondercon only a week away. If you’re lucky enough, you may be able to find a vendor selling this for 40% or maybe even 50% off of its cover price. At that level, I’d say it’d be more worth your time depending on how much you love the character or the creators involved here. As for me, I don’t really regret buying this but I’m still waiting to be able to enjoy one of these new original graphic novels from Marvel without reservation. Next up is Mike Carey and Salvador Larroca’s “X-Men: No More Humans,” and we’ll see how that goes in May.