Spider-Men

You may recall that a while back I expressed my displeasure that this storyline was even happening. Since then, sales on the “Ultimate” titles have sunk even lower and there are rumblings of an “Avengers vs. Ultimates” event happening next year that will formally see the dissolution of this particular universe. If that event does happen, it’ll be because “Spider-Men” helped pave the way for it. All said, there’s no reason why this story can’t be entertaining in and of itself particularly with Bendis writing it and Sarah Pichelli providing the art. The good news is that this a fun story that’s more fluff than anything else.

Things start off fairly innocuously as Peter Parker is swinging through New York City, monologuing it up, stopping some car thieves, and getting harassed by the police as thanks. Then he notices a flash of light coming from an abandoned building and goes to check it out, only to find that it’s the latest hideout for one of his oldest foes: Mysterio! Ol’ fishbowl-head tries to knock out the wall-crawler and only winds up shoving him into this weird lightshow he has running in the center of the hideout. He doesn’t realize it at first, but Peter has been knocked from his universe into the Ultimate Universe. While he gets a feeling that something is very wrong here after he’s told that his costume is in very poor taste, it isn’t until he comes face-to-face with Miles Morales that he realizes how different things really are.

More than anything, this collection shows that Bendis knows how to write Spider-Man, in any universe, better than any other superhero he has written. That opening monologue I mentioned as Peter swings about the city — it’s beautiful in the way it tells you everything you need to know about his mindset and station in life. Even though we’ve seen this kind of scene where he effortlessly stops some random thugs while spouting off quips, it feels fresh here and makes you wish that he’d do this more often (outside of crossovers and his “Avengers” titles).

Of course, Bendis’ great strength has always been his dialogue and that remains true here. Miles acts appropriately starstruck in the face of meeting “a” Peter Parker and it’s fun to see him trade quips with the older hero as he tries to measure up. There are also some great exchanges between Peter and the inhabitants of the Ultimate Universe as he tries to puzzle out what’s going on here, and when he meets that universe’s versions of Aunt May and Gwen Stacy. Though Bendis really wants us to think that’s a really big deal, it doesn’t really have the emotion you’d expect. I suppose it’s nice that May and Gwen find out that there’s a version of Peter out there who didn’t die young, but it’s not clear what we’re meant to take away from their big meeting.

That’s really the problem with this story as it’s full of nice moments, sharp dialogue, slick action and not much more. The fights with Mysterio are formulaic in the extreme and Bendis doesn’t really find any new wrinkles in the “hero finds himself in alternate universe with alternate versions of everyone he knows” trope. For a story that represents the perpetration of something Marvel (or rather Joe Quesada, I believe) said they’d never do, there’s surprisingly little consequence to it all. Yes, there’s that bit at the end but it’s more eye-rolling in the way it makes you go, “BUT OF COURSE!” in its obviousness. This is a fun Spider-Man story that doesn’t require any knowledge of the Ultimate Universe in order to enjoy, but that’s it.

Pichelli’s art is very solid and she continues to be a great fit for Bendis’ style. She can do characters who emote quite well and gives us lots of characters with distinct facial expressions to sell each scene. Action is no problem either, though there are a few parts here and there with panel-to-panel continuity hiccups, though that could be down to the writer as it is to her. It’s also worth noting that letterer Cory Petit does something neat that I didn’t pick up on until my second time reading this. It’s nothing much, but seeing the lettering change between universes was a nice touch.

Even though this is a story about two universes I never wanted to see cross over crossing over, it was still a decent read. There is the fact that with the imprint’s ongoing commercial decline such a thing was likely inevitable, but I guess this counts toward seeing it out with some kind of dignity? (You know, before sales on “The Ultimates” and “Ultimate X-Men” dip below 20K.) So if this is the beginning of the end, it could’ve gone down a lot worse. At the very least, it shows us that Peter Parker and Miles Morales can work well together and having them in the same universe won’t be such a bad thing after all. When it comes to that.