Spider-Man: Miles Morales vol. 3
If there’s one character that Bendis has been most closely associated with during his time at Marvel, it’s been the “Ultimate” incarnation of “Spider-Man.” He wrote every issue of the continuity-free modern update of Peter Parker’s adventures from the start, showed us the character’s death (and eventual resurrection), and gave us a new one in Miles Morales. Bendis has also written every issue of Miles’ solo adventures and the character is likely to remain a fixture in the Marvel Universe after the writer has departed it. Which, in this day and age, is no small achievement.
Yet, if there’s been one weakness to Bendis’ handling of Miles it’s that he’s shown a willingness to have the character’s life defined by his predecessor. Whether that means pitting him against a new version of Venom, doing the “Spider-Man No More” bit at one point, or that time he met up with a resurrected Peter Parker and got the character’s blessing to continue doing what he was doing. While his adventures have been a lot of fun to read, we’ve yet to get a truly defining story about Miles’ adventures as Spider-Man. It’s not in this volume either, even though Bendis delivers some of his best character drama in recent memory. In addition to some new developments for Miles that I can’t give him the benefit of the doubt on.
Things start off on the right foot with a single-issue story that starts with Miles commiserating with his dad over the wrap-up of the crossover with “Spider-Gwen.” There’s some fun father/son bonding over hamburgers to be had before things take a turn for the serious as the two of them head home. Turns out that Miles’ mom and Jefferson’s wife Rio has not only found her son’s web fluid formula, but also her husband’s ultra-high-tech S.H.I.E.L.D.-issue phone and she wants answers from the both of them about these things. Miles and Jefferson both come clean about their secrets and Rio takes it about as well as can be expected.
It’s a thorny patch of drama that could’ve easily veered into shrill histrionics. Bendis manages to keep things on track by having Rio respond calmly and logically to the situation. You know, like an adult. This is both refreshing to see and intensely painful to read as she listens to her husband and son’s well-intentioned rationalizing of why they lied to her. It’s great, genuine drama and only held back by a continuity issue where you realize that the conversation scenes in “Spider-Man/Spider-Gwen” happened after this issue and Szymon Kudranski’s too-dark and too-stiff art. The stiffness is less of an issue than the darkness, but this is definitely not one of the artist’s better efforts.
Fortunately things immediately take a turn for the better, art-wise, with the next arc which features Oscar Bazaluda, formerly of the most recent “Uncanny X-Men” series. Not only does colorist Justin Ponsor give the artist’s work a much brighter look, but Bazaluda’s great with facial expressions and body language. His work fits in well with the series and is a main reason the next few issues are generally pretty fun.
I hesitate to use the word “arc” to describe these issues as there’s not really a single story holding it all together. It’s mainly driven by two key plot threads: Miles dealing with the fallout from revealing his identity to his mom, and the Black Cat and Hammerhead getting up to no good again. While the criminal shenanigans of the latter two aren’t all that interesting by themselves, but they do set up some interesting conflicts as Hammerhead sends Bombshell to the hospital after she interrupts one of his jobs and a very angry Miles goes on to confront him. Miles’ anger issues are a new development for these issues. Earlier, he beats up an entire bar after a purse snatcher he was chasing runs inside. Though I can understand the desire to give him a trait that can both help and hurt his actions as a superhero, the fact that this is an all-new development for him after years of super-heroing does make them more of a contrivance than an actual character development.
There’s better stuff in these issues in seeing Miles, and even Jefferson, work things out with Rio. For Miles, that means talking to her about his career and letting her take care of him when Hammerhead hands him his ass. Rio’s reaction to these things is gratifyingly realistic, particularly when she hauls Miles off to the hospital where she works for treatment. Regardless of how things have gone between them in the past, he’s her son and she’s going to make sure he’s okay above all else. We also get some quality conversation between Rio and Jefferson as they try to hash out their issues and find that it’s going to take some time before things are good between them again.
The most striking bit of conversation in these issues comes from Ganke. He takes the time to rise up above his usual geeky comic relief sidekick schtick to talk to his best friend about his decision to become Spider-Man. As Miles angsts about what’s been happening to him, Ganke makes the very relevant point that he’s essentially being a really good cover band of the main act that is Peter Parker as Spider-Man. Miles has shown that he can do what’s expected of him as “Spider-Man,” but what if there’s more for him than that?
I won’t lie, I read this section and thought, “Bendis finally gets it!” Miles is a great character and has had plenty of adventures going down the same path that his predecessor is still treading to this day. So what can he do to make himself better than that? What kind of adventures should he go on to truly set himself apart?
If the final two issues are any indication, Bendis still hasn’t figured that out yet. I’ll admit that having Miles use his abilities to find his way to Tokyo for some much-needed time off is at least a nice nod in that direction. So is having him infiltrate the Japanese underworld in a swanky tux James Bond-style courtesy of a mystery benefactor. Then it’s revealed that the person running the underground fight club for the rich is none other than Tomoe. She’s the Inhuman who can control technology that Bendis created for his second arc of “Invincible Iron Man” where the title character faced off against her… with Spider-Man at his side.
As fun as it is to see Miles strike out on his own and mug his was into and out of danger, this two-parter doesn’t really showcase a new way forward for the character. It’s basically Bendis playing off of his own plot threads to set up Miles with a nice easy win. These issues do have some nice art from Nico Leon, who shows that his quality work on the “Civil War II” tie-in issues of this title was no fluke.
Here’s the point where I’d say that I still have hope that Bendis will find that new direction for Miles that sets him apart from Peter Parker. Except that I don’t. With the writer’s new exclusive deal with DC, it looks like the next volume of “Spider-Man: Miles Morales” will be his last. For the record, the next volume will feature Miles going up against an all-new Sinister Six. It’s another “Spider-Man” trope, but from what I’ve heard so far it looks like the Six in question will be specific to Miles’ time as the character. Vol. 3 also ends with another character stating that Miles is the future of international espionage, which is different enough to work. This is in spite of the fact that the character stating it has me going, “Wait? This guy?”
As much as Bendis has defined Miles over the years, maybe it’s for the best that he’s letting go of the character now. It’s great to see that he’s recognized Miles’ biggest flaw, but the evidence so far suggests that he’s not sure of the right way to fix it. I’m sure there are plenty of writers at Marvel who would love to write the character’s solo adventures and probably have some great ideas about how to really make him stand out. That they’re going to get the chance now is something to look forward to.