It's these quiet, self-contained stories that really represent the best that this series and these creators have to offer. Bendis takes a look at the super-hero genre and things that readers and writers have taken for granted in the storytelling for decades. His observations have been molded into a thoroughly entertaining story, and Bagley makes it all come to life with a nice balance between grounded, everyday visuals and the more dynamic and exciting ones we expect from our super-hero comics.
Peter Parker thinks all he has to look forward to today is a typical roster of high-school classes and a bagged lunch, but a news report alerts him to something that would of interest to Spider-Man. A powerful metahuman crook wearing a rhino suit is running amok in Manhattan. Peter rushes off to help... at least, he tries to do so, but something keeps getting in the way: life.
The design for the "Ultimate" version of the Rhino is quite striking. It emphasizes his nature as an engine of destruction and makes him seem thoroughly inhuman and dangerous. I think the most important element Bagley contributes to this issue, though, is how he makes Peter's school seem like it goes on forever. He shows us that just making his way out of the school's halls is a major undertaking by subtly elongating those hallways in the backgrounds.
I think what surprised me most about this issue is that Bendis doesn't play the premise up for laughs. A super-hero being unable to reach an emergency due to a number of ill-timed encounters in his civilian identity certainly sounds like humorous notion, and sure, there are a couple of laughs to be had here. But Bendis achieves a nice balance. When Peter runs into a distraught friend, it's easy to understand why he stops, but we can also imagine his frustration. He's well aware that the two situations requiring his attention are about as far apart in urgency as possible, but that doesn't dismiss the friend's obvious pain.
Bendis is well known for taking a down-to-earth approach to super-hero storytelling, and this is yet another example. Fortunately, Bendis isn't the only writer in the industry who recognizes how injecting mundane, everyday elements in a super-hero's life can breathe new life into the genre. Kurt Busiek developed a strong reputation for it starting in the mid 90s, but these days, it's Bendis who's really setting the bar.
