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AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #34
"Meltdown"
Highly Recommended (9/10)
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Marvel Comics
Writer: J. Michael Straczynski
Pencils: John Romita Jr.
Inks: Scott Hanna
Colors: Dan Kemp & Avalon
Letters: Comicraft
Editor: Axel Alonso
Price: $2.25 US/$3.50 CAN |
It's a good time to be a Spider-Man fan. If you want to see the story from the very beginning with a modern twist, you've got Ultimate Spider-Man. If you want stories that are mostly self-contained with a focus on human emotion, you've got Peter Parker: Spider-Man. And if you want an epic super-hero tale that gets better every issue, you've got Amazing Spider-Man. Straczynski shows the skill that made his Babylon 5 such a hit, as he balances
terrific action with an ongoing internal monologue from Spider-Man that
encompasses hope, anger, melancholy and a sense of responsibility. He's joined
on artwork by John Romita Jr. doing the best art he's done in many years. The
result? A Spider-Man story that will go down in my personal book of favorites
alongside the work of Stan Lee and Roger Stern.
Straczynski made a lot of fans (including
this reviewer) nervous when he announced his plans for Ezekiel, and some
revelations about Spidey's true origins. However, he has used these revelations
as the basis for a terrific villain and an interesting ally with an arc of his
own, all the while leaving open the possibility that any changes to the origin
were simply in Ezekiel's mind, with similarities to his story purely
coincidental. The relationship between Ezekiel and Spider-Man has been a fun one
to follow, with each man having something to teach the other one, and despite
the short time we've had with Ezekiel, his actions this issue really had an
effect on me, as if he was a long-standing supporting cast member.
This issue is also the continuation of the
Spider-Man/Morlun bout, and since the creative team took all of last issue to
establish just how powerful and deadly Morlun is, they've got more space to work
this issue while taking our acceptance of that fact for granted. Instead of
focusing purely on how unbeatable Morlun is, they settle in on Peter's reaction
to that. His rage at seeing innocents threatened is keeping in character with
the Stern-era Spider-Man who beat a herald of Galactus through the power of
righteous indignation, and seeing Peter make a call to his loved ones in case
things didn't pan out was a sobering moment. All of this desperation and brutal
punishment of course led up to a terrific moment of confrontation, and while
anyone charting Ezekiel's story could have seen his decision coming a mile away,
it was still presented well.
More importantly, at least for me, is that
Straczynski lays the groundwork this issue for a way to beat Morlun without
undercutting all of the work he's done building up the villain. All too often,
an all-powerful villain is defeated in a way that makes the hero seem stupid for
not seeing it earlier, but Peter seems to be going to extremes to defeat Morlun,
and he's earned his chance through a heroic sacrifice, which helps make that
sacrifice seem like a story point instead of a cheap attempt to make the villain
seem more powerful.
When presented with writing this strong,
Romita Jr. and Hanna rise to the occasion with fantastic artwork. Their
depiction of a beaten and torn Spider-Man is very powerful, and reinforces the
notion of what he's been going through. He's got various bruises, scrapes and
cuts, and in most of the panels where we see him, he's shaking from the sheer
effort of staying up. And the collateral damage of the battle, whether it's
police lines in the distance or shattered cars, buildings and signposts, is
pretty impressive as well.
Email Randy Lander comments about this review. |
