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SPIDER-MAN'S TANGLED WEB #5
"Flowers for Rhino Part One: Rhinoplasty"
Recommended (8/10)
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Marvel Comics
Writer: Peter Milligan
Artist: Duncan Fegredo
Colors: Steve Buccellato
Letters: Comicraft
Editor: Axel Alonso
Price: $2.99 US/$4.50 CAN |
Axel Alonso has found the secret to making good books, and it's really not all that hard: Hire the best talent. Peter Milligan rocked my world with Human Target and continues to impress with X-Force, Duncan Fegredo has done everything from Enigma to Clerks to covers for Lucifer, all with skill and style, and putting the two
of them together for a Spider-Man story almost guarantees something good. What
they've delivered here is not quite as edgy as I would have hoped, it's a focus
on Rhino and an aspect of his character that has definitely been touched on
before, but it's certainly good stuff, and as with last issue's excellent
"Severance Package," Spider-Man is really not much a part of the story. Instead,
it's just the story of the Rhino, stuck in an ugly suit and not all that bright
and realizing that being able to crush armored cars isn't all he really wants
out of life.
Right away, Milligan and Fegredo play with
story conventions. When you open with a beautiful girl being held hostage, it's
a safe bet a super-hero is about to happen in and save her, dusting the goons
holding her in the process. This time out, the rescuer is the Rhino, and that
makes for a bit of fun later on when the girl is rescued from her rescuer, and
we see that Rhino has a bit of an inferiority complex, despite all his power.
We're used to seeing Spidey's side of things, and wanting Spidey to win, but in
this case, even though Rhino was really playing the good guy, he winds up being
made fun of and dragged off to jail, where he's made fun of even more. We're
seeing that Rhino is hurt by the teasing, and though his role as a criminal
makes him not entirely sympathetic, it's hard to really fault him for taking out
vengeance on those who torment him.
What really makes the issue work is that
Milligan gets us inside Rhino's head, both through narration and through his
dialogue. He's just smart enough to realize he isn't very smart, and it's
driving him crazy. Seeing him talk to everyone, from people in a bar to the
scientists who grafted his skin on in the first place, and try desperately to
figure out a way out, assuming that there have been changes he's not smart
enough to understand, is an excellent device to make us understand and
sympathize with the character. While it's hard to empathize with being an
enormous, super-strong and super-tough villain, it's easy to get into the head
of someone who is hurting, and wants to make a change in their life. Everybody
has been there.
Fegredo's work is beautiful as always,
particularly his slightly-distorted vision of the Rhino and a fantastic sequence
in the rain when Rhino talks with Stella and we see the human side of the
character very clearly. As with Risso's art last issue, however, Steve
Buccellato's colors are a bit too bright, a bit too garish, and I wish that
Marvel would find a colorist more like Patricia Mulvihill, Carla Feeny or Matt
Hollingsworth who is better with a darker palette.
In addition, while I enjoyed this take on
the Rhino, I have to admit that I've seen him being depressed about being
trapped in his Rhino skin or about being dumb before, in the pages of other
Spider-Man comics. So some of the book read as overly familiar to me, although I
think part of that is that Milligan knows his audience for this book is probably
made up of many fans who haven't read a lot of Spider-Man in the past.
The title should give a hint to all the
science-fiction fans as to what the story is going to be about, referring to the
classic "Flowers for Algernon," which all pays out in the last few pages of the
issue. This issue is mostly set-up, establishing the Rhino's mind for those who
aren't familiar with the character and showing us what the super-villain life is
like from the point-of-view of the villain himself. There's enough here, though,
including the Rhino's developing crush and his desire to be smarter, to make the
issue a good read, and promise a great read in the second part.
Email Randy Lander comments about this review. |
