Hey everyone! How's it going? I'm doing pretty well. I got to go into the grocery store on Monday for the first time in a year and a half. So that was cool. Today I'm here to review a comic book. All weekend and right up until an hour ago when I came in from sitting outside, I was having trouble deciding on a comic to take a look at this week. I scrolled through my blog and I realized that I've never reviewed a Spider-Man comic on this version of the blog before. I've reviewed them on the old blog, but never here. So today we're diving back into my childhood comic book collection and taking a look at Spider-Man #60 by Howard Mackie with art by Tom Lyle from 1995. Let's get into it.
Back in the 90s Marvel Comics was struggling to stay afloat between bankruptcy and the departure of several big name comic book writers and artist who went on to form Image Comics. This was also the era where Deadpool was created, Chris Claremont and Jim Lee revitalized the X-Men for the 90s, Thanos was introduced, and The Infinity Gauntlet was published. On the Spider-Man of things, a storyline known as "The Clone Saga" was published from 1994 until 1996, a story that became infamous due to it's long and often convoluted nature, mixed with the interference behind the scenes.
Spider-Man #60 is the third part in a four part sub-story called "The Trial of Peter Parker" where Kaine, a clone of Peter Parker, kills someone and makes look like that Peter did it, causing Peter to be arrested. In order to clear his name, Peter trades places with another clone of his, Ben Reilly, also known as the Scarlet Spider. This issue is basically Spider-Man trying to get Kaine to go to the courthouse so that Spidey can prove Peter Parker/Ben Reilly's innocence, therefore clearing his name.
I first got this issue sometime in 1995. In fact, I think I was in the hospital with the chicken pox when I got this issue. I remember my mom went down to get a coffee and was going to stop in at the gift shop on the second floor to pick up a comic or a book for me to look at because I was done watching TV for the day and I didn't really have anything to do. She came back with this issue as well as The Adventures of Superman #525. I thought it was cool because I only had one other Spider-Man comic at the time, and mainly knew him from reruns of the 1967 cartoon as well as from the 90s animated series. I think I'd asked my mom to see if they had any Batman comics or Berenstain Bears books, but they didn't and I guess those two comics I mentioned were the only ones my mom felt were suitable for me to read, judging by the covers of course.
This is a fine issue. It's easy enough to follow even if you haven't read the rest of the Clone Saga because it almost has nothing to do with the wider story arc. Or even with the story arc that it's a part of to be honest. We see a little bit of Peter's trial, but really not until Spider-Man shows up with Kaine, and nearly reveals his secret identity to the world. Aside from Mary Jane, nobody else from Spider-Man's usual supporting cast is present. Aunt May died back in Amazing Spider-Man #400 after having been sick for a hundred issues before that. And J Jonah Jameson is nowhere to be found. At least not in this issue. I've read other Spider-Man comics from around this period and he was never written out. Of course it's weird these days because Jameson is now aware of Peter's identity as Spider-Man and is one of his closest allies. Not to mention he and Peter are step cousins since Aunt May married Jameson's dad, Jay Jameson after "Brand New Day". That's a long story that I don't want to get into at this point.
There's a character in this issue that appeared from 1994 until 1997, mostly during this storyline, and then has had only three additional appearances from 2013 to 2014 in Superior Spider-Man #20 and 21 and Marvel Knights: Spider-Man #5. Her name is Stunner and she has a crush on Doctor Octopus. According to the Marvel Wiki her real name is Angelina Brancale, and she was a clerk at a video store who ended up getting another job with a former student of Otto Octavius. Stunner is actually a virtual projection Angelina uses to commit crimes. She goes after Kaine following the death of Doc Ock. For years I had no idea who this woman was, because she appeared in this issue, and then every other Spider-Man comic I read, she didn't show up again. And nobody talks about her when they talk about Spider-Man comics. It wasn't until I looked her up on the Marvel Wiki that I found out who she is and what her backstory is. I just thought it was cool that she was an employee of a video store. It was the 90s afterall.
The artwork is pretty good. I like Tom Lyle's art style as he did alot of the artwork for the first few Tim Drake solo Robin mini-series in the early 90s. I'm not familiar with Howard Mackie's writing though, outside of this issue and Spider-Man #56 (the comic that launched Linkara's career as a comic book reviewer on YouTube). From what I can tell he's mainly written for Marvel, though he did write for DC in the early days of the New 52 on Ravagers and Batman Black and White. Mackie does a good job at making it easy for readers to follow along with what's going on in this issue because it goes a pretty frantic pace and it's easy to miss something.
This feels like a filler issue, but there is a pretty big reveal near the end concerning Kaine's identity, so I guess you could check it out for that. Though it'd probably be easier to get the Clone Saga collected edition volumes rather than just this individual issue at this point. Then again it might be easier to find this issue on it's own in bargain bins, at conventions or at geek sales.
One thing I want to talk about are the ads in this issue. Specifically one for Marvel merchandise at Kmart that features Iron Man and the Fantastic Four (the back page of the ad is shown above). Being that I didn't read Marvel Comics regularly when I was a kid this was my first exposure to the Fantastic Four and to Iron Man though I couldn't tell you who they were at that point being that I hadn't seen them in the Spider-Man comic I had been given a few years earlier. This ad is for the Kmart restaurant where you could get six collectible cups featuring Marvel characters from the Fantastic Four animated series that was coming out at this time.
The second ad I want to talk about here is this one for Spider-Man toys from Mcdonald's. The toys were from Spider-Man: The Animated Series which was airing on Fox Kids at the time this comic was published. I actually had two of the toys shown in this ad. I had the Spider-Man figure and the Venom vehicle. Even though I couldn't eat at the time, my mom still got me a Happy Meal toy when we went to eat at Mcdonald's for a treat so that I wouldn't feel left out given that my brother and sister could eat the food and I couldn't. I was totally fine with this of course because that meant I got a new toy whenever we went to Mcdonald's. Unless the only one available was one we already had. But that didn't happen very much since we didn't go to Mcdonald's THAT much.
Alrighty that is going to be it for me for today. I might do a blog post of some sort tomorrow, depending on what I feel like doing. If not I will definitely be back on Friday for my review of the 2000 Nickelodeon movie, Snow Day. So until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.
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