Amazing Spider-Man #601 – Review

By Mark Waid (writer), Mario Alberti (pencils, inks), Andres Mossa (colors)

The Story: It’s the morning after M.J.’s return and Aunt May’s wedding bash, as Peter wakes up from a hangover with the woman he least expected to be having breakfast with. As per Peter’s usual straight-edge ethical self, he has a mini-meltdown over his illicit behavior and his upcoming date with M.J. The problem is he can’t remember where and when he is supposed to meet her. But in the course of saving lives and busting crimes, he remembers, only to hit another unforeseen obstacle.

What’s Good: I guess whenever the Spider-Man editors need a soap-opera, personal Spidey story they have Mark Waid’s number on speed dial. He’s the go-to-guy for good reason as he basically seems to deliver whenever he has to tell a story free of major villains and adventurous plots.

In this issue, Waid must present M.J.’s reappearance in a way that doesn’t set off any Brand New Day haters or come-off as too ridiculous. As many readers already know, in the controversial Brand New Day arc, Peter traded away his relationship with M.J. for Aunt May to survive a fatal gun-shot wound. He also regained his secret identity which he willfully compromised during Civil War. So, in this issue we have both of these dynamics return and finally enter into post BND and for the most part, both elements are handled skillfully and satisfactorily. Waid takes a low-key approach to M.J.’s return and for the most part, like Harry’s return, the explanation is sufficiently adequate for readers to forget the garbage in the past and just tune into the current story.

Waid always takes a pragmatic approach to Spidey that I enjoy. For example, when Joe Public is hating on him, it is always for a good reason like webbing keeping crooks encased while cops have to wait around for the webbing to dissolve or store owners suffering property damage from a skirmish. These details keep the story interesting and relatable. Also, perhaps besides Joe Kelly, Waid is the funniest writer in the Spidey Brain Trust.

Mario Alberti is on art in this issue and he does a solid job. The fire scene he depicted was particularly memorable, while some of his character work, especially the flashbacks, were much more forgettable.  Over all, I like his work here a ton. His take on NYC is quirky and the decisions he made on how to present certain dialogue scenes with novel perspectives made them very interesting.

What’s Not So Good: If you were expecting fireworks between Pete and M.J. or any real fall-out from Doc Oct’s return last issue, you’ll be let down here. Also, we only get a tiny clue about the return of a major villain, yet it wasn’t enough to even really spark any interest.

The whole reason why Pete and M.J. didn’t meet was also a little sloppy. How could it be that on one hand M.J. waited all night for Peter to talk to her, but when she realizes she missed the date she doesn’t even care but instead watches TV? Wouldn’t she at least call him? Additionally, her monologue was some of the worst I’ve read in a long, long time. Why would she refer to herself in the third person as “Aunt Anna’s favorite niece” to herself upon waking up? Was she channeling the Thing?

Conclusion: It’s amazing that since the horrid Character Assassination arc a few months ago, ASM has been pretty much on top of my pull list. There is a ton to enjoy in this issue and in this series as a whole lately. It is indeed a big investment, as to stay on board you need to buy three issues a month, but as long as Marvel keeps up this quality, it is money well spent.

Grade: B

-Rob G.

Weekly Comic Book Review

After months of battle with domain companies, we finally got back WeeklyComicBookReview.com.  To our old readers, I hope you find us again.  To our new ones, thank you for all the support and following us from our WordPress to this.  Props to our silent benefactor for buying back our domain for us from some evil and extorting douchebag.

Things are brewin’ here at WCBR.  Expect more consistent reviews on some of the industry’s hottest and awesomely obscure titles, get ready for our feature articles, and be on the look out for our forum. If you have any thoughts and criticism, don’t hesitate to contact us.  In the meantime, keep checking back and follow us on our Twitter and our MySpace.

R.I.P. Jason Montes

A prayer for our friend…

Give all of us gathered here the strength to remember that life is so very fragile.
We are all vulnerable.
And we will all in some point in our lives, fall.
We will all fall.
We must carry this in our hearts– that what we have is special–
that it can be taken from us, and when it is taken from us, we will be tested.
We will be tested to our very souls.
We will now all be tested.
It is these times, it is this pain– that allows us to look inside ourselves.

10 Questions: Ron Garney

By J. Montes

Ron Garney gained much notoriety in the 1990s with his run on Captain America with Mark Waid. His energetic style coupled with Waid’s action-packed scripts not only boost the sales of a sinking title, but re-energized Captain America as one of Marvel’s flagship characters. From there, Garney drifted to other titles like The Incredible Hulk, Green Arrow, and JLA before landing on Amazing Spider-Man with J. Michael Straczynski.

The work Garney did on Amazing Spider-Man is nothing short of controversial and engaging. In it, Peter Parker reveals his identity to the world (and grapples with the ramifications), uses his new “Spider-Armor” designed by Tony Stark, witnesses the shooting of his Aunt May, and nearly kills The Kingpin. Sadly, most of these events would be rendered null by “Brand New Day”, but they still stand on their own merits and arguably push Spider-Man down the darkest path of his career.

Following his run on ASM, Garney did a short stint on Wolverine with Jason Aaron and is now working on Skaar: Son of Hulk with Greg Pak. His work here is a huge departure from what fans may be used to – not only because of the lack of an inker on his work, but also because of the involved fantasy setting.

Your run with Mark Waid is regarded as one of the best runs on Captain America. Do you have an itch to go back and work on that character?

Not really an itch. At the time I was doing it back in the 1990s the title had gone on such a rollercoaster ride [Editor’s Note: Captain America was taken away from Waid and Garney so that it could be rebooted as a “Heroes Reborn” title by Rob Liefeld] that I thought I’d never want to again. But after I got to draw him again in my Amazing Spider-Man run, I remembered how much fun it was. I think that’s what made it so enjoyable, just being able to draw the character without the political hoopla surrounding a suddenly “hot title”. So yeah, I’d like to draw him again at some point if the story is right.

Your art has evolved throughout the years, but I’ve always felt your work’s most constant, and greatest strength is the energy you put into your characters. You have a great sense when it comes to portraying dynamic, hard-hitting action. Was this skill something you always had or something you really had to work hard at?

Thanks!  I don’t know if I have a method for doing it that’s conscious on my part, but it’s a process of feeling it, I suppose; getting the eye to move through the story at an exciting pace that makes sense. Visually, I go back over the pages and reread and draw them until I think they flow right. And (with) the figures I try to put them in their ultimate positions for action – meaning following through to the end of their form – the extensions of the legs or arms. The figure work is a large part of it.

A lot of artists use photo reference and models for their work these days. What method do you use? If you’re using photo referencing, let me tell you: it’s pretty hard to tell with your artwork.

Not generally, no. I will if I have to draw a place like Kansas City in the 1920s, for example. I’ll want the authenticity, but I don’t generally reference figure work unless I’m having real trouble with it. I might look at myself in a mirror once in a while with a light bulb to cast shadows or what have you, but it’s rare. To me, the work itself can lose a bit of the charm and personality when photo referencing too much in certain places. There’s a lot of guys who do it brilliantly and it seemed since the advent of Alex Ross’ popularity that it became the craze. Whenever I’d spoken with Alex I’ve told him I blame him for it. *laughs* It seems like it became a big competition as to who could photo ref the best. That’s the way I view it, I suppose. I’m not saying it’s wrong, just not right for me. But I suppose it was an inevitable backlash to the manga craze in the 1990s.

Back to your work evolving, you’ve recently started having your work digitally inked. Why did you decide to forgo using inkers on your work? I’ll argue that some artists like Leinil Yu can pull it off, but if you look at his stuff on Secret Invasion, it looks (in my opinion) more crisp with an inker.

Well, sometimes just because it’s ‘crisp’ doesn’t mean it’s anything more than to the one who likes it that way. I know people who really like the less ‘crisp’ look and people who like it rougher as well. As far as the pencils, I wouldn’t even say they’re “digitally inked”. On Wolverine I wanted to try it and I loved the results – how the pencils looked colored – and that was the bottom line for me.  I love Leinil’s work uninked, and I love it inked. There’s something really cool to me about the rawness of the pencils and in my case it works if I have the time and not so much if I’ve been rushed, but it’s the same thing in my inked work. It takes time and a meticulousness for it to work really well. Yes, the inked pages are a beautiful art form but, I think uninked, it’s a cool approach to experiment with. Without exploration there’s no growth – regardless of whether every single page or cover gets pulled off or not.

Fair enough. Is this new “penciled only” style something you’ll be using more in the future or something temporary?

We’ll see. It depends on the project, but yeah I’ll use it again and again. But I’ll do the ink approach too, so you can wipe the sweat off your brow Jason! *laughs*

I see how it is! But in all seriousness, I do prefer your inked stuff. But after hearing your reasoning it makes more sense to me now and I can respect your decision to try something new. I honestly thought Marvel was just trying to save money or cut corners. Moving on, Skaar is much different from the work you’ve done in the past. How much of a challenge is it for you to do a fantasy setting?

It’s fun! I wouldn’t say it’s more of a challenge – just getting into a different mindset. I like looking at old Roger Dean Yessong covers and things for inspiration. Before comics, I intended to be a fantasy illustrator. I had tons of oil paintings in that vein. Unfortunately, they were all stolen from my apartment years ago and I never went back to it. But, if you go to my Myspace page you can see some of my fantasy sketches there.

Well, it all makes sense now. Your creatures and dragons from Skaar are fantastic. I’ve never seen this side from you before. Where do you draw your inspiration for these creatures?

I just drew them. I went through quite a process of redrawing till I got them to where I liked. Obviously, the scales were the toughest thing about it – they’re very challenging to draw – more so than I thought they’d be, but also very gratifying and pleasing when you get them right. There’s something cool about the shape of the heads and such. There was a page I drew where I sort of let my Maurice Sendak come through. It’s a splash page of three dragons blasting fire down at Skaar and I couldn’t get Where the Wild Things Are – my favorite childrens book – out of my head, and I think it came through on the page.

Your Amazing Spider-Man run was fantastic. How was it working with Joe Straczynski?

I enjoyed the scripts.

How do you feel about the direction Marvel Editorial decided to take with “One More Day”? It was almost like they rendered a lot of your work and JMS’ story null.

Well, I’m sure that Joe (Quesada) did what he thought was best for the character at the time. Did he pull it off? That’s up to the readers to decide for themselves. But as much as I understand that point of view a lot of fans have – it’s comics and history in comics can be rewritten infinitely. Each history is viable depending on who’s writing it. Yeah, I like the work that we had done, but in my mind it happened – it’s just that a character changed history. I think I read somewhere there’s a theory that Mephisto was actually the metaphor for Joe Quesada, himself, and I burst out laughing at that.

You’ve done many iconic Marvel characters – Captain America, Spider-Man, Wolverine, Hulk. Who would you like to tackle next if given the opportunity?

I’d like to a more lengthy run on Wolverine at some point, and I’d like to do Thor or the Fantastic Four.  There’s plenty.

JMS and Garney reunited on Thor would be glorious! Thanks, Ron!

Thanks Jay!

RECOMMENDED READING:

Captain America: Operation Rebirth
Wolverine: Get Mystique
Spider-Man: Back in Black
Civil War: Amazing Spider-Man
Skaar: Son of Hulk