Comic Book Review: Amazing Spider-Man #607

…………..Huh? What? Oh, this is a comic. My bad I got a little distracted.

This title has really been on a roll these past few months. And the last issue that re-introduced Black Cat to Amazing Spider-Man post-OMD was a fun issue. Joe Kelly is showed a great handle on the character and her relationship with Spider-Man. I fully expect Kelly to deliver another great issue with Amazing Spider-Man #607. Let’s hit the review.

Creative Team
Writer: Joe Kelly
Artist: Mike McKone and Adriana Melo
Inkers: Mike McKone, Andy Lanning, Justice, Smith, and Benes
Colorists: Chris Chuckry and Jeromy Cox

Story Rating: 8 Night Girls out of 10
Art Rating: 7 Night Girls out of 10
Overall Rating: 7.5 Night Girls out of 10

Synopsis: The issue starts with Spider-Man and Black Cat costumes on the floor. We then see Peter and Felicia in bed together after having sex (Is it me or has Peter gotten more tail these past dozen issues than he has gotten in the past 40+ years of publication). Peter looks at Felicia thinking how they do not talk, not even about their relationship. As he is about to say something Felicia says they can play “grown-ups” tomorrow which Peter is fine with.

Peter wakes up the next morning with Felicia already gone. Peter starts to put on his Spider-Man costume only for a married couple to come into the room for their honeymoon. We see that the room is actually a hotel room Peter and Felicia did not pay for.

Spider-Man tells the guy to make sure room service cleans the sheets before putting his new wife on the bed (had to make that joke didn’t he) and makes a not-so-graceful exit.

Peter makes it back to his apartment to clean up, and luckily for Peter Michele is not there.

Peter then heads out to The DB as Spider-Man to confront Dexter Bennett about the dead body he found in his home last night. When Spider-Man shows him the pictures of the dead man Dexter is in shock as the dead person was one of his former business partners.

Bennett explains to Spider-Man that back when he was younger him and the guy in the picture, named Mayer, built half of the buildings in the 80s until they had a falling out.

Spider-Man believes him and as he is about to leave he notices the front cover of The DB with a picture of Spider-Man and Black Cat’s kiss from last night (seen at the end of last week’s issue of ASM). Bennett tells him that it is all over the internet.

Spider-Man heads to one of Mayer’s warehouses to see what Diablo wanted with him. As he is scoping out the area he accidentally squashes some rat poop with his fist and knows that this can only mean that Black Cat is around.

Black Cat then reveals herself and Spider-Man questions her about the book she stole from Bennett’s place. Black Cat changes the subject by getting on top of him and giving him a kiss. As they are making out her phone rings.

In the warehouse we see Diablo going through another robbery. Spider-Man comes in through the window and slams Diablo to the ground. Black Cat follows him and they start double-teaming Diablo.

Diablo pulls out one of his capsules and recipes some equation that makes the ground beneath Spider-Man and Black Cat turn into cement. Black Cat is able to avoid being stuck but Spider-Man isn’t so lucky.

Diablo then throws another capsule that makes the pipes behind Spider-Man and Black Cat fall. They are able to dodge all the pipes and Spider-Man frees himself from the cement. While this is going on Black Cat is flirting with Spider-Man and he asks her if she has some form of Tourette’s (Now Spider-Man is the one telling the other one to be quiet, nice role reversal.)

Diablo throws yet another capsule at Spider-Man and Black Cat which covers the two of them in gold. Diablo starts ranting about his plans. As he rambles on Black Cat uses her “Hilarity Ensues” powers to make one of Diablo’s capsules fall out of his belt which melts the gold.

Spider-Man throws a bunch of web balls at Diablo and then checks on an unconscious Black Cat, giving her CPR. She wakes up telling him that is the first time someone slipped her tongue during CPR. Diablo uses this time to make his escape.

The next day Spider-Man and Black Cat meet on the roof of The DB. Spider-Man says this whole thing was about 20,000 tons of steel that Mayer bought in a back-door deal. He continues to say that it is not just regular steel but Diablo steel so somewhere in New York City a building is about to collapse.

Black Cat tells him to trust her as she is going to put the final pieces of the mystery together herself. Spider-Man asks her if she kept the light off and did not look at his face like she promised. She says yes. Spider-Man then says he does trust her and Black Cat takes off to solve the rest of the case alone.

An hour later, Black Cat gives Spider-Man an address and he goes there to see half the building evacuated. He uses his webbing to keep the building from collapsing and give the firefighters and cops time to get everyone out of the building.

Down below, Mayor Jameson is taking credit for everything saying that as he promised he is keeping the people of the city safe. He is hit in the back of the head by one of Spider-Man’s impact webs. Spider-Man tells the mayor he is welcome.

As the building is cleared Spider-Man asks Black Cat how she found the building. She tells Spider-Man that all the businesses in the building had huge insurance policies that covered them in case of natural disasters that totaled $9 billion. She continues to say that is where Diablo comes in as he knew the steel would only last 20 years and the reason for Diablo doing this is classified.

They both then talk about their relationship and agree to take it one night at a time. They then do a similar kiss, similar to the famous one from the Spider-Man movie.

We then see Diablo in his hideout listening to the news of what happened earlier. He throws his helmet at the TV in frustration. Kraven’s daughter, Anna Kravinov, walks in and tells Diablo that her mother wants to talk to him. End of issue.

Commentary
The Good: Amazing Spider-Man #607 was another fun issue. Joe Kelly is great at writing some excellent comedy and when it comes to Spider-Man that is something all writers should have. Kelly juggles the action and comedy of this series in such a great manner that he is showing himself as one of the top, if not the top, writer from the Spider-Man Brain Trust.

While the villain Kelly used in this two-part story, Diablo, was very lame the relationship and dialogue between Peter and Felicia was what made this short arc entertaining. Over the past few years the dialogue between the two became very tame because of Peter’s marriage to MJ and knowing nothing would happen between the two. But now that Peter is single that spark between the two is back. The dialogue feels fresh and does not feel wrong or forced because of the marriage being in the way.

One of the things I have always liked about the relationship is that Black Cat represents the temptation Peter has for not only keeping his Spider-Man identity but permanently adopting it. It is sort of the opposite relationship Peter has with MJ, Gwen, and most other women in his life as he feels Spider-Man gets in the way of those relationships. But with Felicia, Peter is able to let go and be both without having to always feel like one life is holding back the other.

This is something Kelly was able to effectively show as Peter did let himself go with Felicia and accepted the unpredictability of their relationship instead of running away from it. The inner monologue Peter kept having throughout the issue nicely showed this.

Throughout the entire inner monologue, we saw Spider-Man conflicted with how he feels having Black Cat around and if it is right to be in another relationship with her. But, in the end, he accepted that he needs to let it go and just go with the flow and not let his head get in the way of the relationship like it did in the past.

Also, it is good to see that Kelly and the rest of the Spider-Man writers are treating Peter as an adult and not just the same loser living with his Aunt in his childhood bedroom by showing/implying him getting himself some with the ladies. It is time to get out of that little bubble and see Peter as a guy in his mid-twenties and even though he won’t get some all the time it isn’t hard to believe hasn’t had sex yet. And with the relationship he has had with Black Cat, it is only right to think he and Felicia have done it before with each other.

The highlight of this issue and this arc is Black Cat. She has been absolutely fantastic in this story. Kelly writes an excellent Black Cat by not just giving us a slutty version of the character but a strong and confident female character. Though she is shown constantly flirting in this issue Kelly does show that the previous development of the character with her becoming a detective has not been forgotten as she solves the mystery behind what Diablo and Mayer were planning to do.

Also, I love how she is the one character that can keep up with Spider-Man’s banter and even annoy him with her constant flirting. It was funny how Spider-Man even asks her if she suffers from some form of Tourette’s. And also I especially love the use of Black Cat’s “Hilarity Ensues” powers and how we see that she does have some control over them.

In the end, I look forward to seeing where the Spider-Man Brain Trust takes this relationship. There are a lot of possibilities with the return of these two being back together that could affect Peter’s personal and Spider-Man life for the worse, well better for us as readers.

Also while I do not like Diablo I am enjoying how the writers are slowly building up the whole Gauntlet and Spider-Hunt storylines. After some big stories in “American Son” and ASM #600, it is nice to see that Marvel isn’t just rushing to the next big storyline and allowing it to grow organically, like “America Son.”

Even though this slow-burn approach to building the next big story can be annoying there isn’t much of a wait time till we get to at least the Gauntlet storyline as it begins next month. This is the beauty of the thrice-weekly schedule Amazing Spider-Man as we aren’t stuck waiting a year like we have to in almost all of today’s comics.

Mike McKone’s artwork was again very well done in this issue. He did a nice job conveying the action and comedy that Kelly filled this issue with. The only thing that kept his artwork a bit from being as good as the last issue is that he had a handful of inkers working on this issue. While it did not show much in his artwork there were some slight inconsistencies in the artwork especially with having Spider-Man’s costume darker than Black Cat’s black leather costume. Still, McKone’s art was very good and had a lot of energy.

The Bad: After the ending of the last issue, I am disappointed that we didn’t get an appearance of MJ in this issue. It would have been good to see what MJ thought after seeing Peter kissing Felicia on the big screen in NYC. It makes the ending from the last issue feel a little less relevant as we did not get any sort of resolution to MJ’s reaction to seeing the kiss.

Also, Diablo was a lame villain that was very much needed for this story. Diablo’s involvement in this short story arc could have been filled by any D-list villain and it would have changed much. The whole Diablo plotline felt like more of a distraction from getting some great dialogue between Peter and Felicia as well as not seeing MJ’s reaction to the kiss.

Adriana Melo for the last few pages of this issue was very inconsistent and rushed. The artwork did not fit in with McKone’s artwork and was distracting with how bad it was in certain panels.

Overall: Amazing Spider-Man #607 was another entertaining issue. Joe Kelly is a perfect fit for Amazing Spider-Man as he does a great job writing Peter and his supporting cast. If you haven’t tried these past few issues of Amazing Spider-Man I highly recommend getting these issues in trade format, starting with “American Son,” as this series has really been on a roll the past few months.

Kevin