ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #1
MARVEL COMICS
WRITER: Brian Michael Bendis
ARTIST: Sara Pichelli
COLORS: Justin Ponsor
LETTERS: VC’s Cory Petit
COVER: Kaare Andrews (Variant covers by Sara Pichelli and Justin Ponsor)
32pp, Color, $3.99 U.S.
I don’t read many titles from Marvel Comics, and it has been that way for the past seven years, at least. During the last decade, I’ve occasionally read titles from Marvel’s Ultimate line and, for the most part, enjoyed them. However, I had ignored the “Death of Spider-Man” Ultimate storyline which ran through most of this year. Peter Parker was killed, and Miles Morales, a teenager of African-American and Latino descent, is the new Spider-Man (or Ultimate Spider-Man II).
Ultimate Spider-Man #1 (AKA Ultimate Comics: Spider-Man #1) begins 11 months prior to the main story and is set at an Osborn Industries laboratory on Long Island. Norman Osborn is demanding that his latest hire, Doctor Markus, reverse calculate the specifications of a genetically altered spider. What spider? That would be the spider that bit Peter Parker and gave him his special powers; the spider’s genetic alterations were the result of Osborn Industries.
Eleven months later, Miles Morales and his parents are attending a lottery that will decide which Brooklyn, New York students get to attend the charter school, Brooklyn Visions Academy. Miles’ life, however, is about to take an even bigger turn because young Mr. Morales has a date with a special spider.
A few years ago, I started reading back issues of Static, one of the titles published by the comics publishing wing of Milestone Media, a company dedicated to bringing diversity in terms of race and ethnicity to comic book superheroes. Reading those early issues of Static, I was struck by how much they reminded me of the early issues of The Amazing Spider-Man by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko.
Now, I’m struck by how much this Ultimate Comics: Spider-Man reads like an early issue of Static. Spider-Man writer Brian Michael Bendis has adapted, updated, and reworked the stories of many of the Spider-Man comic book writers that came before him, notably Lee and Ditko. Now, it seems as if he has taken the fresh style and urban tone of Static writers, the late Dwayne McDuffie and Robert L. Washington, III, and fashioned that for Ultimate Comics: Spider-Man. I kid you not; this Spider-Man comic book is an early issue of Static.
I don’t have a problem with that because (1) this is a good opening issue and (2) the story looks, reads, and feels right for a contemporary story of superhero fantasy in which the star is a person of color. This is an auspicious beginning, and I hope Miles Morales welcomes in new readers the way Peter Parker did 50 years ago.
A
Ultimate Comics: Spider-Man #1 includes a backup feature that reprints pages from “A Moment of Silence” and “Heroes,” two of Marvel Comics’ 9/11 publications: Bill Jemas (story), Mark Bagley (pencils), Scott Hanna (inks), Hi-Fi (colors), Sharpefont’s PT (letters); and Joe Quesada and Alex Ross (cover illustration)
Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux
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