Ben Reilly: The Scarlet Spider #21 Review

Ben Reilly: The Scarlet Spider #21

Writer: Peter David

Artist: Will Sliney

Color Artist: Rachelle Rosenberg

Letterer: VC’s Joe Caramagna

Cover Artists: Khary Randolph & Emilio Lopez

Assistant Editors: Lauren Amaro

Editor: Devin Lewis

Executive Editor: Nick Lowe

Editor in Chief: C. B. Cebulski

Chief Creative Officer: Joe Quesada

President: Dan Buckley

Executive Producer: Alan Fine

The Story: Ben and Sauron duke it out at the naval base, all while Ben tries to keep Sanders safe, or else Abigail dies. Meanwhile, Kaine manages to separate the boy from the Mindless One just before a mysterious woman named Nakano shows up, spears and kills the creature, and leaves with the body. Kaine senses something is up and decides to tail her. Back at the naval base, Sauron mortally wounds Sanders; taking a cue from “Jaws” Ben tosses an oxygen tank into Sauron’s fire-breathing mouth, causing a massive explosion. Ben and Sanders escape the blast, and it turns out Sauron makes it out alive, albeit in his human form. Dying, Sanders tells Ben that he was a spy and that his boss from the Diogenes Initiative can provide a cure for Abigail. Turns out that Kaine seemingly tracks Nakano to the same exact address… Bum bum bum!!!

The Good: Man, just when I thought things couldn’t get any wilder than a pterodactyl man randomly showing up, things get even crazier! I’m pretty curious as to what the Diogenes Initiative is exactly (it’s been slowly built up over the course of the book’s short history) and it looks like we’re all gonna find out soon enough. Peter David killed it this issue, and so did Sliney; no punches pulled here!

The Bad: While Ben still has those flowery sleeves on the cover, I’ll admit, Randolph can draw the hell out of a pterodactyl man. So it sort of balances itself out. My only other minor complaint would be that the Mindless One subplot didn’t go exactly the way I was hoping it would, but hey, it’s only a minor issue. I guess I was just hoping they’d get to further explore the dynamic of a powerful gollum in the hands of an inexperienced youth, who just wanted them to be superheroes, with Kaine painfully caught in the middle. Oh well. Looks like getting more info on the Diogenes Initiative will be the trade off, here.

I’m giving this issue a 9/10 oxygen tanks!