Miles Morales: Spider-Man #3…… and 4!
Hello True Believers! The new Miles Morales comic is chugging along with a boosted reading base from the new movie! So if you’re here because you saw Into the Spider-Verse, welcome! We’re glad to have you!
Title: Miles Morales: Spider-Man #3
Writer: Saladin Ahmed
Artist: Javier Garrón
Color Artist: David Curiel
Letterer: VC’s Cory Petit
Cover Art: Marco D’Alfonso
Editor: Nick Lowe
Overview:
Miles is teamed up with the Rhino and then Captain America shows up because……. reasons? He says it’s because his congresswoman asked him to but I’m not sure that. I mean, shouldn’t be busy stopping Dr Doom or Loki or doing literally anything else? Anyway, they find the kids in an old SHIELD warehouse meant to contain mutants “if the need were to arise”. They find out this dude named Snatcher is kidnapping the kids (for oddly racist reasons. I like how he tries to justify kidnapping the kids because he’s racist). Cap has such a strong willpower that he’s able to resist the Snatcher’s snatching power which forces Snatcher to focus everything on Cap. This lets Miles Deus Ex Machina him….. er……… I mean “venom blast him” and it ends with Cap going off to Romania and Spider-Man praising Rhino for acting like a good guy.
Highlights:
This issue was very cheesy and campy and it was amazing. This cheesy style of comics are very gouda in my opinion and I personally don’t think they can get much cheddar (ok, I’ll stop with the cheese puns before I turn into a real munster).
Anyway, I thought the issue was great and while Cap had no real reason to be there, I thought that made it even better in a weird sort of way. He just randomly showed up because his congresswoman (who definitely isn’t supposed to be Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez *cough cough*) asked him to. And then he just leaves. To go to Romania. Perfect.
Here’s Cap’s congresswoman. A young female minority congressperson with three names from New York. Yep, totally not AOC.
Not to mention when Miles has to help Cap with his smartphone. A smartphone that Iron Man conveniently downloaded an app onto that can identify the chemical makeup of any liquid. Wow.
This is perfect
What was lacking:
I still stand by my opinion that this storyline should not have been three issues. It really should’ve been one but I could’ve seen the case to make it two at the most. While I really enjoyed this issue and found it to be the best of the three by far, the story was not worth $12.
Final Grade: A
The story was funny and corny enough to be enjoyable but not obnoxious. Do you disagree with me? Let me know in the comments what your grade would be!
Title: Miles Morales: Spider-Man #4
Writer: Saladin Ahmed
Artist: Javier Garrón
Color Artist: David Curiel
Letterer: VC’s Cory Petit
Cover Art: Marco D’Alfonso
Editor: Nick Lowe
Published: March 20, 2019
Overview:
Miles skips school with his friends to go to a Biggie museum but his vice principal is trying to prove that Miles is skipping school. The train they’re on derails and then the Frost Pharaoh attacks the museum. Miles saves the day and gets back to school but his crush Barbara pretty much knows that he’s Spider-Man. Also Miles finally gets to kiss her after trying three times this issue.
Highlights:
Frost Pharaoh. He seems cool. I hope Nick Spencer will do something with him at some point and I’m sure Mark Alford will like him.
Alright! Another great bad villain! He was taken out with two punches. What a guy.
I also liked the school secretary who, while the Vice Principal was yelling about how much of a trouble student Miles is, kept talking about how sweet Miles is and how nice he was to help her out one day. That was pretty sweet and kind of reminded me out Aunt May.
This is my favorite panel in this issue. Such a sweet lady!
What was lacking:
There wasn’t a whole lot here. It just felt like filler. Looking back at it what did it set up? What did it contribute to further stories? Nothing and then not much. Next issue they’re advertising Tombstone but why wasn’t that this issue? The writing wasn’t bad, and it was a fun read, but I’m just not sure it was needed.
Final Grade: B-
The story is fine and was enjoyable, but it didn’t feel like a whole lot was there. What do y’all think? Let me know in the comments!
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I am one of those that’s here because of Spider-Verse but I’m up to date on all the previous iterations of the Miles Spider-Man comics. Have to be honest, I’m finding it really hard to get a handle on this version of Miles Morales; he just doesn’t do much for me, which is a huge shame because I loved the ITSV version and the PS4 version of the character. In ITSV, he was a defined and, more importantly, vastly different character to Peter. Thus far in the comics he just comes off as “Peter Lite”.
I’m not sure what it was about the movie version, and it may be simply that he had a defined arc that is hard to replicate in long form comics, but to paraphrase Jeff – there was a spark in him that made me root for him and made him stand out even among the fantastic portrayals of Peter, Gwen and Noir.
Hopefully Ahmed can turn it around and find Miles’s voice, but so far the Rhino arc and the Ferris Bueller’s Day Off story just haven’t hit it for me just yet.
Ersatz AOC, eye-roll.
I feel like they could have just saved some time by shouting, “Snatcher, no snatching!” three times.
As far as the Frost Pharaoh goes, anyone who says, “So proclaims ..(insert stupid name)!” is A-OK in my book!