AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #594 REVIEW

AMAZING SPIDER-MAN # 594

Writer: Mark Waid
Penciler: Barry Kitson and Mike McKone
Inker: Morales and Lanning
Story Title: “24/7 Finale”

Plot

Spider-Man gets over being blind. A marriage proposal. Peter meets his new roommate. All goes back to normal. Spider-Man comes to a conclusion.

The Commentary

All in all I was very satisfied with the conclusion of 24/7. It was a pretty packed three issues and I dug the fact that certain questions I had were answered, others were created and for the first time in my tenure as the reviewer of this title I feel like the series is heading somewhere instead of having random stories between big event pieces.

The resolution of the Vulture fight was satisfying. I like it when writers use Peter’s abilities to their fullest and show off his intellect. I am fairly sure that this trick has been used before but thinking like Daredevil was a clever way to get out of the blindness jam. All of the scenes with the Vulture, new and old, were entertaining actually. The bit with Adrian had a funny little joke at the beginning and was a good call back to that character.

Peter used more of that previously mentioned brain of his by actually trapping the new Vulture, which led to the fight at Yankee Stadium. Part of me liked this a great deal. Instead of waiting for the Vulture to strike again Peter took a proactive approach to getting the villain, which fit into the overall theme of Spider-Man being on duty all day all night and the strategy used in the fight made for an enjoyable finale. On the other hand we went from one issue of people loving Spider-Man to another where by the end everyone hates him again. Now this might seem like classic Spider-Man, and it is, and while it is sort of how things should go it all went by so fast that Peter didn’t get to experience more of the good will. It’s almost like this story should have gone another issue while at the same time it worked out nicely as a three issue arc.

It leaves me a tad conflicted, but in a good way. Like I was satisfied with what I was given while at the same time wanted a bit more.

The scene where Peter meets Michelle was played for laughs but went over well just the same. It’s kind of weird. I’ve seen all of three pages of her and already I like her better than Vin. Odd that.

One aspect of the story that I didn’t care too much for was J. Jonah Senior’s proposal. These people just met. I know that Jonah made a good case, but still. If this was a monthly book it might have gone down a little better but as a pretty much weekly affair it feels rushed. I could be wrong on this and others might feel differently but for my money it seems like they did this just to get the wedding in issue six hundred.

Parting Thoughts

Despite having issues with how fast Jonah and May’s relationship has gone I still liked this issue a great deal. The art was fantastic, the writer was strong and I like how Peter is gearing up for a face off with Norman Osborn. I understand that Norman is the big bad of the Marvel Universe right now and that Dark Reign is the omnipresent story taking up a good number of regular series in addition to a plethora of mini-series but he’s Peter’s villain. Norman is Peter’s arch enemy. He stands above all of the other villains so I like that the Brain Trust is finally setting up a face off between the two.

All of which is a long winded way of saying that I am looking forward to American Son.

4 out of 5 webheads.