The Amazing Spider-Man (2015) #1.6 Review: The Bogenrieder Perspective

“Let it end, Peter.”

Hello, Darkness, my old friend…..

Amazing Spider-Man (2015) #1.6

“Amazing Grace, Pt. 6: Lead Me Home”

Writer: Jose Molina

Artist: Simone Bianchi and Andrea Broccardo

Inks: Simone Bianchi and Andrea Broccardo

Colors: David Curiel and Matt Yackey

Editors: Nick Lowe and Devin Lewis

Plot:

So as Spidey and Santerians fight Julio and his monsters (Oh look, another team up! I thought we were supposed to escape the crossovers with this arc!) they realize that hell is empty. Tony Stark (AUGH!) is monitoring the portal and Peter tells the Santerians to stop using their powers, and the portal reopens again, with Uncle Ben reappearing. (Ben, you’re not supposed to be here until Dead No More! Get back in the portal!) The Santerians snap Julio’s neck (Nah, should’ve just tossed him off the nearest bridge! Those have a 100% success rate, doncha know?) and Spidey goes Captain Picard on them, telling them off for their moral ambiguity. He then puts on his coat and his Fred Jones cosplay to talk to God and forgive him for letting Uncle Ben. (I swear, I can hear Slott yelling down the hall, “Hey, Jose! Better hold off on that epilogue! We have Dead No More coming up!”)

Thoughts:

If I wasn’t reviewing this title, I’d have dropped it.

The same problems persist throughout the entire series as though the editorial department were high on something and just shoved it into the printing press.

Whatever they were on while making this? I want some, because it sounds amazing.

Mark and I have continually sounded like broken records going backwards throughout our entire process of reviewing Amazing Grace. And while it’s been surprisingly easy to plow through the reviews saying the exact same thing, it gets monotonous to have to point out the exact same flaws that keep cropping up during my reviews.

We’ll talk about the leading contender for biggest screw-up first, and then head over to what I thought of the story’s resolution.

I present to you, the crappiest artwork you have ever seen!

Wait, that’s not it. There we go!

Ugh, just… look at that. Euugh. The main problem is that it feels so static, and there’s not really any movement that can be seen. Sure, the actions have been completed, but there’s no flowing action that makes the characters move around. I feel like it was too slow for my tastes, and even motions as simple as walking drags in this issue. It might be better than the last five issues, but this art is so poorly made that I wanted to stab it like Tom Riddle’s diary.

Alright, now that I’ve ripped into my specialty, time to talk about the resolution.

I honestly feel like there was no point to this series. Granted, that was apparent from the start, but after seeing this resolution to the story, I honestly felt like I wasted about twenty-four dollars to tell you people that this was a POS.

Because this story accomplished absolutely nothing.

See, in previous Spider-Man stories, Peter has always had some sort of religious belief. It doesn’t define his character, nor does he thump the Bible like a fanatical zealot. At the very minimum, he has been raised with a smidge of theist background. But for no reason and with no explanation, Peter has lost this religious piece of the pie for the sake of retconning in that he became an atheist because science and that whatever holy figure he prayed to killed his uncle. Because, at its core, the story of Amazing Spider-Man’s point issues is a religious one, of a man who has lost his religious faith regaining it. However, not only is this message kind of shoved into the background and not really explored upon in the main narrative, people familiar with Spider-Man, like you and me already know Peter’s religious background.

So, for all intents and purposes, this story has no purpose other than to piss people like you and me off. It is made to push aside the audiences of old, and make us go away to make room for the “new audience” that Marvel claims exists, but events like Civil War II and Death of X have proven that Marvel has gone on with alienating its new audience as well. Marvel has shot itself in the foot so many times that the foot doesn’t even exist at this point, and now they’re just shooting bullets into the ground.

Good riddance, Amazing Grace. Eugh.

Final Grade: F+

Series Grade: F-