Free Comic Book Day 2020: Spider-Man #1

“*sigh* Why do I even bother? Whatever, let’s do this.”

It’s free! Free! But wait, there’s more! I get to tell you what I think of it! And that’s also free!

Free Comic Book Day 2020: Spider-Man #1

“Spider-Man and Black Cat in: Moonlighting”

Writer: Jed McKay

Artist: Patrick Gleason

Colorist: David Curiel

“Venom” (I dunno, there’s no name for the story, that’s just what’s on the last page)

Writer: Donny Cates

Pencils: Ryan Stegman

Inker: JP Mayer

Colorist: Frank Martin

Story:

For the sake of brevity, I’ll keep this part very, very short, since there’s not a whole lot of substance that’s meant to be something like a trailer. (Such as the 2018 issue that serves as a prologue of sorts to the Spencer ASM run or the 2019 issue being an opening bookend for Absolute Carnage.)

Spying on Vulture making a sale of Skrull Fear Gas grenades from Secret Invasion, Peter and Felicia bust in and cause the grenades to go off in Vulture’s face. The two then get sushi and banter while Vulture hallucinates Spiders and cats that eat birds.

Meanwhile, Eddie gets chewed out by the Avengers for dipping into the Elder God pool, and as he’s heading home, he gets accosted by Virus. And though he manages to chase Virus off, Virus leaves a calling card in the form of a crudely painted Pumpkin Bomb.

Thoughts:

Free Comic Book Day issues, more often than not, as I mentioned earlier, either trailers for new or ongoing books, or a showcase for new creative teams. And I think this specific issue is a bit of both, specifically because one is a one-off by existing creators, and the other is meant to be act one of a story where act 2 is already in motion.

To begin, I’ll start by schmoozing and praising the art teams here to high heaven and back. It’s great to see Patrick Gleason drawing Spider-Man again, especially with how he renders Peter and Felicia, masks on and off. His action scene (i.e. half the story) flows wonderfully and allows for strong choreography with the colorist, David Curiel. The pages are both busy, yet crisp and clean, easy to follow and energetic. The same applies for Ryan Stegman, albeit with a much more geometric style that’s rougher but still crisp thanks to J.P. Mayer’s ink work. (A fact that has been brought up on multiple occasions that Stegman’s art is a lot choppier with his own inks.) Additionally, Frank Martin’s colors brings a dreary atmosphere down on lineart that’s already shadowy, but provides enough light in the fight scenes from multiple sources to make everything (Particularly Virus’ green war paint) stand out in the busier panels, in all their excruciating detail.

That said, the substance is a bit light when it comes to to writing, sometimes for better, sometimes for worse. The Black Cat story I’m willing to accept it with, mainly because it’s meant to catch up on Black Cat and be a fun little Peter/Felicia story rather than something. I think the strongest element is the dynamic between Peter and Felicia, which is consistent in-between the fight scenes and the slow ones on the rooftop during Sushi Time. It’s Jed McKay flexing and proving once again after the Black Cat Annual that he can still write the two in a platonic friendship. (One that has been sorely lacking since the OMD/BND era began.)

Unfortunately, I can’t say the same for the Venom bit.

Aside from having some rough pacing in between the end of Venom Island and here, (I don’t know why Venom didn’t tell the Avengers about the more intimate bits of Absolute Carnage, especially considering how dangerous Knull is long-term) this serves as a very rough transition into Batm–Venom Beyond. It’s mainly a quick fight scene and a bit of teasing for Virus’ real identity, but given that this came out after Venom #26, this feels like the oddly-paced first act to the second act that was the first issue of Venom Beyond. Pacing aside, it came out at a really weird time, and it just didn’t work with the second act already out and not having mystery that isn’t being dragged out. And honestly, I’m not sure if that could have been fixed by it coming out when it was supposed to.

Free Comic Book Days aren’t really meant to be taken seriously, unless they’re billed as such. And half of it was, and that’s where the problems set in. It was fun for what it was, especially in the first half, but it wasn’t what I was promised, nor what was needed to help Venom retroactively.

First Story: A

Second Story: B