WHAT IF…? #105 - February 1998

Legacy…in Black and White

Credits:  Tom DeFalco (plot/script), Ron Frenz (plot/pencils), Bill Sienkiewicz (finishes), Matt Webb (colors), Chris Eliopoulos & Virtual Calligraphy (letters)

The Plot:  May “Mayday” Parker’s spider-powers begin to emerge during a basketball game.  While out with her friends that night, the Green Goblin appears, telling May to send a message to her father.  Later, she overhears her parents discuss Peter’s life as Spider-Man, and the final battle with Green Goblin that led to his retirement.  Peter figures out that the new Goblin is Normie Osborn, but is unable to gain help from the Fantastic Five or the Avengers.  Peter prepares to meet the Green Goblin at the Brooklyn Bridge, while MJ takes May to the attic and reveals to her Peter’s past.  Soon, May arrives at the bridge, wearing Ben Reilly’s old costume.  During the battle, she spares Normie’s life when he’s caught in the path of a semi-truck.  With Normie institutionalized, the Parkers have a ceremonial burning of Spider-Man’s possessions, unaware that May is designing her own costume and webshooters.

The Subplots:  May is popular with the school jocks and nerds.  She has a crush on football player Brad Miller.  

Web of Continuity:  

• This issue marks the debut of Spider-Girl, even though she’s never called that during the story.
• The recap page essentially confirms that the “package” Alison Mongrain stole for Norman Osborn at the end of “Revelations” was baby May.
• Spider-Man retired after his final battle with the Green Goblin fifteen years ago.  The battle left Norman Osborn dead and Peter with an amputated leg.
• The Fantastic Five and A-Next debut in cameo appearances.
• Foggy Nelson is married to Liz Allan, who is suffering from a fatal disease.  He also claims that Daredevil died years earlier.

Review:  Tom DeFalco always maintained that he created Spider-Girl as a one-off character for this issue of What If…?, even though the genesis for the entire MC2 Universe is here.  I’m not quite sure how the concept of Spider-Girl evolved into not only an ongoing series, but the anchor of an entire line of comics in late 1998.  I do remember a Spider-Girl ongoing was first promoted as a part of Stan Lee’s “Excelsior!” line of comics during the spring of 1998 (inside the same insert that promised X-Factor #150 would reveal Graydon Creed’s killer).  “Excelsior!” never materialized, but within a few months, Spider-Girl and the youth-skewing MC2 line arrived in comic shops.  Tom DeFalco’s critical reputation as a writer had taken a hit after his run on Amazing Spider-Man, and many fans instantly hated the idea of a line of “kids” Marvel titles, so the early buzz for the series was mostly negative.  Within a few issues, however, Spider-Girl had developed a healthy cult following, and most online reviewers were vocally supporting the book by the end of its first year.  Spider-Girl became the little comic that could for several years, never becoming a hit but defying cancellation after cancellation thanks to the efforts of a devoted fanbase.

Spider-Girl developed a following in large part because it was a deliberate attempt to move away from darkness and embrace a friendlier Silver Age ethos.  Ironically, the character is debuting during the “dark” era of What If…?, a conscious effort to save the low-selling comic by just flagrantly giving fans what they seemingly wanted.  Most What If…? issues of the day seemed to be stories about various X-Men dying in horrible ways, as rendered by Leonardo Manco.  This issue isn’t nearly as dark as the standard 1998 What If…? comic, but it’s not the lighthearted, all-ages romp I tend to view Spider-Girl as either.  The tone’s more solemn than what I normally associate with DeFalco’s work, and he seems to be making a conscious decision to lay off the corny retro-dialogue.  Normie Osborn is recast as Robert DeNiro’s character from Cape Fear, a tattooed, buff lookalike of his grandfather, now sporting dreadlocks.  This description might sound ridiculous, but wow, is he freaky-looking.  Bill Sienkiewicz provides the finishes, which automatically adds a certain amount of grit and shadows to the proceedings.  Pairing him with Ron Frenz is a fantastic choice, giving the issue a hint of a traditional Spidey feel, but there’s also a sense of menace that you don’t normally get with a DeFalco/Frenz collaboration.  

Thankfully, the story doesn’t succumb to the normal What If…? clichés of radically altering established characters or just killing them off.  The closest we get is Peter’s severed leg, which does serve a legitimate story purpose.  I’m not prepared to say that May Parker is an obvious choice to headline a long-running series after reading this issue, but she is likeable enough, and the basic premise of the Parkers’ teenage daughter becoming a hero does have potential.  The issue finds a nice balance between a traditional superhero origin and the darker material of late ‘90s What If…?, and DeFalco’s able to deliver the needed exposition rather smoothly.  It’s a solid comic all around.  I really wish we could’ve seen work on this level on Amazing Spider-Man during this time.

WOLVERINE: INNER FURY - November 1992

Credits: D.G. Chichester (writer), Bill Sienkiewicz (art), Michael Heisler (letters), Sherilyn van Valkenburgh (colors)

Summary: Wolverine learns from Nick Fury that Hydra has targeted him. Soon, Wolverine is attacked by Hydra agents, who slice into his adamantium bones with a nanotech-infested sword. He’s rescued by a bounty hunter named Big, who’s been trailing Hydra. As the nanotech virus infects Wolverine, his healing factor fades away and his body begins to reject the adamantium. Big accompanies him on a mission to find the Whale, a defected Hydra scientist who might be able to help. After finally locating the Whale, Wolverine learns that Big is actually a Hydra agent who’s used him to track down the rogue scientist. Near death, Wolverine thrusts his claws into his own brain, which forces his immune system to reboot. He recovers as Big tries to dispose of his body with a chainsaw. When the chainsaw hits adamantium, Big dies in the ensuing accident.

Production Note: This is a $5.95, forty-eight page prestige format one-shot.

Review: This is what happens when the prestige books get artistic. The summary listed above is a charitable approximation of what appears to be happening in the book, as the creators seem determined to make the entire comic as impenetrable as possible. Along with the basic story of Hydra duping Wolverine into tracking down a turncoat scientist, the creators throw in the shadow of a voluptuous woman assigned to kill the Whale (who turns out to be Big, whose little hovercraft casts a shadow that resembles Christina Hendricks’ figure), dream sequences that cast Wolverine as Captain Ahab, and endless pages of scientists spouting tech-babble at one another. The fight scenes are also nearly impossible to make out, and Whale and Big are given such similar designs (tiny men with big, pointy noses), it’s hard to tell them apart at first. I seem to recall Chichester pulling similar stunts on Daredevil, particularly in the issues Scott McDaniel drew. I can respect the desire to create something higher than an easy read, but confusion for confusion’s sake is just annoying. I also wonder if the byzantine storytelling was partially motivated by a need to cover the lackluster plot. Big’s the one who leads Wolverine on the mission to find Whale, yet the story points out that Wolverine’s enhanced senses aren’t working well due to the nannite infection, so it’s not as if Wolverine’s in a condition to be tracking anyone anyway. Why exactly was Wolverine involved in this mess in the first place?

WOLVERINE #123 – #124, April – May 1998

WOLVERINE #123

“Better Than Best!”

Credits: Tom DeFalco (writer), Denys Cowan & Bill Sienkiewicz (artists), Comicraft (lettering), Jason Wright (colors)

Summary: Wolverine ponders his New Year’s resolution as he’s abducted by Bloodscream and Roughouse, who are working for a crimelord in New York. He escapes his manacles by breaking his wrist, and then faces the duo. The fight destroys their hideout, allowing Wolverine to walk away victorious.

Continuity Notes: This issue ignores the fact that Roughouse reformed during the Goodwin/Byrne issues of the series, and the X-Men Unlimited story that had Bloodscream lost in a mystical vortex with Belasco (Bloodscream was trying to “redeem his humanity” in that story, so that’s two reformations ignored in one issue). Wolverine’s New Year’s resolution, as revealed in X-Men #73, was to “be the best there is at what I do…and to figure out what that is” (which isn’t an exact quote from that issue, but close enough).

Review: I’m not sure why, but it seems like Tom DeFalco became the standard Wolverine fill-in guy during this era (I think he also wrote the Wolverine cyber-comic for Marvel’s website). It’s interesting that someone within the X-titles, like John Francis Moore or new writers like Ben Raab and Joe Casey, weren’t brought in to do these stories. I’m sure even Larry Hama would’ve come back to do a few more issues if he had been asked. I don’t say this to dismiss DeFalco, who has written some enjoyable comics over the years, but he just seems like an odd choice for the title. If you’re willing to overlook the continuity problems with this one, it’s a tolerable fill-in. The plot’s extremely light, but DeFalco gives Wolverine enough personality to keep the story from feeling too generic. Any edge in the comic comes from the combination of Denys Cowan and Bill Sienkiewicz, who predictably make the art as dark and gritty as possible.

WOLVERINE #124

Invisible Destroyers!

Credits: Tom DeFalco (writer), Denys Cowan & Bill Sienkiewicz (artists), Comicraft (lettering), Jason Wright (colors)

Summary: Outside of a public appearance by Captain America , Wolverine suspects something is wrong. He enters the building and is confronted by invisible foes. Captain America joins the fight, as their opponent is revealed as Rascal, who is trying to build a reputation with his men, the Rodents. Wolverine, who was questioning his instincts earlier, is able to see through Rascal’s suicide bluff, which enables Captain America to defeat him.

I Love the ‘90s: There are two separate Spice Girls references in this issue.

“Huh?” Moment: Wolverine’s narrative captions make such little sense on one page, I can only assume that a major typo occurred. After commenting that his instincts were wrong about sensing danger inside (which is blatantly false), Wolverine goes on to say, “Does that mean I should stop doubtin’ myself, I never once questioned my senses until today..Does that mean I should stop doubtin’ myself -- or keep questionin’ my instincts?!” I’m assuming the letterer accidentally retyped the wrong lines from the script, or some lines were changed by editorial but not fully corrected.

Review: And here we have the legendary debut of Rascal and the Rodents. To be fair, Rascal’s motivation for killing Captain America, only for self-serving publicity reasons, is somewhat novel. However, the man’s name is Rascal, and his henchmen are called the Rodents. Unless you’re fighting Adam West in 1960s primetime, this is really inexcusable. This is the type of story that seems tailor made for annoying seventeen year olds who really want to take their superhero comics seriously. Aside from the fact that the story is obviously time-killer, large sections of the dialogue consist of dull exposition (explaining things that have already been made very clear), and awkward banter between the two heroes. The rough, scratchy art isn’t bad, but it’s flagrantly inappropriate for such a Silver Age throwback story.