Sticky Fingers: Avenging Spider-Man #15.1 Review

Editor’s Note: With great spoilers must come great responsibility. More or less.

Okay, so Peter Parker is “dead,” and Otto Octavius is Spider-Man now. Whether you agree with how Dan Slott did it or not, it’s the way things are for the time being. And given that Spider-Man appears regularly in four different comic books that I can think of off the top of my head, if you have any intention of following Marvel Comics – particularly the Avengers books – for the next year or so, you’re going to need to come to terms with this new Spider-Man, and get to know what Otto’s like now that he’s Spider-Man, and what makes him tick. You know, besides being suddenly able to walk, see his own junk without a mirror, and leer at Mary Jane (and make no mistake, it will just be leering; if you follow Dan Slott’s Twitter feed, you know that he’s bought himself enough trouble without setting himself up to be confronted by women in red wigs at every comic convention, asking him why he supports date rape via deception in his comics).

Marvel Editorial, possibly realizing that killing Peter on December 26th and leaving readers to wait two weeks for the debut of The Superior Spider-Man on January 9th would only give the most rankled ones more opportunity to figure out how to plant hooker toes on Slott and then dime the police, made the decision to give us the first real taste of the new Spider-Man in Avenging Spider-Man #15.1, released this week in parallel with The Amazing Spider-Man #700.

So: what do we get in our first full issue of Doc Ock as Spider-Man? Scenes of a former villain embracing the responsibility that comes with his newfound power? Or does he frantically masturbate to Pete’s iPhone gallery of Mary Jane pictures before going to the barber, handing over his favorite bowl and saying, “Just follow this”?

First of all, this Point One issue breaks the usual Marvel Team-Upish format of the title; it follows Otto in his first days following his victory over Peter, getting used to his job, his friends, and striving mightily to prove he is better than Peter was in every way, and coming to terms with living with having some of Peter’s old instincts rolling around in his head. He sneers at Peter’s scientific achievements, while marveling at his power and trying, to varying (small) levels of success to navigate the social levels of Peter’s life, while still clutching elements of his old life as Doctor Octopus.

This issue is entirely a character study of Otto and his thought processes in his first days as Spider-Man, and they are generally what you’d expect: arrogant, overbearing, and condescending to the people around him and to Parker himself. Despite being beamed all of Peter’s memories and his motivations throughout the last couple of issues of The Amazing Spider-Man, Otto is still Otto, and keep in mind: Dr. Octopus is a character with almost as much history and back story as Spider-Man himself – the guy debuted in The Amazing Spider-Man #3, after all. So to expect that a simple understanding of what drove Peter to make Otto suddenly become a completely new man would be pretty unrealistic; after all, I cried the first time I saw Charlotte’s Web when I was four, but it didn’t stop me from consoling myself with a fat bacon sandwich right afterwards.

Writer Christopher Yost does a solid job making sure that the old Doc Ock’s personality is generally front and center, making it clear that his motivations are less to do good for its own sake, and more to prove to himself that he is better in every way than Peter Parker was. It’s a compelling characterization, and Yost has it come into play and create internal conflict within Otto (just about the only conflict there is in this issue; Otto talks to exactly three people in about five panels in the entire book) particularly when Otto is forced to deal with his own lab’s defenses since his biometrics no longer match up (though I would have liked to have heard a computer voice saying, “Body mass index too low… hair length not recognized… genital measurements wildly inaccurate…”). Seeing Otto forced to confront his own defenses, and a recording of his old self ranting and screeching self-importance, is a pretty interesting juxtaposition that gives Otto a level of self doubt and loathing that cuts through the general arrogance he’s always demonstrated.

Yost uses the experience to give Otto the realization that, bar one time, he always lost to Spider-Man, redoubling Otto’s commitment to improving himself and becoming a better version of Spider-Man. The sequence is satisfying and effective… only I would have preferred to see Otto lose to his own defenses. This seems like maybe it’s a minor quibble, but I found myself thinking that if Otto was able to defeat his own defenses as Spider-Man, it would lead him to believe that it was just the powerset, and not the intellect, that led Otto to lose to Spider-Man for years. Whereas if Otto was repelled by his own defenses, it would be more likely to make him believe that it was Peter Parker who was always able to beat him, not just the powers, which to me would be a stronger motivating force for Otto to make himself a better Spider-Man. I don’t generally like to review a book based on what isn’t there (my complaints about how Slott killed Peter as being completely different than the way I think Peter Parker should die aside), and make no mistake: what’s on the page makes sense and is effective at demonstrating some of Otto’s goals as Spider-Man… I just think having Otto lose to himself would have been a stronger demonstration of just how big a pair or shoes he’s trying to fill.

But it isn’t all heavy internal conflict and self-absorbsion here; Yost has fun showing a self-centered megalomaniac like Ock trying to meander his way through Peter Parker’s life. Scenes with him brusquely insulting Peter’s co-workers without thinking, getting himself all hot and bothered while trying to convince himself that Mary Jane needs to be eliminated, and marveling in his own powers are alternatingly funny, entertaining and just plain fun. So while we get generally good, solid character work in the issue, there’s enough lightness to keep things entertaining, without becoming a reenactment of King Lear or something.

Let me take a second to address Spider-Man’s new costume here. Some of it makes a lot of sense – of course Doctor Octopus would find a way to turn his mask lenses into a version of his trademark goggles – while others? Well, not so much. Those little talons on Spider-Man’s fingertips look cool and a little fearsome… except they are on his fingertips, pointing inward. So we see these talons in one panel and see Otto making a fist in the next, and all I was able to think was that Otto was now busily bleeding out into his own glove. You know, in a superior manner. But let’s face reality: part of replacing the guy in a superhero’s costume means that a new costume is part of the mix. It’s just about the law in superhero comics, and given Otto’s proclivities, we’re lucky we’re not seeing him swing around in a green and orange unitard.

Paco Medina’s art is a pretty god match for the story; his style reminds me a little bit of Humberto Ramos, without quite so much manga stylization. He works with a fine line and a slightly cartoony style, but erring more on the side of realism than Ramos. And unlike many fine-line artists, his facial expressions aren’t slashed all up with detail lines. His faces are simply expressive, without moving into full-on cartoon exaggerated features. There isn’t a ton of action in this issue, but what is there is well choreographed enough to be able to keep track of what’s happening and why. However, Medina also peppers some pages with flashback images that make for good-looking pages that will probably sell pretty well on Artists’ Alley, but if not for the coloring making those images darker than others, the fact that we’re looking at flashbacks might be lost. Still, he draws a pretty good Spider-Man in action, and his storytelling is clear and simple to follow.

As an introduction to what we can expect from Dr. Octopus as Spider-Man, Avenging Spider-Man #15.1 is a pretty solid look at what we can look forward to and some of the motivations we can expect to see driving Otto while he’s behind the mask. Seeing that Marvel has a plan for Otto beyond a simple, “Let’s kill Peter Parker! It’s fun to be on the front page of the New York Post!” is somewhat comforting, and might make some who are out there weeping over their copies of The Amazing Spider-Man #700 and sharpening their toecutting shears take a deep breath and give what’s coming a day in court. It’s not perfect, but it is a reasonably compelling look into Otto’s head, and goes a long way toward convincing us that we’re in store for something a little more complex than, “Spider-Man is now a dick,” or “Doc Ock is now the bestest of good guys.” As a companion piece to Amazing Spider-Man #700, it’s recommended, if only to take some of the sting out of the events of that issue.

Now, only two more weeks to wait until The Superior Spider-Man #1… to see if that’s where Ock tries out his new equipment. So to speak.