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This was an interesting one that I had to pick up. Spider-Man had his own comic strip that was done by the one and only duo of Stan Lee and John Romita, probably the second most influential duo to ever work on the series (behind only Lee and Ditko of course). The strip debuted on January 3rd, 1977 and this collection follows the daily strip up until January 28th, 1979.
The stories can be best separated into main arcs. The stories take about a month to progress from start to finish, though some were longer. The early stories featured a lot of repetition but by the time Stan got one year under his belt he was rolling and the stories really started flowing really well from one story to the next. The repetition lessened and it made the strips much more enjoyable.
The strips include all the main stars of the comic series: Peter Parker, JJJ, Robbie Robertson, Mary-Jane, Flash Thompson and Aunt May and had the usual host of Spidey’s rogue gallery. The first arc featured Doctor Doom coming to the UN at the behest of JJJ to take out Spider-Man. Spidey is portrayed as the villain when he confronts Doom, of course. Eventually Spidey defeats Doom and Doom does an honorable exit. While it was odd to start off the strip with a villain who was always associated with another book, it set up the characters that would be used and showed that the strip wouldn’t be that different from what was going on in the Spidey-verse at the time.
The second arc features a more traditional Spidey villain: Doctor Octopus. Doc gets in close with Aunt May but he’s just using her as a tool in order to achieve his bigger goal: stealing a Chinese idol that could start a World War. Luckily, Spidey is able to prevent that from happening. We move from an Octopus to a reptile, but not a villain I’ve ever seen in Spider-Man before. His name is the Rattler and he was a store owner that was bitten by a venomous spider and a serum made him turn into a snake. Peter takes photos of Mary-Jane with the Rattler in the background and this brings the Rattler into the world of Parker and as a result the world of Spider-Man. Spidey stops the villain who ends up dying when he decides he doesn’t want to deal with the serpent inside of him anymore.
We move from the Rattler to Kingpin. This was the most interesting of the stories so far. Kingpin actually hires Spider-Man to work for him and Peter, down on his luck, decides to take him up on the offer. Kingpin’s goal is to get his guy elected mayor of New York. Spidey eventually regrets his decision but Kingpin has captured him and Spidey is forced to watch on the sidelines until Kingpin’s wife releases him. Spidey confronts Kingpin but when Kingpin’s wife is injured as a result of their tussle Spidey’s further dropped into the depths of depression. This leads to a brief origin before our next villain enters: Kraven. This is similar to the first story. JJJ brings Kraven to NY to take out our hero. Robbie actually quits as a result of JJJ’s actions. After Spider-Man defeats Kraven at the printing plant Robbie comes back to work and both realize how brash they acted.
That last story brought us to the end of December and Spidey stops some common thugs as he does his Christmas shopping and donates a reward for stopping a criminal to man injured by the crook. We move forward with MJ going to tour with Kraven and Peter isn’t too keen on that. Luckily he meets a stunner on New Year’s Eve and they are having a good time. The only problem, as Spidey finds out, is that her father is a terrorist who is setting off bombs in NY, including an attempt on Robbie’s life. Spider-Man eventually catches on to a plot that the terrorist is about to execute and he clears the building as the bomb is about to explode. Lana walks in and Spidey has a choice of who to save and he saves Lana. Her father perishes in the explosion and yet another woman is blaming Spider-Man for her father’s death. We don’t see Lana again as she fades into the background.
We move to a more traditional Spider-Man villain, Mysterio. Spidey gets wind of a movie that is to star Spidey and he wants the role. Of course, he gets it. He’s ready for the big time and the big payday but it is ruined by Mysterio and his jealousy of Spider-Man and his ex-wife. Spidey vanquishes his foe but gets nothing in the process, as the film is dropped and he gets no money. I guess we’ve run out of villains because it’s back to the who we started out with: Dr. Doom. This time Doom wants to mess with Spidey’s mind in order to deliver his final defeat and although Doom gets close, Spidey wins out, eventually finding that his shrink is just one of Doom’s robots.
After that battle Spidey goes a little more local, stopping some common thugs from trying to rob his aunt and later silence her. Another level is added because one of the thieves is Robertson’s nephew. I actually found this to be an interesting story with subplots of Spidey being portrayed as the villain but also the perils of having a life of crime. The next story is another interesting one. Spidey leaves his clothes on the side of a wall while stopping a crime and a woman finds them and discovers Peter’s identity. She uses that to gain revenge on a man who wronged her and ruined her career as Spidey tries to discover who knows his identity. He discovers the woman who is pulling his strings but she plummets to her death after trying to attack him. We conclude our story with Flash and Harry opening a disco and having some tough guys offer their “insurance” as a plot for the Kingpin to rule the underworld. Spidey gets involved, and captured, but he eventually stops the two no-names.
-The Bottom Line- This was a really interesting collection to read. It started off a bit slow, with a lot of information getting repeated, but once Stan figured out how to write these things you have some great stories that rival what he did with Romita in the comic book. The use of villains was interesting (Doom twice, and Kingpin) but each arc offered something different. The art of Romita was dazzling here, and it was reproduced very well here. There was just a few panels that seemed a little dirtier and smudged but overall the strips looked amazing. There are a few extras, including the original proposal for the strip that featured the Prowler getting confused for Spider-Man as well as an interview with Stan about the strip and a feature on Romita regarding the strip, too. When it comes to Lee and Romita’s legendary run on Spider-Man, this is an essential element that should be added to your collection. Highly Recommended.
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