Issue #2 saw Ben coming to grips with the reality of what he's done, doing some twistedly altruistic things, and be a snarky jackass. Issue #2 saw Kaine, on the other hand, running around fake torturing a woman for information about Ben, breaking into an office building in a way that would make John McClane weep with pride, and finding out what it's like to be on the receiving end of more dakka. Where will Issue #3 take us? Well, for starters, it takes us back to Ben Reilly's signature costume as the Scarlet Spider on the cover.
Even though I did express my feelings on the new suit in my Issue #1 review, allow me to reiterate: didn't mind the new suit, thought it was even kind of a neat design. But it seems that the classic look won out and it is nice to see it back again. The pencil work by Mark Bagley is really good, particularly his work on the cover with John Dell and Jason Keith to bring Ben's classic look back in glorious...uh...bursting from a gradient background. Kudos!
We pick up in Issue #3 with Ben still talking to Cassandra Mercury and Slate, interrupted by a phone call from dear Rita, who has escaped her imprisonment in the warehouse thanks to a helpful bum named Artie. After telling her to check into a hotel for a few days, Ben calls in "The Kill Crew", who apparently were a contact he had for getting rid of clones. Which, of course, leads us into the situation that Kaine finds himself in - caught behind a desk while the bullets fly. With the cunning use of a web shield and then jumping out of a window, Kaine escapes.
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| "Go in, find the president, bring him out in 24 hours and you're a free man." |
Back in Vegas, Ben gets a little Escape from New York pulled on him when Slate sticks him with a tracking device in the neck. It will track him anywhere within one hundred miles and, Cassandra says, will blow his head off if he leaves that radius. After Ben leaves to get to work finding a geneticist to help cure Abigail's disease, Slate mentions to Cassandra that the tracker can't do that...but Cassandra assumes he isn't going to call her bluff.
So, it's less Escape from New York and more Escape from LA.
Thankfully, the quality level of this is much higher.
Heading out, Ben runs into Mandy - the woman who he saved from a robbery and then intimidated money from back in Issue #1. Following her, he interrogates her about how she's spent her money and the job she's trying to get. Before he can get far, however, she points out a trio of men - one in a classic Scarlet Spider outfit, one wearing a classic Spidey outfit, and another dressed as Spider-Man 2099, and all of them heading toward the casino.
Back at Cassandra's room, she and Slate talk a bit about the situation, where Slate mentioned off-handedly that he has a son but fails to elaborate. As they're discussing the shooters from the heist in Issue One, one of the staff alerts them to a problem downstairs. It seems the three Spider-Men have made their way into the casino and are demanding to see Cassandra Mercury...but in a rather humorous scene, "Spidey" finds that his voice is muffled by the cloth of the mask.
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| Michael Chiklis demonstrating what Marvel did to Spidey in 2007. |
When he manages to get it off enough to start speaking, Slate uses the Slasher Film teleportation technique puts him in a chokehold. When "Spidey" and his friends - the "Web Spinners" as they call themselves - don't answer as to who their contact is that told them Cassandra was a criminal, Slate snaps his neck. 2099 is the next one on the chopping block, but Ben soon intercedes and gets into a fight with Slate long enough to let the pair escape.
He meets them not long after in an alley, berating them for acting like morons...and then the one dressed as the Scarlet Spider makes the mistake of critiquing Ben's outfit comparing it to, of all things - Spidercide.
I had legitimately thought that Spidercide was just that one particular part of the Clone Saga (or one of the particular parts) that everyone had agreed to forget had ever happened. To see him referenced in a comic in a post One More Day world is...surprising, to say the least.
The issue ends with Ben taking the classic Scarlet Spider costume and swinging off in it, proclaiming the guy to be a jerk.
Issue #3 is where we see things coming more together. We have the status quo fully established with Ben working for Cassandra Mercury, his pseudo-antagonistic relationship with Slate both in and out of costume, and Ben's quest to become a hero again...even if he's not going about it in remotely the right away.
Also, they basically made an entire issue to deal with the controversy of the suit. For some reason, I just find that hilarious!
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| Ben Reilly is back in business! |
Next Saturday, we'll get into Issue #4. The "Next:" page promises us a fight between Ben Reilly and Kaine - together again for the first time under the lights of Vegas. Before we get to that, however, come back tomorrow for yet another comic review - this time continuing the adventures of the Master of the Mystic Arts as he faces the beginnings of what may be his greatest challenge yet!
May your amulets never tickle! Tomorrow, it's Doctor Strange #2!
Ben Reilly: The Scarlet Spider #3 comes to us from Marvel Comics.Written by Peter David, Penciled by Mark Bagley, Inked by John Dell, color artist'd by Jason Keith and Jay David Ramos, and lettered by Joe Caramgna. They all did great!
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