"A Night on the Town"
Kurt Busiek-Mike Allred/Joe Sinnott
Redartz: Hello everyone, and welcome back to the 1990's. Yes, the decade who's comics have a rather checkered reputation; but fear not. Today we will look at a little Silver Age gem, as told by Kurt Busiek and illustrated by Mike Allred (who gave us "Madman" and inked by the one and only Joe Sinnott.
Some may be familiar with "Untold Tales of Spider-Man", a title published all too briefly during the 90's. The kicker was that these stories took place during the Lee/Ditko era of Amazing Spider-Man, and fit into continuity between the original issues of ASM. In fact, they even provided a chart breaking down what issues went where, for those inclined to pursue it. Some issues of "Untold" featured such veterans as Doc Ock, Vulture, and Sandman. Some introduced 'new' foes, such as the Scorcher and Batwing. The cast included all the Lee/Ditko faces, including Liz and Flash, Harry Osborn, even Fred Foswell and Bennett Brant (Betty's brother, killed in ASM 12). Other characters were also added, as Busiek and artist Pat Oliffe took this fun book and had a blast with it. These comics were great and are well worth a read; you could probably find all of them in a dollar box.
Today, however, we are looking at the first Annual the title offered. The story, in a nutshell (a brief aside- the credits in this book tout a story suggestion by Paul Dini, comics writer extraordinaire):
Spider-Man is about to capture a gang of hoods, when his friend/rival the Human Torch swoops in and upstages him, taking the credit. Spidey decides to get even with the Torch...
and visits the Baxter Building. There he asks Sue Storm for a date (not expecting success). Sue, feeling neglected by Reed, actually accepts! Incidentally, I think Mike Allred did a nice job of giving the book a Silver Age look. And Joe Sinnott's inks certainly give the FF a familiar look.
The Torch, of course, is quite dismayed by events. Peter Parker, on the other hand, is beside himself with excitement. He floats through a day at school, but runs afoul of the old Parker luck when Betty Brant calls that evening. I sense Allred channeling Ditko here, especially with Betty's look...
While Sue and Spidey go out, the sulking Torch figures he'll fix the webslinger- he hunts down the Sub-Mariner, and tells Namor that Spidey has kidnapped Sue. Subby takes the bait...
The scene of Peter and Sue sharing a pizza is wonderful. I love the expression on Peter's face in the last panel. Of course, this is a Marvel comic, and it's been too quiet. At this point Namor rather dramatically intrudes upon the couple...
Now the fireworks ensue, and for awhile Namor gives Spiderman his lumps. And as fate would have it, who but Jolly Jonah Jameson, and Betty, show up on the sidewalk below the battle. They are quickly endangered by a pile of rubble, courtesy of the Sub-Mariner's temper.
Meanwhile, Sue summoned the rest of the FF, who are less than pleased to discover the cause of the commotion...
In a scene reminiscent of Daredevil 7, Namor witnesses Spider-Man's selfless courage as he acts to save Betty and Jonah, and begins to question his initial assessment. But the webslinger is pretty ticked. Yet before things deteriorate further, the FF show up with explanations. The Torch smirks as Spidey leaves, but later Spidey pays a silent visit to Johnny's garage and gets one last bit of payback...
This story is a lot of fun, with the guest stars, the action and the humor. Actually, the whole package is a lot of fun. Taking a leaf from the classic Spider-Man Annual #1, the creators give us a feast of special feature pages following the main story. We get villain pin-ups by the likes of Sal Buscema, Gil Kane, Jim Mooney and Klaus Janson. We get "How Kurt Busiek and Pat Olliffe Recreate Untold Tales", in the spirit of "How Stan and Steve create Spider-Man" from that 1964 Annual. We get a couple more feature pages, and even a recipe for Aunt May's wheatcakes! That's a lot of four color goodness for a cover price of 1.95. And that's definitely the way to make an Annual...
