The Amazing Spider-Man [2018] #19 - Marvel Comics

THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN No. 19, June 2019

Considering that Nick Spencer’s narrative for Issue Nineteen of “The Amazing Spider-Man” focuses upon a plethora of the titular character’s most notorious arch-villains, most notably that of the Vulture and the Rhino, this comic’s 74,018 strong audience must have been disappointingly surprised at the plot’s pedestrian pace. For whilst Peter Parker’s black-suited alter-ego invariably ends up scuffling with Aleksei Sytsevich, as well as battling against a pack of Hunter-bots, these confrontations are so tantalisingly brief and unsatisfyingly short-lived, that they arguably needn’t have been included at all.

Indeed, in many ways this third instalment of the American author’s “Hunted” story-arc seems to have been purely penned simply to push along the multi-edition event’s numerous secondary threads, and resultantly rather haphazardly dips into the Black Cat’s incarceration with Billy Connors, the Last Son of Kraven’s unhappiness at his father’s grand scheme, Adrian Toomes’ laughably dishonest attempt to seize control of the Savage Six, the Rhino’s palpable anger at being previously ‘betrayed’ by Spider-Man when Web-head rescued Aunt May rather than save the super-strong Sytsevich from the clutches of the Taskmaster, and Tony Master’s ‘off-screen’ capture of the Lizard.

Of course, all these insights into this storyline’s impressively large supporting cast are both noteworthy and fairly diverting, especially Felicia Hardy’s use of her bad luck probability power to have her cell’s hapless guard molested by a savagely-fanged wild cat. But such a choppy goulash of so many dialogue-heavy scenes and sedentary sequences debatably makes this twenty-page periodical a somewhat tediously tiring, rambling read; “Let them see the Kravinoff Family name restored through bloodshed. Show them what we are capable of. Show them what you are capable of.”

Providing some glimmer of light however, are Gerardo Sandoval’s layouts, which successfully imbue even the most monotonous of monologues with a modicum of dynamism and emotion. The Vulcan’s earnest power play beneath one of Central Park’s fifty bridges is a good example of this, as the Mexican illustrator provides Toomes with all the physical animation the former electrical engineer needs for his argument to appear compelling when contrasted to Spidey’s unconvincingly delivered counterclaim that the professional criminal is unfit to lead simply because he’s an untrustworthy fraud.

The regular cover art of "THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN" No. 19 by Humberto Rams & Edgar Delgado