The Amazing Spider-Man [2018] #20 - Marvel Comics

THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN No. 20, June 2019

Despite containing a couple of corking confrontations featuring the likes of Black Cat and The Lizard, Issue Twenty of “The Amazing Spider-Man” probably still disappointed a fair few of its 76,903 readers due to Nick Spencer’s insistence on depicting both bouts of fisticuffs as disconcertingly one-sided affairs. In fact, having established Curt Conner’s overwhelmingly strong parental instinct to save his young boy’s life in one of this storyline’s earlier editions, the American author seemingly does a complete u-turn on the character’s ability to overcome his aggression-inhibiting spinal chip, by having the scaly anti-hero meekly succumb to the Last Son of Kraven even though the cold-hearted killer has vowed to tear young Billy “limb from limb” and “mount his head on a wall” whilst forcing the reptilian human mutate to watch.

Combined with Felicia Hardy’s inability to best a lone Hunter-Bot who is initially lightly armed with just a knife and pistol, such a disappointing decline in the fighting prowess in two of this comic’s leading cast members arguably comes across as unsophisticated story-telling, and smacks of simply being contrived in order to help set-up the twenty-page periodical’s so-called shock revelation that the virtual link between a portly Great Hunt participate and his automaton cannot be severed until both the robot and its wealthy user have been destroyed/killed; “What the heck is wrong with this thing? Arcade! Arcade, come on --”

Admittedly, that doesn’t mean for a moment that the two-time Charter Party political candidate’s narrative for this comic lacks any entertainment value, as its action-packed shenanigans most assuredly do. But every time Spencer sets up a potentially mouth-watering skirmish the end result just seems to show the ‘good guys’ as being perturbingly ineffective, and in the Black Cat’s case, the only reason the former Crime Boss is alive is because the man who shot her suddenly gains a conscience just long enough to be reminded that he has a boy about the same age as The Lizard’s sobbing son.

Perhaps this publication’s biggest strength therefore lies in the layouts of Humberto Ramos, which in particular do an awesome job of putting across the increasing frustration felt by the Last Son of Kraven with his father’s plan. The clone is clearly absolutely beside himself with rage by the time he encounters Curt Conner’s alter ego and this book’s audience can almost physically feel the man’s relief when he initially gets to beat down upon his ineffective opponent.

Writer: Nick Spencer, Penciler: Humberto Ramos, and Inker: Victor Olazaba