THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #125

"Wolfhunt!"

• Writer: Gerry Conway
• Artist: Ross Andru
• Inker: John Romita, Tony Mortellaro
• Print Date: Oct, 1973

Featuring:

Plot Summary:

It's not been a good week for our web-slinging hero. Two deaths haunt him, one of the woman he loved and the other of his best friend's father. And if that weren't enough for one hung-up college student, for the second time this evening, he's about to be attacked by a rampaging Man-Wolf!

Where we left off last issue was Spider-Man sitting on the edge of a rooftop, spider-sense tingling, with the Man-Wolf leaping at him from above. Spider-Man rolls to his feet avoid the Man-Wolf-'s pounce, but the Man-Wolf leaps again knocking them off the building. Spider-Man's webbing saves them both, and Spider-Man goes onto the attack pinning his assailant to the ground. While holding the Man-Wolf down, Spider-Man briefly notices the pendant around the Man-Wolf's neck, but before he can determine where he's seen it before, the Man-Wolf frees himself from Spidey's grasp. Yet, before the Man-Wolf can lunge in to finish Spider-Man off, the moon begins to set. In typical horror show fashion, the Man-Wolf splits from the scene. Spider-Man starts to chase the Man-Wolf, but that deep gash the Man-Wolf gave him last issue slows him down and leaps him lying weakly in the alley.

Slowly but surely, he's regaining a portion of the enthusiasm he once thrived on, the interest in exploring the mysterious and unknown, an interest he lost when Gwen died at the hands of the villain called the Green Goblin! Returning now to his apartment, he's already considering this new mystery as well as returning his attention to an old one. Harry Osborn is still missing. It's been over a week, and if he hadn't shown up for a moment yesterday, Peter would start to think something happened to him aside from having his father die. In a daze from blood loss, Peter bandages up the cut on his chest and lies down to ponder where he's seen that pendant before. But before he can even finish the question in his head, he falls asleep.

While our wearied hero takes some much needed rest, let's look in on the other members of our cast a few hours later, in a coffee shop near the campus, as Mary Jane Watson has an unorthodox breakfast with an old friend. Flash Thompson tries to bring MJ out of her funk and get her to stop brooding about Peter. As MJ puts on her happy face, Harry Osborn walks by without a word to any of them. MJ follows Harry up to the counter, try express her sympathy, but Harry erupts and tells her go shovel her false sympathy on Peter. With some other harsh words, Harry drives MJ to tears and she flees the restaurant leaving Flash and his friend to wonder what's going on with Harry.

Elsewhere this same morning, on a shady block residential of brownstones overlooking the Hudson River, Jonah Jameson gets out of his car at his son's apartment. Stealing himself to face unpleasant facts, Jonah goes upstairs to confront John Jameson. Walking in, Jonah finds John passed out on the couch wearing the Man-Wolf's yellow and green costume. Walking up, John recounts how he managed to get into his mess, and how it's all his fault.

Flashback: It all started six months ago at Cape Kennedy with the take-off of a special unscheduled and top secret moon flight. On the moon's surface, John came across the strangest rock he'd ever seen and brought it back to Earth with some other samples. 'Borrowing' the rock from quarantine center, John had the rock fashioned into a pendant and took to wearing it about his neck. One night, taking the turnpike up to New York, the moon had an inexplicable affect on John. When the full moon shone down on John's pendant, a transformation took place. John became the Man-Wolf. That's how it started. Somehow John made it to the Pennsylvania hills and when he woke, he was half-naked in a rain-filled culvert. Every month since then he's been transformed with John unable to stop the transformation. To that end, he develops a (yellow and green) radiation suit to cut out the lunar rays, but that suit came apart last evening. He's also unable to remove the pendant as it has grafted itself to his skin.

Seven hours: That's how long Peter Parker's slept since falling exhausted to his bed. Seven hours: and now it's the middle of the afternoon of a new day. Taking it slow, Spider-Man heads to the Daily Bugle to visit his old friend Joe Robertson. Strangely, Joe panics at the sight of Spider-Man, but before words can pass, Jonah bursts into the office with two officers firing tear gas at him. Blinded by the gas, Spider-Man leaps out of the office, but tumbles to a trash strew alley below.

Lying stunned in an alley far below, our hero misses a bit of dialogue that he might have found illuminating. We, however, are somewhat more fortunate. Joe asks why Jonah was waiting in ambush with those police, and in so many words, Jonah replies that not only is Spider-Man a murderer, but he's also a glory hound, stealing headlines while good men are suffering without a word.

And if you can believe that, you may not care about another scene an hour later, when Mary Jane Watson opens her to discover 'Petey' standing there in a daze. Collapsing in her chair, Mary Jane berates Peter for being constantly bummed out lately. Mary Jane wrestles with her concern for Peter momentarily, but decides 'not to get involved'. She kicks Peter out of her apartment with the instructions to chill it until he's more cheery.

Four hours: the time elapsed since our hero's meeting with Miss Watson. Now, we turn to another approaching confrontation between John Jameson and his demure fiance Kristine Saunders. Kristine rings John's bell but with no answer. Looking up, she sees two figures standing in John's apartment window. Right at that moment, as Jonah confronts his son, the moon peers through the skylight, triggering John's transformation to the Man-Wolf!

With a lunge, the Man-Wolf reaches the skylight glittering overhead. A pause, an instant of scrabbling, the skylight lifts, and the Man-Wolf is free. Then, as the lupine figure swings over the roof-edge and drops to the alley below, a sudden sound startles him, and he turns to see Kristine! Frantically, Kristine turns her car to flee but the engine stalls and she stares in horror as the Man-Wolf leaps!

Okay, as it happens, Spider-Man's put two and two together. Recognizing the Man-Wolf's costume as a converted space-suit for astronauts, Spider-Man remembers that J. Jonah Jameson's son is an astronaut. A quick glance at the Manhattan telephone directory gives our hero the address he needs, and he arrives just in time to save Kristine from the Man-Wolf's attack. Guessing that the pendant is triggering the Man-Wolf's changes, Spider-Man webs up the stone to cut off the moon's ray. However, that idea didn't work, and Spider-Man returns to his tried and true method of pummeling his opponent into submission. As the Man-Wolf continues to try and get passed Spider-Man to Kristine, Spider-Man finally leaps on the Man-Wolf's back and rips the pendant (with a large chunk of flesh) from the Man-Wolf's neck.

Before two sets of staring eyes, the transformation begins, and as it progresses, one set of eyes becomes blank with horror when the identity of the monster becomes apparent. Looking at the pendant in his hand, Spider-Man tells Jonah to get his son to a doctor just like he should've done in the first place. Throwing the pendant in the nearby Hudson River, Spider-Man verbally lashes out at Jonah for being more concerned about publicity than he son's life.

Comments:

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaawwwwwwwwwnnnnnnnnnn... Still camping. At least it's not raining today, but the sky is still pretty overcast. I'll feel better once I go down to the lake for a cool dip and a quick wash. For now though, I'm tired and cranky. Perfect review mood.

Plot Analysis:

Overall, I didn't care for this story too much. It's hard for me to pinpoint exactly what about it didn't work. I suspect it was just a collection of little things that mildly annoyed me, and detracted from my comic reading experience overall. Why don't I take things one at a time at we'll see if I can get to the crux of the problem.

I think part of it is that we're in the middle of a short stretch of one-shot stories. We had Luke Cage last issue, the Man-Wolf these two issues, and the Kangaroo coming up, and there just doesn't seem to be a lot going on in the Spider-Universe at this point in time. I understand the need for downtime following the climatic confrontation a few issues ago, but it doesn't make this issue any more enjoyable. I think another thing I disliked about this issue is the fact that Peter thinks about Gwen's death in a lot of different places in this issue, but he just seems to be more whining and depressed about being alone than anything. Thinking about it, I suppose that's probably a realistic attitude after she's been dead for... wait... how long?

Last issue, they made a point of saying that Gwen died ten days ago. This issue, they talk about what a miserable week it has been for Peter, and in another place this issue they mention again that Gwen's death was within a week. A small discrepancy, but it still one that the writer shouldn't have made.

Anyway, we pick up where we left off with the Man-Wolf pouncing on Spider-Man from behind. Obligatory opening fight scene begins. It really isn't explained particularly well why the Man-Wolf decided to stalk and attack Spider-Man when he just left Spider-Man unconscious and helpless in Jonah's home last issue. Regardless, he's here, and we're subject to the results. Spider-Man and the Man-Wolf tries to out-grapple each other with Spider-Man putting the Man-Wolf in a cute figure four move around his neck at a time before professional wrestling had really taken off and pinning him to the ground.

Now, another continuity problem. We, the readers, have seen the pendant around John's neck and later around the Man-Wolf's neck. Spider-Man has not met John Jameson recently enough to see the pendant around his neck. There should be NO reason why Spider-Man recognizes the pendant around the Man-Wolf's neck. It shouldn't seem familiar to him at all. I'm beginning to wonder if Gerry Conway didn't pen this issue in about 15 minutes while suffering from a crushing hangover.

Ah... Another nod to the classic horror movie. Just as the werewolf moves in to finish the heroic star of the film, the moon starts to set, causing the werewolf to flee into the night. This seems like a good time for Spider-Man to track and confront the Man-Wolf. However, the gash that Spider-Man suffered last issue. You remember, that deep scratch across his chest that has had absolutely NO affect on him whatsoever during this whole fight, that gash? Yeah, well, for reasons unexplained, the cut doesn't prevent him from web-slinging around and tumbling and wrestling with a werewolf, but it does prevent him from chasing the werewolf on foot through the street. It also causes enough memory loss to prevent Spider-Man from tagging the Man-Wolf with a spider-tracer for later.

Peter returns to his apartment. The mysterious disappear of Harry Osborn remains as he is not at the apartment and later we find he is still not feeling social. Peter is still wondering where he saw the pendant before that he's never seen before. Finally, Peter collapses on his bed. Ok, I want to point out that for having a deep cut on his chest that has apparently caused enough blood loss to make Peter dizzy and require a massive bandage wrapped across his chest, there isn't a lot of blood on his chest or costume. I'm assuming that the artist didn't want to go overboard on the gore, so I won't harp on that too much. It's just that when Peter talks about how bad this scratch on his chest is affecting him, and then said scratch appears to be no more than a nasty paper cut across his chest, it's a little disconcerting.

Harry Osborn does make a rare appearance later on at the lunch counter. He tells off Mary Jane for spending so much time with Peter. This is a little irrational as he has not been around at all. This calls into question how MJ is supposed to spend time with him, and how he knows who MJ has been spending so much time with. Of course, this is applying a rational counter-argument to Harry's emotional argument, and I know from personal experience that's never going to work. Anyway, Harry drives MJ and it appears to be the beginning of the end of their relationship. Only time will tell though.

Jonah really comes across as a 'bad guy' this issue. Like issue #123 with Luke Cage, he comes across as an extremely self-centered, shallow, person with misplaced priorities. I'm not sure if I care for that characterization of him. I can see him being self-centered, but I can't understand him putting his reputation and public image ahead of his son's well-being and safety like he does this issue. He confronts John in John's apartment, and he seems more concerned about the damage John's transformation will do to the media empire he's created than about nursing his son back to health. For example, at one point, he says, "I'm alone. Do you think I'd involve someone else in this disaster of yours?"

John's origin is a little hokey. How anyone could manage to do a 'secret' moon launch from Cape Kennedy is beyond me. Having never been to Cape Kennedy, I expect they could keep the public away while the prepare the rocket for launch, but I have no idea if they could actually managed to keep people far enough away to not notice the noise and sight of a rocket taking off. On second thought, if they simply lied and said they were launching a satellite or something, that'd probably work. Why they need to do a 'secret' moon launch that John can't tell his dad the reason for boggles me as well. As a 'werewolf origin' though, it works OK. It's a lot less hokey than having John being bitten by a werewolf at any point (the classic werewolf origin). I think they intentionally leave it ambiguous whether and how many people John has killed while in his wolf form. He doesn't actually harm anyone this issue or in his origin flashback, but he does stalk and attack plenty of people it seems. I suppose the writer wants to keep John as a sympathetic character and not make his alter-ego so vicious and violent that the readers want him put down at any cost.

Jonah gets around this issue. He stops by his son's in the morning. That afternoon, in the next scene, he's got police on hand at the Bugle to attempt to subdue and arrest Spider-Man. Then, that evening, he's back out at his son's apartment. Spider-Man stops by to find out what Joe Robertson knows about a certain pendant, but is driven out by the tear gas. I feel sorry for Joe Robertson as well since he's in his office, without a gas mask, when the police storm in with a cloud of tear gas. Also, even if he did have a gas mask, how do you get the smell of tear gas out of your office???? I think the writer would've been better off driving Spider-Man off with just the police instead of throwing tear gas in the mix.

Actually, if I was going to re-write this story, I wouldn't have Spider-Man ever notice the pendant. That would remove the discontinuity of Spider-Man recognizing the pendant that he's never seen before. We could also remove the scene with him visiting Joe Robertson as well since he would have no reason to talk to Robertson about the pendant. We could've cut from him dragging out of bed in the afternoon to him visiting and moping around MJ's apartment.

It's nice to see Harry's outburst have an affect on MJ. Before, she was constantly trying to drag Peter out of his funk, but with Harry's biting comments earlier, she's decided that it's not worth the trouble, and kicks Peter out of her apartment for being a drag. She's not totally out of character though because she's briefly considers letting down her guard and allowing herself to care about Peter before she steels herself to kicking him out.

We finish off the whole story with John transforming into the Man-Wolf that evening. He shocks his father who witnesses the transformation. We see him on verge of feeding on a mugger in the alley behind his apartment before seeing and attacking his fiance. I'm pretty sure this terminates the engagement as I don't believe we see or hear about his fiance after this issue.

Kristine does have a nice car though. Some old 40's style roadster convertible. Just thought I'd mention that.

Peter somehow manages to recognize the Man-Wolf's 'costume' as an astronaut suit. I'm not sure how he makes that connection, but it does put him in the right place at the right time to rescue the girl, rip the pendant off the Man-Wolf's neck, and basically save the day. Jonah continues to play the role of the publicity obsessed publisher by acting more concerned about the publicity of bring John to the doctor rather than his son's health. This also gives Spider-Man the opportunity to play "holier than thou" and talk down to Jonah. This whole conversation at the end leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

All in all, not a particularly good story or issue.

Art Review:

Y'know... I really don't have a lot to say about the artwork this issue. It's completely bland. I mean, this is pretty much what I would consider completely average Spider-man artwork. There's nothing particularly good about the issue, but on the other hand, I didn't see anything that stood out as being bad either. I think this is the start of a long run of Amazing Spider-Man for Ross Andru. At least, I know he does this issue, and I see he does a whole slew of issues around #150. I'm not sure yet how many in between he does as well.

Action Factor:

A little more action this issue than last. Two fights over a total of six pages. Actually, the beginning fight, silly as it (See review why), provides most of the action. We get a good glance at how feral and animalistic the Man-Wolf is. He fights Spider-Man without a care for his own safety. Spider-Man should've ended this fight an issue ago, but it isn't until innocents get threatened that he gets his head in the game and takes the Man-Wolf out without much ado.

Spider-Villain lessons 101:

Tip #1:
Two fight tips for the price of one! Spider-Man distracted doesn't fight nearly as well as he can. And threatening innocents is a sure-fire way to get Spider-Man's head back in the game.