THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #168

"Murder On The Wind!"

• Writer: Len Wein
• Artist: Ross Andru
• Inker: Mike Esposito
• Print Date: May, 1977

Featuring:

Plot Summary:

To recap: Our hero is hypnotized into immobility by the ethereal figure who calls himself Will O' The Wisp, and now they have both been unexpectedly confronted by Jonah Jameson's incredible Spider-Slayer!

As Spider-Man stands helplessly by, Jonah attacks Will O' The Wisp for the rights to the helpless Spider-Man. While Will O The Wisp merely wants to take the envelope and leave, Jonah has been waiting for years to put an end to the miserable wall-crawler. During the fight, a blast of light from Jonah's Spider-Slayer strikes Spider-Man in the face. It doesn't do any damage (why not?), but it does release Spider-Man from the power of the hypnotic spell. Suddenly freed, Spider-Man knocks the Spider-Slayer back into a startled Will O' The Wisp, and while the two untangle themselves, Spider-Man hides the envelope he "borrowed" from Jonah nearby.

With Spider-Man and the Spider-Slayer watching, Will O' The Wisp screams out from the pain in his head and vanishes in a ball of light. Leaving just the two of them, Spider-Man and the Spider-Slayer battle to a standstill across the ice. The tide finally turns in Spider-Man's favor when the Spider-Slayer crashes into a giant bronze statue of Prometheus which falls and pins the Spider-Slayer beneath its oppressive weight.

And, in the Empire State University Laboratory of Dr. Marla Madison, the frustrated publisher of the Daily Bugle tears a certain psycho-cybernetic helmet from his head in rage. As Jonah mourns his lost opportunity, Dr. Madison promises that they can rebuild the Spider-Slayer making it more powerful than before.

Shortly on the tar-papered roof of Peter Parker's rundown apartment building in Chelsea, Peter lowers himself through his bathroom skylight, and opens up Jonah's envelope. Inside, he finds photos of Spider-Man discarding the body of the Jackal's clone of Spider-Man. Remembering back, Peter does recall thinking that someone was watching him out at the incinerating plant, but who?

While in a tenement loft uptown, Will O' The Wisp returns to the run-down lair of Jonah Harrow whose recall device forced him to abandon the fight earlier. Will O' The Wisp explains it was Spider-Man who prevented him from stealing the plans, and Harrow, tired of being thwarted by Spider-Man, orders Will O' The Wisp to destroy Spider-Man or be destroyed by Harrow's implant.

In Peter Parker's darkroom, our hero has concocted some scheme about Jonah's photos. As he waits for some negatives to dry, he finds Mary Jane in this kitchen making tea.

We'll leave the pair for now, and catch up with Spider-Man sometime later. Spider-Man sneaks into Jonah's office again and replaces the envelope right where he found it before. As leaves the Bugle however, he's surrounded by a ball of light. Will O' The Wisp has returned and, regretfully, is back for Spider-Man's death. The two battle to a standstill as Will O' The Wisp is unwilling and somewhat reluctant to get a good shot in on Spider-Man, and his intangibility prevents Spider-Man from getting a good shot on him. The presence of Harrow in the crowd of onlookers prevents Will O' The Wisp from disobeying his orders directly. Will O' The Wisp finally resorts to hypnotizing the crowd to attack Spider-Man while he watches from above.

Spider-Man frees himself from the frenzied mob and confronts Will O' The Wisp atop a neon sign away from any unwitting victims. Will O' The Wisp recounts the accident that destroyed the natural magnetic adhesion of his body's molecules. In search of a cure to restore his lost humanity, he found himself involved with Harrow who implanted a device in his skull. If activated, the device would scatter The Wisp's atoms across the city. Deciding to end the fight, Will O' The Wisp channels the electricity running through the neon sign into Spider-Man. However, before he can finish Spider-Man off, he realizes that to do so, he would be sacrificing his humanity forever. In a rage, he leaps at Harrow standing in the crowd below, but Harrow simply presses the device in pocket. In a cry of pain, the Wisp's molecules simply fall apart and drift away.