Comics / Comic Reviews / Marvel Comics

Avenging Spider-Man #1

By Colin Andersen
November 10, 2011 - 13:00

I’d be lying if I said that I expected much from Avenging Spider-Man. It just seemed as though it’d be another one of Marvel’s sometimes continuity-light “team-up” books in the vein of Marvel Two-In-One and, more recently, Deadpool Team-Up. Possibly the only thing that actually compelled me to check out AvSM, however, was the announcement of Joe Madureira as the books artist. Being as much of child of the 90’s as I was, I am a huge fan of Joe Mad’s, especially his work on X-Men and luckily he didn’t disappoint here.
    Thankfully, however, this series seems as though it won’t have to rely exclusively on artistic merit as writer Zeb Wells creates an incredibly fun script for the issue to work with, even if it isn’t exactly deep or insightful. The story focuses on Spider-Man and Red Hulk teaming up to fight an army of Moloids and giant monsters as they attempt to kidnap J. Jonah Jameson. That’s really all there is to the plot and that’s okay; it really is similar in style to the old Marvel team-ups if they were crossed with the decompressed storytelling techniques of today and that worked for me.
    Zeb Wells’ humor is spot on in this first issue with some lines that actually made me laugh out loud, which is a tremendously impressive feat for a comic book. Wells even manages to wring some humor out of the reason these two were even together when the conflict of the story breaks out (spoiler: Spidey

needs a ride home). If you came to Avenging Spider-Man looking for some deep new insight into how Spider-Man or the Red Hulk think, then you are most definitely in the wrong place: this book exists for fun and crazy scenarios and that’s it, but if you’re just looking for a good time, then have at it.
    Madureira certainly shows why fans have been clamoring for his return to regular comic books with this issue. His art is delightfully fun to look at he seems to nail just about every character he draws in a truly impressive fashion. Admittedly, his muscular and slightly exaggerated, loose style might not be for everybody, but if you like big over-the-topness in your comic book art, he’ll be right up your alley. If nothing else, Madureira is one of the few artists that can successfully make Moloids look somewhat threatening, so he has at least that going for him. I do think Madureira would have bemefited from actually having an inker on this issue instead of just having his pencils colored as it would have made the book look a little cleaner and more polished, but it’s not a huge problem.
    I am really amazed at just how much fun I had with Avenging Spider-Man. It’s by no means a perfect book and some will find too little real substance to the series, but to me it was the perfect cross of the team-ups of yesteryear with the storytelling of modern comics. Perhaps the biggest problem here is the $3.99 price tag, though. This is a quick read that is definitely more flash than substance, even if it is entertaining flash and, because of that, I feel that unless my description sounds like the perfect kind of book for you, it might be better to wait for the trade on this one or else you may not feel like you’re getting your money’s worth. To be fair though, Marvel is including a free digital download of the issue when you buy the physical copy so that may alleviate price issues for some. That being said, I think any fan of Spider-Man should check this issue out at some point.

Rating: 8.5 /10

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12