Amazing Spider-Man #692 Review

Amazing Spider-Man #692 Review

Alpha Part 1: Point Of Origin

Written by Dan Slott

Pencils by Humberto Ramos

Inks by Victor Olazaba

Colours by Edgar Delgado

Spider-Man For A Night

Story and Art by Dean Haspiel

Colours by Giulia Brusco

Just Right

Written by Joshua Hale Fialkov

Art by Nuno Plati

Point of Origin

Story: Peter holds a demonstration of his newly discovered “Parker Particles” but there's a problem and he accidentally creates a new superhero

Review: This story introduces a Midtown high school students named Andy Maguire who is just your regular, everyday kid. He doesn't put himself out there or take any risks, he's ignored by his parents, and is hopelessly in love with a nerdy Asian girl named Chrissy Chen but she doesn't notice him. He forges his parents signature on a release form to go to Horizon Labs to see a demonstration by Peter Parker, where a disgruntled employee turns off the safety on Peter's experiment which unleashes his “Parker Particles”. While saving Chrissy Chen, Andy gets his by the particles, turning him into a superhero. A team of experts consisting of Reed Richards, Beast, Giant-man, and Tony Stark are called in to examine the boy. It is found that he has all the usual superhero powers of strength, speed, energy projection beams (accompanied by Andy saying “Pyoo! Pyoo! Pyoo!” when he fires them), a force-field, and flight, but he can only use one at a time. It's also found that his powers are tied to the universe and will grow with time. Reed Richards tells Parker that, since he created him, he's his problem and has to train him. He also has the idea to make Andy (Alpha) a sort of “Spokes-superhero” for Horizon. Alpha starts getting cocky with his power and Spidey intervenes, telling him that he's been enlisted in the “Sidekick program” for the Avengers. Spidey get called away and tells Alpha to stay put. Alpha sees this as a test and intervenes in a fight between the Fantastic Four, Spider-man, and Giganto, knocking the beast out and saying how great it is that the Avengers gave him Spider-Man as his sidekick. I'm not sure what to think of this story. To be honest, it sounds a bit standard but I have every confidence that Dan Slott can turn this into something great. Time will tell.

Spider-Man For A Night

Story: A burglar finds Spider-Man's uniform in a trash can (presumably during the “Spider-Man No More” storyline), and decides to use the suit to his advantage to steal money for his sick granddaughter

Review: Again, a pretty standard story where a thief tries to be spider-man to get money to save his sick granddaughter but discovers that it takes more than looking like a superhero to be a superhero. However, although I said it's a pretty standard story, I was nearly in tears at the end by the exchange between the thief (in the spider-man outfit) hugging his sick granddaughter. Heart-warming to say the least.

Just Right

Story: Peter sleeps in for his new position as a guest lecturer and despite all attempts to get to his job, he gets sidetracked by missing the bus, taxis being claimed by others, getting the wrong end of the stick in an alley brawl, and helping a kid that is getting bullied.

Review: I wasn't sure what to think of this story at first, but that was mainly due to the art style of Nuno Plati. It reminded me a little of anime and I wasn't too keen on how spindley Peter/Spidey were drawn. I soon grew on me, however. The story is funny and cracks on at a good pace. Peter getting confused for the Scarlet Spider was particularly funny in my view. A guest appearance by The Thing also had me laughing. The bullied kid provides a good moral of not lying and the lucky little sod even gets a kiss from She-hulk and Spider Woman.

Conclusion: I really liked this issue. It'll be interesting to see where this Alpha story goes, and the two support stories were just the icing on an already great cake. A nice tribute for Spider-Man's 50^th