Thursday, September 02, 2021

Spider-suit, spider-suit, wear that stolen spider-suit...


This was a favorite run of mine as a kid, although now I'm wondering if this was a fill-in. From 1986, Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #114, "The Key" Written by Len Kaminski, pencils by Joe Brozowski, inks by Keith Williams and Del Barras. 

With his aging dad's locksmith business floundering, a young man finds himself forced into petty burglary to try and help him keep things afloat. Interrupted by a maintenance man while trying to pick an apartment's lock, he flees into an alley and witnesses a lone cop trying scowl down a street gang. (This was a pretty white gang, as opposed to the usual sort of multicultural generic gang you'd see in a book like this, except they did have a guy that looked like he was older than Jesus.) The gang is not intimidated, but a passing Spider-Man gives them a thumping. The cop is not grateful, and Spidey swings off mad. 

Leaving the alley unseen, the young man remembers a recent client that bought "fancy locks," a guy named Parker. He breaks in, but only has time to grab a box full of electronic equipment before he hears something, namely Spidey coming in through the bathroom skylight. He's somewhat perturbed at being robbed; while the young man gets home, laments being forced into crime to make ends meet, and finds a red-and-blue costume...! Putting on the suit and web-shooters, he climbs up to a seventh-story window, figuring it would be unlocked, and enters an apartment only to immediately be spotted by its tenant, who understandably panics and offers the good silver, her jewelry, and purse. It's a nice haul, except it and the climb apparently took a while, since his webline dissolves on the way down; and a couple cops gather up the unconscious "Spider-Man" afterwards and bring him to the surly cop from earlier.

The surly cop tells the uniforms to forget this ever happened, then tries to blackmail "Spidey" into taking down the gang he had a grudge with. Afraid of being exposed, the young man tries it, and catches a relatively deserved thrashing. The cop catches a brick to the skull and is also captured; but the young man uses his electronics knowledge to rig up a signal booster for the Spider-tracer he finds in the belt, and that the real Spidey had been trying to track down. Spidey arrives in time to beat up the gang and save the cop for the second time that night, then finds the guy in his suit and is a little angry, but calms down when he realizes the guy knows he messed up. Spidey gives him the usual snow job about "his deal with Parker" as to why his spare gear was there, as well as some encouragement to get into a different line of work. The cop overhears most of this, and realizes he's been a jerk as well.

A couple weeks later, the young man's new electronics business has reinvigorated his dad's shop, but he gets sent on a call to help someone locked out of their apartment: sure enough, it's the same one he had been trying to break into before, and it's the cop's place! He does a better job getting in this time, though; noting it's much easier when you're not looking over your shoulder!

I was thinking the red-and-blue suit hadn't been seen much of late at the time, possibly remembering Web of Spider-Man #17, but that was still a few months away; Spidey may have been using both depending on which was clean, or how cheap black ink was that month...

1 comment:

  1. I mean, you can't really blame the cop for thinking that the thief was Spider-Man when he can all of sudden fill out that spare suit VERY well this instant muscles he magically gains just from putting on the suit. Shit I wish that worked that way in real life. Of course when you also consider he just saw Spidey wearing a black costume you start to wonder just how good of a cop is he if can't tell the difference. Nice fill in with a good, positive ending. I think the current day Spider-Man stories are missing this kind of element nowadays.

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