"The End" Week: Over the Edge #10!

OK, that gargoyle is clearly a Warwolf from Excalibur...For those of you who maybe don't recall the 90's, Marvel experimented a few times with ninety-nine cent titles: the regular issue of Daredevil the month this came out, #355, was $1.50, although there was a price increase coming up shortly. Untold Tales of Spider-Man is doubtless the best known of the ninety-nine cent titles; largely because it was just really good. And I quite liked Uncanny Origins, but I don't think I had read much, if any, of this title until recently. Luckily, I'm only paying about a penny over the 1996 price! Over the Edge #10, "The Politics of Infamy" Written by Joe Kelly, pencils by Stephen B. Jones, inks by Mike Witherby, Al Milgrom, Justin Bloomer, and Tom Palmer.

This issue did feature something I don't think you see much anymore, but was a staple maybe going out of favor at the time: the one-off villain! No huge arcs, no massive origin set piece; just fight the hero for as many pages as necessary, then wait for a surge of reader mail demanding their return; but "Infamnia" probably needed a couple more passes on workshopping that name. Daredevil saves a third-party presidential candidate from a fire, then from an attack by Infamnia, who had odd, tentacle-loaded gauntlets. The candidate tries to explain her away as a former scientist employee, who had been diagnosed with cancer, underwent the prerequisite experiments, then went nuts. It takes DD a minute, but yeah, the guy was lying, and later sets an attack helicopter on him and Infamnia. (I do feel like DD should've heard that thing coming a mile away...) She tries to kill herself in the ensuing fire, but Daredevil saves her, which also makes sure the candidate will face justice. Still, with a better name and maybe different motivation, Infamnia could've been a nice Doc Ock-kinda baddie for later use.

I also had to check Mike's: Joe Kelly wasn't the regular writer for Daredevil yet; he would take over after Karl Kesel's run. I don't know if this issue would've been a try-out for Kelly, but it's written closer to Kesel's throwback/fun-loving Daredevil; and Kelly's own run would revert him back to his more familiar brooding/borderline depressive nature. Now to throw this out there, since it's been in my head since reading these...I know it's not quite the same, but still.