Random Happenstance

"Perfunctory" would be the word I'd use to describe this last week, as I couldn't do some stuff I usually enjoy so instead I think I did the bare functional minimum of everything to work, stay alive, etc. I need a bit of a pick-me-up, so a fun comic should hit the spot, and luckily enough this one might have two doses! From 2012, Marvel Adventures Spider-Man #23, "There Can Be Only One!" Written by Paul Tobin, pencils by Matteo Lolli, inks by Terry Pallot; and "Control Freak!" Written by Paul Tobin, art by Rob Di Salvo, color art by Sotocolor.

Highlander reference notwithstanding, nobody gets decapitated in this one, it's a kids' book! Besides, how would you decapitate MODOK? Spidey's having a busy morning wrapping up purse-snatchers and carjackers; which is weird since he's also guarding a Stark armored car from A.I.M! The beefier, guard Spider-Man doesn't make a good showing, since he's just a decoy in a suit, an actor hired to scare off thieves. It doesn't really work, although even when confronted by the real thing, MODOK still seems convinced, since there's no way a scrawny little nothing could be the genuine Spidey, right? In the end, Spidey has a pretty good sense of humor about it, even as you can see the actor, still in costume, getting interviewed by the news.

"Control Freak!" features Fantastic Four baddie the Puppet Master, who starts by using pigeons in a robbery. Luckily, Spidey has back-up: his girlfriend in this series, the mutant Chat, who could talk to animals. Once Spidey squashes Puppet Master's clay effigies, he's "just a bald guy in a cheap suit!" Chat probably shouldn't let herself be seen by police detective George Stacy, but this was the second-to-last issue of this series, so OK.

I bought a little stack of these during quarantine, and luckily didn't plow through them all at once! Pretty sure we'll have at least one more before the year is out.