Review: AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #4

| July 22, 2014 | Comics | 2 Comments

Writer:  Dan Slott
Penciler:  Humberto Ramos
Inker:  Victor Olazaba
Colors:  Edgar Delgado
Letterer:  Chris Eliopoulos

Amazing Spider-Man #4 takes it turn tying into the event series Original Sin with an issue focusing on the new character, Silk.  Dan Slott has been pulling the curtain back on Silk over the last three issues, and here we get her full debut.  How does she tie into Spider-Man’s origin?  And what other people from Spider-Man’s past does she have a connection to?  We start to get clues here.

Amazing Spider-Man #4 Original Sin interior art

What I Liked

The premise of Original Sin is secrets being pushed to the forefront and the heroes responding to them.  When The Orb explodes one of The Watcher’s eyes, the assembled heroes are overwhelmed with new secrets and visions from the past.  For Spider-Man, he’s taken back to the incident where he was bitten by the radioactive spider.  What we learn is after the spider bit Peter Parker, it also bit a girl named Cindy Moon.  It’s here where we see her connection to another person from Spider-Man’s past.

I have to admit that I am not familiar with this person, so I can’t safely say if they are a friend or foe.  But Slott has managed to introduce Silk in a way that naturally fits.

Humberto Ramos lends his expressive pencils to this issue.  I believe he is the one who designed the visual look for Silk.  She has slight variations on her powers that Spider-Man does not have, and Ramos displays them well.  Plus, her suit is totally made up of webbing.  This could go in either the positive or negative column.  It’s a positive because of how creative it is, but with the strong focus on having female characters not be seen as sexual items, a woman who’s only clothing is webbing can be seen as a step backwards.

What I Didn’t Like

I already mentioned Silk’s clothing, but let me mention one other thing about her.  I’m already a fan, and hope Slott has big plans in store for her.  I’m sure she’ll be involved in the upcoming Spider-Man event Spider-Verse.  I don’t want to see her go the way of Alpha.  Alpha was billed as Spider-Man’s new sidekick.  Perhaps it was the negative reaction that fans gave to Alpha that made him not pan out the way he should have.  New unique characters like Alpha and Silk have loads of potential and shouldn’t be shuttered to the sidelines and forgotten about.

Amazing Spider-Man #4 Original Sin cover

Summary

Wonderful story mostly revolving around Silk’s origin.  Her being involved in Spider-Man’s origin is a nice setup.  We catch up briefly with Black Cat, one of the antagonists in this opening arc.  Could Silk and Spider-Man form a new partnership, taking the place of the one Spider-Man had with Black Cat?  Or could she turn out to be a new foe?  We have to keep reading to find out.

Rating:  4 out of 5

This review is written in partnership with Pop Culture Network.  They can be found at their website http://www.popculturenetwork.com/

#ComicBookChronicles @CBChron founder. Editor-in-Chief of @thekliqnation. Comic book reviewer, podcaster #RABBLERABBLE

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  • ComicBook Coby

    Silk is a surprisingly fresh and vibrant new character–I’m looking forward to seeing more of her. They also set up some of the upcoming Spider-Verse stuff, so that should be interesting (although, not having read the previous Amazing Spider-Man stories, I was pretty lost on the references…).

    more at http://cobyscomics.blogspot.com/2014/07/cobys-top-5-comics-of-week-of-72314.html

    • I didn’t know the backstory to the person that Silk was tied to too. Sounds like Spider-Verse should have huge impact on Spider-Man line of books.