Mighty Marvel Masterworks - The Amazing Spider-Man Volume 3

 

I'm sure I've mentioned it before, but naturally Spider-Man was one of my fave superheroes as a kid - a smart, geeky teenager who was constantly bullied by the jocks and hardly had any friends - sounded like me, for sure! But, he was a lot luckier with the girls than I was and, of course, he had crazy super powers! But, like Captain America, I appreciated his agility as well as his personal responsibility and ethics, although I had no interest in getting into fights constantly!

In any case, this volume compiles The Amazing Spider-Man 20-28 along with the second annual and it has fantastic artwork (no one is created for inking, so that could be his, as well) by Steve Ditko - might be heresy, but I think I dig his artwork better than even Kirby's, and their creativity is at least close to equal. Stan Lee, natch, wrote the stories - Ditko plotted a couple of them - with plenty of teen angst and love troubles to go along with the heroics and wild villains. And what a selection of foes here! The origin of the Scorpion, the Beetle, the Masters of Menace, the Green Goblin, Mysterio (undercover in a plot to drive Spidey mad!), the Crime-Master, the Molten Man, and more! There's even a team-up with Dr. Strange, most likely to bolster the latter's sales, and the initial appearances of Mary Jane Watson!

Sure, it's comics so there are plenty of stereotypical and sometimes trite plotlines, some goofy dialog, and unlikely situations, but the writing really is a step above other comics of the times damn if I didn't love these as a kid and love revisiting them now! The Mighty Marvel Masterworks series does a great job of reproducing these old comics - such fun!