Even though Spider-Man is my top hero of all time, I have little tolerance for the Spider-Verse. Sure, both animated movies and characters like Spiders Gwen and Ham are fun, but the success of those films and the event that started it all has created a pool of Spidey variants that have become pretty exhausting. Thankfully that doesn’t apply to one of the few Spidey variants that existed BEFORE the Spider-Verse craze: Spider-Man Noir, who makes his return to comics in a new collection timed perfectly for his big Amazon Prime streaming show. Yet Spider-Man Noir: The Gwen Stacy Affair from Erik Larsen and artists Andrea Broccardo and Marika Cresta is no mere tie-in cash grab. Instead, it’s a fun and very entertaining enrichment of this Spidey’s world.
Newly returned to his home dimension after another trip around the Spider-Verse, Peter Parker (noir edition) is trying to piece his life back together. Since his months long sojourn, Aunt May lost her house and moved in with her friend Anna, Peter and MJ split up, and there’s a growing Nazi presence among New York City’s criminal element that is leading to even more headaches for Spidey than usual. Behind on office rent for his private investigation firm, Parker’s about to pack it all in when Gwen Stacy arrives, begging Peter to help find her father’s killer. But soon into the investigation Peter makes a chilling discovery: Gwen’s father George wasn’t just a part of the devious Scorpion Gang, he was also killed by Spider-Man himself!
One of the aspects that makes The Gwen Stacy Affair so entertaining is the lengths it goes to establish this take on Spidey as its own. While we get the mainstays of the mythos here with Mary Jane, Aunt May, and the classic “Parker luck”, much of this volume of Spider-Man Noir is full of original villains and situations that fit the noir setting perfectly. Aside from the Scorpion Gang, there’s not a single revamped classic Spidey rogue to be found, and instead we’re treated to some really interesting and unique villains like Hard-boil, Plasma-Man, and my personal favorite, Fliegende Fledermaus, a bat-themed villain who makes the biggest impact with the fewest page count. That commitment to originality was something I wasn’t expecting, and really makes this particular tale stand out when so often with these tales we just get the same Spider-Man villains and characters put through a different filter.
Marvel
Another surprise is Erik Larsen’s appearance here on some of the first Marvel work he’s done in a long time. The Savage Dragon creator was one of the big Marvel names that bailed to start Image Comics in the early ’90s, and while he’s returned to Marvel in the past, it’s surprising to see him come back for something like this. Yet his script is fun and finds a perfect balance between noir stylings and classic Spider-Man stories that longtime fans of his Spidey work will love. As one of the big creators that worked on the title when I was first getting into comics decades ago, it was a treat to not only see his name on the cover, but to also see that he really did a great job with this series, even though his script does tend to dip into the melodrama more than it should.
Larsen also uses the noir genre trappings for good and bad here, which means that characters like Gwen Stacy are sadly nothing more than plot devices to help move the case along, even though her relationship with Peter and the fact that he killed her father as Spider-Man is the big dramatic lynchpin of the series. There’s also the feeling of a similar story structure throughout the five issues, as Spidey fights a new bad guy, discovers a new part of the mystery with George Stacy’s death, and then unpacks that information with either Aunt May or Mary Jane (who both know his secret in this universe). As a monthly book that’s fine, but when read all at once it gets a little repetitive.
Marvel
While there are two artists credited on the book, Andrea Broccardo handles four out of the five issues in this collection, and their style is good for an action book but missing some of the noir stylings of the older Noir series from the mid 2000s. That being said, Broccardo’s depictions of Spidey flying through the air and taking on villains is really fun, and their cartoonier style will work wonders on a mainline Spidey book if they ever get the chance. Marika Cresta’s fill in issue is also well done, and focuses more on a side quest than the main case Peter’s on, so while it doesn’t fit wholly with Broccardo’s style, the fact that the issue is also going down a “side mission” to the case makes it a little easier to handle.
With so many Spider-Man books out there, a lot will get lost in the shuffle, but with eyes on this version of the character thanks to the upcoming show, I hope people snag this volume up. It’s fun, easy to jump into, and gives the character of Spider-Man Noir his own universe to really grow in, complete with his own stable of original villains and a neat spin on characters that will appease fans of Spider-Man from other media. The sheer fact that Aunt May and Mary Jane both know Peter’s secret and offer him advice in this universe is a breath of fresh air for this current Spidey reader, and while the ending is a little more concrete than I was expecting, I’d love to see more on this character from this creative team. But even if we don’t, this is the first of the many Spider-Verse adjacent books that I’ve read that can stand alongside the original Spider-Man Noir stories.
You must be logged in to post a comment.