Well, the madness starts here and man was it good. The whole concept of Spider Island is seeing our favorite Wall Crawler contending with a whole city of regular people with Spider-Powers! Ridiculous right? But oh so fun! And unlike X-men Schism where I had no idea what I was getting except an eventual schism between the X-men, Spider Island delivers and I have to admit after hearing so much about Dan Slott- He is great at writing Spidey. Not to mention the $3.99 price tag was definitely worth how long the issue was, I wish every comic I bought lasted so long.

So the issue starts off with giving everybody, especially new readers I’m assuming, the low down on what’s going on in Spidey’s world and in particular in New York City. He’s balancing his life between his solo career, two Avengers teams and the Future Foundation (Fantastic Four). He is generally loved by the public and police for his assistance in the fight against crime and Mayor J. Jonah Jameson still hates his guts, branding him a menace. A move that by the way completely backfires on his approval ratings. Peter is also working at Horizon Labs, where constantly gets to make improvements to his spider suit and gadgets also while making a living. Peter is also getting karate lessons from Shang-Chi in his spare time (What spare time?), so the more I think about it, the more I see Spidey as becoming Batman with his gadgets and mastery of the martial arts.

Anywho, who shows up but our old friend the Jackal, who is of course up to his cloning shenanigans to the max and apparently behind the infestation of spider powered transmitting bed bugs we’ve heard so much about. But the bigger mystery is who the mysterious “benefactor” is behind the Jackal’s work. All I know is that she is red headed and her word bubbles are also red, but that really means nothing. So who is she? Madame Web? Mary Jane? I’m sure we’ll find out in due time.

Overall I have to give this issue and beginning of Spider Island a 5 out of 5 bears. After not having read a Spidey comic in so long it was great to pick up and read an issue that was worth the price in length and the quality of writing from Slott. I was really digging the art by Stefano Caselli. It has that cartoonish look but mixed with something in the caliber of Salvador Larocca whom I believe is the best artist in the business today. Keep it up Caselli! Can’t wait for the next part of Spider Island when things really kick into full gear.