Well, a new year has dawned on us and I’m starting it off by
looking at media featuring martial arts. That’s what January has been about for the
last few years and I still want to keep it up. Sorry for starting a little
late. So, what can I say that isn’t related to me making fun of the fact that
Spider-Man: Homecoming pushed Black Panther back a few months? I might as well
let go now. I don’t need to mention it anymore especially since I watched
Homecoming with a pretty cool lady. Wait, what else has happened that involves a certain creator of Marvel’s Ultimate Universe?
For those who don’t know, Brian Michael Bendis, the writer
of this series and many other series, has left Marvel for DC Comics. It was
something that literally got me out of bed when I saw it on my phone. I didn’t
believe and I’m still pretty shocked. One may wonder what caused him to leave
but I wanna know what he’s going to do at DC. Maybe he could do justice with
the Outsiders or B’Wanna Beast. Just keep him away from Superman because I can
see that going either way.
Anyway, the next volume for this series is "Ultimate Knights" and it contains Ultimate Spider-Man #106-111. The creative team is pretty much
the same. Bendis is writing, Andrew Hennessy is inking, and Justin Ponsor
handles the colors. Mark Bagley is still on pencils but it has to be said that
this is his last arc with this series. He and Bendis stuck with this series for
over 110 single issues. Not many teams have done that. At the end of this arc,
he passes the torch-shaped pencil to Stuart Immonen who does a few pages here. So,
let’s see what happens when Spidey teams up with some martial artists, a crazy
guy, a sorcerer, and a blind lawyer.
Ultimate Spider-Man Volume 18: Ultimate Knights
Writer: Brian Michael Bendis
Pencils: Mark Bagley and Stuart Immonen
Inks: Andrew Hennessy
Colors: Justin Ponsor
Letters: Corey Petit
SYNOPSIS
Things are in flux with the Parker boy. Things are kind of
looking good for him. His relationship with Aunt May is better. He’s even back
together with MJ. The whole city’s even looking at him better because of his
recent battles. Of course, there is the fact that he hasn’t told Kitty that
he’s back with MJ. What makes it worse is that she ends up transferring to
Midtown High for reasons that may be in the Ultimate X-Men series. There’s also
the fact that he and May need to talk about the Spider-Man business.
Pete, I like you and all, but what about the X-Girlfriend? Dude!
Then, crap really hits the fan when Peter is visited by Matt
Murdock, aka Daredevil. It turns out that he has been assembling a team to
finally take down the Kingpin. Peter is reluctant but goes to their first
meeting. He pretty much runs into most of the lower-tier heroes he’s met over
the last year: Daredevil, Moon Knight, Doctor Strange, Iron Fist, and
Shang-Chi. Daredevil posits that they should kill Fisk but Spidey and a couple
of other heroes disagree. It’s then decided that they’ll do all they can to end
Fisk’s operations in New York without killing him. They decide to have Moon
Knight infiltrate the organization as one of Fisk’s enforcers as Ronin.
Uh... well, that didn't go well as planned.
Then, their plan pretty much fall apart. Iron Fist
(threatened by Fisk) lets Fisk know what the heroes are planning and there’s
the fact that Marc Spector (Moon Knight) is a loon. He infiltrates Fisk’s
operations and is ordered to capture Spider-man at Midtown High. He goes there,
wrecks the school, and captures Spidey. Peter later wakes up unmasked in front
of Fisk. Instead of hurting Peter, Fisk instead beats the crap out of Ronin
since he knows what’s up. Fisk also recently found out that he somehow has merchandising
rights to Spider-Man’s image, so killing will make him lose money. He threatens
Peter’s school (he can’t figure out Pete’s name since SHIELD is blocking it),
he lies to him about Matt selling them out, and lets Peter go. Fisk also has
his goons take Ronin off to the river and leave him for dead.
Later, Spidey meets up with the heroes again and almost
pummels Matt until it’s revealed that Danny actually sold them out. The group
disbands but Daredevil isn’t finished yet. He heads over to Fisk’s home and
threatens to kill Vanessa, Fisk’s comatose wife. Luckily, Spidey followed
Daredevil and gets him to stand down. He also threatens to have SHIELD all over
Fisk’s operations if Fisk doesn’t leave New York. Fisk leaves vowing revenge
but the police show up at his plane in order to arrest him. It turns out that
Marc survived his injuries and told the police that Fisk tried to have him
killed.
We end the trade with a long talk between Peter and Aunt
May. He lets her know everything. He tells her about how he got his powers and
about what happened with Uncle Ben. He even tells her about his facing a
villain who we know as The Spot. May doesn’t understand it all, but she knows
Peter is doing a good thing. The story ends with the two hugging it out and peasants
everywhere letting out a nice “Aww.”
Uh... excuse me. I got some water on my face.
OPINION
This was a pretty good read. After all of that clone
business, we needed something a little more grounded and the Kingpin brought
that in spades. We also get a bit of Pete’s personal life here. Pete’s life
sort of gets back to normal but he does have new challenges with Aunt May and
an X-girlfriend (ha ha). Both of peter’s interactions with them were pretty
good. The whole talk with Aunt May was pretty much a highlight unto itself.
It was pretty cool to see Marvel’s street heroes team up or
at least try to team up. It was also nice to see Bendis doing Daredevil in
another light. For those who don’t know, Bendis is remembered for having a
well-received run on Daredevil. It was nice to see the others if only it was
for a brief time. Then, we get to the Kingpin who was at his best here. Until
the end, he seems to be almost on top of everything. As for the ultimate
version of The Spot, he was alright, I guess.
As usual, the artwork is good. Bagley puts in some good work
for his last stint on the book. While I can’t say it all was his best work,
Peter’s scenes with Aunt May towards the end were pretty awesome. Stuart
Immonen’s few pages were pretty good too. It gave readers a taste of what
Immonen brought to the book after Bagley’s departure. What action we got was
good as usual and the small moments between characters were good.
While I like this one, it does have a couple of pitfalls
here and there. I wish the other street-level hroes got a little more to do.
Outside of Daredevil, Moon Knight, and maybe Strange, the other two get little
to do. The team really doesn’t even get to throw down. At
least I’ll be getting back to Shang-Chi and Danny here soon. I also thought the
Moon Knight scenes with his different personalities interacting was a bit
weird. Other than those things and a couple of nitpicks, this was really good.
Reveals/Unmaskings of Spider-Man: 1
We get one unmasking this time. When Peter gets captured by
Ronin, he wakes up unmasked in front of Wilson Fisk. Fisk doesn’t find out his
name thanks to SHIELD essentially blocking it. Still, it’s a nice unmasking
and shows that Fisk can screw you even when he actually doesn’t know your name.
Total Reveals/Unmaskings of Spider-Man: 19
HIGHLIGHTS
Finally, here are some of the highlights from the trade:
-Ultimate Meeting: it was cool seeing all of these
street-level heroes finally meet for the first time. While they didn’t truly
fight together, it was still nice to see.
-Kingpin’s Threats: Fisk’s threats to Peter (and the team)
were nice and pretty scary. It’s the best I’ve ever seen from this version of
Fisk.
-Spidey’s Intervention with Daredevil: Spider-Man’s intervention with
Daredevil was quite nice. He always got "the Uncle Ben" maneuver to pull.
-The Talk: The whole issue with Peter and May’s talk is a
highlight. Not only do we get good dialogue, we get Bagley and Immonen artwork.
……………………………………………
Well, that ends that. I definitely recommend this trade to
be read. With how everything is available these days, it’s easy to find. As for
any more posts on Ultimate Spider-Man, this might be the last for a while. If I
do come back with more from this universe, I may be doing it a little
different. Hey, you’ll know something when I figure it out. Anyway, I’ll be
back with some more martial arts goodness. Until then, Peace, God Bless, and be
careful out there.
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