ICYMI! The Amazing Spider-Man #11 – In Space, No One Can Hear You Swing

It’s that time of year again—yet another milestone issue has been reached for The Amazing Spider-Man. Issue #11 (LGY #975) arrives in all of its sixty-page glory. With two main stories and a trio of backups to boot, this one may actually be worth its $7.99 asking price, as it promises to be full of substantial story beats first and foremost, with guest appearances coming in second.

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Broken Mirror

The Amazing Spider-Man #11 opens as so many Spider-Man stories do, with John Romita Jr.’s pencils detailing both the warm past and the shattered present of Peter Parker’s life.

Our first story directly follows up on the strange antics of both Peter Parker and Spider-Man since the initial Hellgate appearance, confirming many fan theories about what has been going on over the last few issues regarding the character’s odd behavior. To my disappointment, however, this section does not exactly go into the hows and whys of our current predicament. Instead, it charges forward in a way that sets up some exciting conflicts to come, while also feeling a bit disjointed as a result.

Of course, we can expect explanations down the road, but it would have sweetened the pot here if we had gotten the best of both worlds—forward momentum and some much-needed answers.

In addition to the big identity reveals, we also get to spend more time with Aunt May and Felicia Hardy in ways more meaningful than their page count would have demanded. Kelly has made a selective effort to ensure the supporting cast receives moments of interpersonal conflict, peppered throughout the story in ways both big and small, making sure nothing is left behind as Peter’s world spirals into total chaos.

At the core of it all is a rough-and-tumble, classically constructed John Romita Jr. action scene that ties the pace of the tale together neatly. It’s an overall solid story—one that isn’t as satisfying as it could be, but still leaves a trail of breadcrumbs to get excited about as the team works to take some of the character’s biggest failures from recent years and spin them into something unique, without feeling the need to over-retcon those developments out of existence.

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Broken Man

Similar in setup, our second story leaves us with no answers as to how we got here, but in and of itself it excels at establishing a completely new status quo, with some genuinely interesting conflict at its core. Peter Parker—the real Peter Parker, that is—has been transported somewhere into deep space, where he finds himself lost within the heart of his deepest desires: science pursued for a supposed greater good.

Wrapped inside the ongoing Hellgate mystery and set against a backdrop totally new to the character, Kelly leans on his science fiction roots to deliver an atmosphere and aesthetic that feel utterly alien to Spider-Man’s usual world. Yet, at its core, it remains unmistakably Spider-Man, carried by the author’s consistently pitch-perfect voice for the character. At no point does it ever feel like you’re not reading The Amazing Spider-Man.

Pepe Larraz’s art seals the deal gracefully. His work has always excelled within the science fiction space, but it was his fluidity that brought new life and energy to the title back during the book’s first arc. Here, it’s explosively pulp in its execution of grand galactic imagery, but equally sharp and modern in its delivery of flexible, fast Spider-Man action.

While the previous tale may deal with the wider Spider-Man mythos, this one is neatly focused on an interpersonal demon Peter has struggled with since Kelly took over the title during Eight Deaths. It leads to a very satisfying, fully painted picture of the book’s heart—something that has been deeply missed over the last few years.

Dividing the series between these two stories in the months ahead seems poised to alleviate the sense of decompressed aimlessness that has plagued the title since the deletion of Spider-Man’s secondary book. Too often, so much yet so little has been explored at once. We’ve long needed a Spectacular-like counterpart, and seeing as how we won’t be getting one anytime soon, this appears to be the next best solution.

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The Backups

There are three backup stories at the end of this issue, and none of them take away from the real estate Kelly needs to flesh out his major setups for the road to ASM #1000. Two lighthearted shorts from Lee Gatlin and Jason Loo serve as a sugary blast of fun to balance the weightier tone of the main features.

But the standout is Saladin Ahmed and Pere Pérez’s follow-up to a story that debuted in Giant-Size Amazing Spider-Man #1 earlier this year. It further develops Rapid, a recent addition to the Spider-Man mythos, in an earnest tale of heroics. While it doesn’t expand the larger world, it does provide more insight into his personal motivations and future direction after his introduction.

This is exactly how backups should function in large-scale milestone issues. They’re concise addendums that feel more meaningful by being few in number. This issue matters not because of the milestone number on the cover, but because of what it delivers in the main stories—rather than falling into the trap of being a collection of disposable shorts from industry friends with little long-term value within the Spider-Man mythos.