Spider-Gwen: Gwenverse #5: End Of Time

Gwen Stacy is your typical teenager, she’s in a band, goes to school, loves her dad and is your occasional neighborhood hero, Ghost-Spider. With great power comes great responsibility, right? When she tires of the humdrum of Earth-65 and her less-than-adrenaline-pumping foes, her boredom with the usual neighborhood threats gets her into a mess well over her head… and makes a decision that changes the multiverse.

Everything has a cause and an effect, an action and a consequence. Gwen’s unfortunately ended in creating five dimensions with very distinct Gwen Stacys, each unique to their own world.Gwen has now gathered all five Gwens (Captain America: Gwen Rogers, Thorgwen: Gwendolyn Janus, Wolverine: Gwen Howlett, IronG.W.E.N: Toni Stacy and Nightbird: Gwen Stacy). Individually they are each powerful and can handle themselves in a good fight but will that be enough to take arch-villain Finale out.

Finale is easily the most formidable forces Gwen Stacy has encountered, manipulating and demolishing time and dimensions. She’s not only got skills, she’s strong and doesn’t back from a fight and punches way, way above Gwen’s weight class. Gwens of the multiverse have there work cut out for them, but since when did a Spider-person ever back away from overwhelming odds? I appreciate the colorfulness and diversity brought together in each character throughout the issue. They all share more than the name Gwen. They feel guilt and carry it with them as their drive. Seems like every Spider, no matter the universe, utilizes and harnesses their potential through guilt. Ghost-Spider is no different, and each new Gwen is an extension of her.

I do wish we got to see more of each Gwen, particularly Wolverine and Thorgwen as their stories have some real potential. Between them and the villain I have really enjoyed this series. Finale is probably one of my most recent favorites Marvel has given us. She’s different, and different done well does wonders in a multiverse full of infinite possibilities. This series was fun to read from the story to the artwork.

The colors all encompassed everything I would want from a Ghost-Spider comic and added more with the introduction of other characters, such as Finale and Wolverine. Finale is described in the book to be a combination of Gaga and Dr. Doom and could not be a more accurate description. Her high pony and eclectic future garments place her from a time in the future. Pinks and blues and her line work very, and are sharply-rendered. Wolverine combines the colors of vibrant yellow and blue reaching outside the scope of pink and blue which is typical of a Gwen Stacy comic.

So much was devoted to the color and artwork in this series. I couldn’t take my eyes off the page I looked at everything. Fernando Sifuentes and Jodi Nishijima did an amazing job with this book. What a fantastic team to capture Tim Seeley’s story. If I were them I would be very proud of this book!