Hawkeye 12
Fraction (w) and Francavilla (a and c)
Barney Barton's back and I'm kind of dumb for not connecting it all. I don't know if you guys did but I sure didn't. Last issue, Lucky saw a guy who he thought might have been Clint getting beat up by tracksuit draculas and barked at them to help him get away. That guy, of course, was Barney. Fraction does a great job in all of his books but in this one particular framing stories against one another. It comes up a ton in this book where something from an issue or two previous will play a very minor role in the next book just to give us a sense of time. It's a really phenomenal tactic if done right and it keeps the reader involved. So here, Barney is back, penniless and begging for change, and wants to meet with Clint. The story is split between present day and flashbacks to their youth, where they were abused by their father and where Clint couldn't help fighting back. Barney kept out of it, mostly, but did his part to make sure Clint was strong enough to fight. In the present, Barney has accidentally run afoul of the tracksuit draculas simply by looking like Clint. They offer him money to let them hit him, which he accepts, but of course they renege on the deal. Twice. The second time, he fights back, beating them all up with relative ease. They try to run but he draws his bow from his duffel bag and shoots the tires of their van out, collecting the money from them when they've screeched to a halt. Finally he meets up with Clint at Clint's building and they embrace.
It's a very sweet issue for Barney, who has taken a lot of heat in the last several years at Marvel, from joining Norman Osborn's Dark Avengers to blinding Hawkeye for a bit in there. This issue would make it seem like he might be trying to come back a little bit, in his own way, but it's hard to put too much on that at this point. Still, the relationship that Fraction establishes between the brothers is a touching one and one that fits nicely into their past, even despite everything that's come before. Not to mention Clint could use another ally or two right now and, given Barney's strength, his brother would make a pretty useful one. Francavilla's art is, as ever, pretty gorgeous and his colors are always haunting. He does a great job, even alongside Aja's art, making Barney look the role of the older brother to Clint's younger brother. Aja has redefined Hawkeye, especially as Jeremy Renner's influence pours into the 616, as a dirty and beat-up kind of guy, making him look maybe a little older than his cinematic counterpart or his typical Avengers look, but Francavilla frames it nicely under Barney's age, who looks fine but rather more beaten and aged. Little touches add immensely to the bigger picture.
Superior Spider-Man 13
Slott and Gage (w) and Camuncoli, Dell, and Pallot (a) and Fabela (c)
Spider-Man has been given the go-ahead from Jameson to stop Smythe by any means necessary. Smythe, meanwhile, is counting on Peter's personality and his need to save the civilians. He continues to flaunt the fact that he's sent Scorpion and Vulture to attack Jameson and the onlookers in the hopes that Spider-Man will allow him to escape in exchange for their lives. Unfortunately, this continues to not be Peter Parker and so he's not going to be dissuaded by a little thing like innocent lives. He attacks Smythe full out, landing a couple of huge blows that eventually kill Smythe. Doc doesn't waste time on pitying him, choosing instead to think about how worthless Smythe was and how he would never have let the hostages go. He returns to the rest of the people to find that Vulture has been talked down a bit (mostly by Nora, who invokes the knowledge of his grandson, and by everyone else playing on leaving him a legacy worth remembering) and then stunned by that jerk security guy and that the Lizard, apparently gone full Curtis Connors (aside from the appearance), has saved Jameson from Scorpion. They all return to the entrance of the Raft before Smythe reappears, his body almost entirely destroyed and his consciousness barley running on fumes. He unleashes his final plan: to swap consciousness with Spider-Man. Of course, Doc Ock is maybe the only person in the world who would be prepared for such an attempt and, as such, he stops Smythe again, revealing to him that he is, in fact, Doc Ock as Smythe dies. On the ride back to the mainland, Spidey convinces Jameson (through a little bit of blackmail) not to close down the Raft but, instead, to turn it over to him as a base of operations, dubbing it Spider Island 2. The last page shows Spider-Man making some phone calls to build himself a bit of an army.
The most impressive thing about this book so far has been the slow burn we've seen with Doc's personality. Has he been, at his best points, a more efficient superhero than Peter was? Sure. Has he crossed the lines that Peter would never cross? Yes, for better or worse. Each issue out, though, it seems like his plan for a superior Spider-Man coincides with the way he ran things as Doctor Octopus. It's still a little early to say (because Slott doesn't want to waste his ammo so quickly and it would be silly to do so) but each step seems to push him a bit more away from Spider-Man and a bit more towards Doc Ock. Maybe he'll re-design Spider-Man's old Civil War Iron Spider costume to give himself the extra arms. Either way, it's been a stellar book with these new fresh changes and, though I continue to miss Peter (and wouldn't be surprised to see him revived in time for his new movie next May), there have been a lot of interesting developments to keep this idea fresh, not just a series of Doc Ock trying to keep his identity secure.
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