{"id":9449,"date":"2023-09-22T23:04:40","date_gmt":"2023-09-22T22:04:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=9449"},"modified":"2023-09-22T23:04:40","modified_gmt":"2023-09-22T22:04:40","slug":"uncanny-spider-man-1-annotations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=9449","title":{"rendered":"Uncanny Spider-Man #1 annotations"},"content":{"rendered":"

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>UNCANNY SPIDER-MAN #1<\/strong>
\n“Park Life”<\/strong>
\nWriter: Si Spurrier<\/strong>
\nArtist: Lee Garbett<\/strong>
\nColour artist: Matt Milla<\/strong>
\nLetterer: Joe Caramagna<\/strong>
\nDesign: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen<\/strong>
\nEditor: Sarah Brunstad<\/strong>
\nEditor-in-chief: C B Cebulski<\/strong><\/p>\n

UNCANNY SPIDER-MAN<\/strong> is the latest iteration of the book formerly known as\u00a0Way of X\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0Legion of X<\/em>. We last saw Nightcrawler in\u00a0X-Men: Before the Fall – Sons of X<\/em> #1 (which was effectively a\u00a0Legion of X<\/em> special), in which he was freed from Orchis and reunited with the “Hopesword” that Margali Szardos conjured out of him in\u00a0Legion of X\u00a0<\/em>#10. Then he decided to leave Krakoa, which is why he wasn’t around for the Hellfire Gala.<\/p>\n

COVER \/ PAGE 1.<\/strong> Nightcrawler in action as “Spider-Man”.<\/p>\n

PAGES 2-3.\u00a0<\/strong>John Romita tribute pages.<\/p>\n

PAGES 4-9.\u00a0<\/strong>“Spider-Man” defeats some organ thieves.<\/em><\/p>\n

Shocker tech.<\/strong> The thieves are apparently using the technology of perennial Spider-Man D-list villain the Shocker – and they’re so far down the pecking order that they think it’s impressive.<\/p>\n

“Entschulgigung.” <\/strong>“Excuse me.”<\/p>\n

Nightcrawler is wearing a modified Spider-Man costume with a mask, though he’s not exactly going overboard to disguise himself – his tail is in full view and his unusual hands and feet are also clearly visible. Plus, he’s still wearing his red and black colour scheme. This seems to me more of an exercise in plausible deniability.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The sword is the Hopesword, which he evidently produces from inside his body. The sound effect when he puts it away again is rather disconcerting, but he doesn’t seem to be in any pain.<\/p>\n

PAGE 10.\u00a0<\/strong>Some random park dwellers approach.<\/em><\/p>\n

In the first panel, Nightcrawler is looking at the burnt ruins of the Treehouse, the X-Men’s former New York headquarters. It is indeed right next to Central Park – according to\u00a0X-Men<\/em> #1, it’s on “the southwest corner of the 86th Street Central Park Transverse”.<\/p>\n

We’ll find out later who the woman muttering about her baby is – the others in the group call her “Sad Suzie”.<\/p>\n

PAGES 11-13. <\/strong>A Sentinel approaches.<\/em><\/p>\n

This is one of the Stark Sentinels seen in\u00a0X-Men<\/em> and\u00a0Invincible Iron Man<\/em>. It detects Nightcrawler as a mutant but somehow gets tricked into changing its mind. The voice that whispers in Nightcrawler’s ear in page 12 panel 2, and takes credit for thwarting the Sentinel, appears to be the voice of the Hopesword itself – but quite what it’s actually doing<\/em> here, and what powers it has, aren’t clear yet.<\/p>\n

Spinnenmann<\/strong>. “Spider-Man” in German, obviously.<\/p>\n

PAGE 14.\u00a0<\/strong>Data page – just a standard Orchis propaganda poster. Presumably the X’s on the map are the locations of disabled gates.<\/p>\n

PAGE 15.\u00a0<\/strong>Recap and credits.<\/p>\n

The title, “Park Life”, is presumably a vague reference to the 1994 Blur single, which wasn’t a hit in America, but was one of the iconic Britpop tracks (even though it only got to number 10). The story has nothing to do with it, though.<\/p>\n

PAGES 16-20.\u00a0<\/strong>Kurt and Spider-Man.<\/em><\/p>\n

I’m not honestly sure what this building is supposed to be – it doesn’t look like the Belvedere.<\/p>\n

Spider-Man has given Kurt his blessing to join the Spider-Man franchise. However, Kurt originally pitched his plan as being to hide in plain sight and clear his name after Orchis sent him to kill a bunch of people in\u00a0Sons of X<\/em>. He seems to have lost sight of all that, and is now just hanging out in the park keeping a low profile.<\/p>\n

In keeping with the “Fall of X” premise, Spider-Man is aware of Orchis’ allegations of mutants poisoning drugs and so forth, and while he doubts the allegations, he doesn’t reject them out of hand. However, he presumably sees that as an allegation against the Krakoan authorities rather than mutants in general. In fairness to Peter, he does know that the drug-poisoning really happened (if not how), and he also knows that the Quiet Council was filled with very dodgy characters, so it’s not entirely unreasonable for him to give some credence to the idea that somebody on the Quiet Council might indeed have done this on purpose.<\/p>\n

PAGES 21-25.\u00a0<\/strong>The Vulture works on Orchis’ Hound programme.<\/em><\/p>\n

The Vulture. <\/strong>Since this is a quasi-Spider-Man book, we get a quasi-Spider-Man villain. Adrian Toomes has been around since\u00a0Amazing Spider-Man<\/em> #2 (1963). He’s an odd character to use as a creator of Hounds<\/strong>, a concept which dates from the “Days of Future Past” storyline and timeline. That normally involves mutants biologically altered in some way to make them into mutant-hunting slaves; the Vulture is more of a tech guy. However, his experiments here do indeed seem to be mainly technological in nature.<\/p>\n

His outfit here also has a distinct look of techno-organics about it, with the traditional colouring of black with yellow highlights. Perhaps this storyline is picking up on Legion of X<\/em> #10, in which Warlock wound up being absorbed by Nimrod.<\/p>\n

Vulture figures out that Nightcrawler has some sort of ability to dodge the mutant sensors, but decides to call in some mercenaries rather than to pass it up the chain of command.<\/p>\n

Ultimatum-X<\/strong> is what Vulture is calling the threat to kill 10 humans for every mutant found on Earth, which Orchis made in\u00a0X-Men: Hellfire Gala 2023<\/em>. The “Fall of X” books have been wildly inconsistent about how seriously characters are taking this threat. Here, Orchis seem to regard it as something they might do occasionally for the sake of show but don’t genuinely intend to take literally. Understandably, Vulture figures that Nightcrawler might not know about it, since he wasn’t at the Gala –\u00a0Wolverine<\/em> also portrays it as an ultimatum directed more at the X-Men than against mutants in general. Wolverine, however, does<\/em> know about the ultimatum, presumably from Professor X’s attempts to march everyone through the gates; if so, Nightcrawler might well know too.<\/p>\n

The unnamed mutant being experimented upon by Vulture is\u00a0Feral<\/strong>, from the first line-up of X-Force. She was last seen living among the Marauders in Madripoor.<\/p>\n

PAGE 26.\u00a0<\/strong>Data page – Spider-Man fans discuss the new Spider-Man on the webpage mentioned by one of the organ thieves in the opening scene.<\/p>\n

“That Limbo Tower thing down on 59th”<\/strong> is the Limbo Embassy from\u00a0Dark X-Men<\/em>.<\/p>\n

PAGES 27-32.\u00a0<\/strong>“Spider-Man” stops a mugging.<\/em><\/p>\n

This jogger is about as unsympathetic as a mugging victim could get, but she\u00a0is<\/em> still a genuine member of the public, so she gets saved.<\/p>\n

The mugger is\u00a0Mystique<\/strong>, who was also the homeless woman near the start. Mystique suffered some sort of aneurysm while resisting Professor X’s attempts to march her through the gates in\u00a0Hellfire Gala 2023<\/em>, which presumably explains her confused behaviour here. Mystique is, of course, Nightcrawler’s biological mother.<\/p>\n

PAGES 33-37.\u00a0<\/strong>The mercenaries prepare to face Nightcrawler.<\/em><\/p>\n

The mercenary leader is\u00a0Silver Sable<\/strong>, another Spider-Man character, and usually an ally of his. Broadly speaking, she’s a “good” mercenary, and so an odd choice for Orchis to bring in.<\/p>\n

The photos given to the mercenaries by Orchis show Nightcrawler in his heavily mutated form from\u00a0Sons of X\u00a0<\/em>and the closing issues of\u00a0Legion of X<\/em> – which, to be fair, is what he looked like the last time they saw him.<\/p>\n

“A little documented ability to become functionally invisible in low light.”<\/strong> Early X-Men stories mention this power but are\u00a0very<\/em> inconsistent about it. X-Men\u00a0<\/i>#102 is very explicit about him having the power; the reprint of that same story in\u00a0Classic X-Men<\/em> deletes the dialogue.<\/p>\n

PAGE 38.\u00a0<\/strong>Trailers. The Krakoan reads BLUE STREAK.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As always, this post contains spoilers, and page numbers go by the digital edition. UNCANNY SPIDER-MAN #1 “Park Life” Writer: Si Spurrier Artist: Lee Garbett Colour artist: Matt Milla Letterer: Joe Caramagna Design: Tom Muller & Jay Bowen Editor: Sarah Brunstad Editor-in-chief: C B Cebulski UNCANNY SPIDER-MAN is the latest iteration of the book formerly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-annotations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9449"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9449\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9451,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9449\/revisions\/9451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}