Spider-Man Reviews: Amazing Spider-Man 33, Amazing Spider-Man 34

Amazing Spider-Man #33 (February 1966) – “The Final Chapter” – Stan Lee/Steve Ditko

This one follows straight from last issue, with Spider-Man trapped under tons of steel and the chamber about to be flooded. He summons all his strength and will power, lifting the impossible weight off himself and grabbing the serum just in time. The chamber floods but he rides it out and makes it to the surface, only to run into the Master Planner’s gang again. Spidey’s exhausted, but his desire to save Aunt May lets him beat the odds and pound the gang into submission. He gets the serum to Connors and tests it on his own blood. When the serum gets rid of the radioactivity, he takes it to the hospital to give it to Aunt May’s doctors. Not wanting to wait around, he heads back to the hideout to take a few photos, tipping off the cops and Foswell. Peter takes the photos to sell to Jameson and Betty freaks out when she sees how beat up he is, giving him shit for being such an action junkie. Peter makes Jameson pay top dollar for the photos (though Jameson thinks he’s getting away with something) and heads to the hospital, where he finds Aunt May is recovering nicely.

This is a classic issue, with the now-iconic scene of Spider-Man lifting the steel off himself. Ditko’s art makes you feel how heavy it must be and Stan’s inner monologue fits Peter’s personality perfectly. It was nice to see Peter getting the photos of the Master Planner’s gang being unmasked and giving Foswell the tip to make up for accusing him of being the Crime Master. The stuff with Betty is getting annoying; Peter’s made up his mind about her, so why doesn’t she just marry Ned and shut the hell up? We don’t find out what happened to Doc Ock when his hideout got flooded, but he’ll be back. You can’t keep a classic Ditko villain down for long.

Amazing Spider-Man #34 (March 1966) – “The Thrill of the Hunt” – Stan Lee/Steve Ditko

This one starts with Kraven brooding about not defeating Spider-Man in their first encounter. HE decides to come back to New York for a rematch. Meanwhile, Betty’s having dreams about Peter being Spider-Man, Aunt May’s getting out of the hospital, and Peter finds out his classmates at Empire State University don’t like him because they think he’s been snubbing them since the beginning of school. When Kraven arrives in the city, he impersonates Spider-Man and starts harassing Jonah Jameson to make Spidey look bad and get his attention. Jameson loves it because he’s selling more papers (and it gives him a concrete reason for his hatred of Spider-Man), but Peter figures he’d better find this impostor before he does some real damage. Since Kraven wants to be found, he makes it easy and sprays Spidey with a potion to dull his spider-sense. After a cat-and-mouse chase and running fight (interrupted briefly by some punks who want to waste Spidey), the two of them square off and Spider-Man kicks Kraven’s ass. Kraven’s sense of honour forces him to admit to the cops that he was the one harassing Jameson, thus exonerating Spider-Man (and pissing JJJ off to no end). At the end of the issue, we see Betty has left town, but Peter doesn’t know that yet.

This is a pretty good issue with some cool fight scenes between Spidey and Kraven, as well as Spidey kicking the shit out of some gangsters (and Kraven even takes a few out himself). Kraven’s exaggerated sense of honour first shows up here, with him confessing after Spidey beats him. Kraven’s last appearance was actually in the first annual, but he acts like that never happened. We’ll also get a retcon later that says Green Goblin (aka Norman Osborn) paid Kraven to go after Spidey here, but it sure doesn’t seem like that’s his motivation. I suppose Kraven would’ve gone after Spider-Man anyway, but figured he may as well take Osborn’s money just to cover his expenses. Those jungle potions ain’t cheap! Aunt May is out of the hospital, being looked after by Anna Watson (who was out of town, probably visiting Mary Jane and her family). I wonder if Betty’s dream is supposed to indicate that she’s figured out Peter’s secret, subconsciously at least. If so, nothing ever comes of it, but Ditko leaves before Betty gets back so maybe he would’ve had her figure it out since he seems to have thought Peter and Betty were made for each other. Peter’s unpopularity at college is a Ditko thing too, but it’ll change soon enough; Gwen is certainly intrigued by him already. When Kraven is hounding Jameson dressed as Spidey, a bystander says the FBI should get involved. That makes me wonder why no other heroes (the FF, the Avengers, Daredevil) investigated this front page story. Maybe they were all too busy with their own stuff, or maybe they know Spider-Man well enough to give him the benefit of the doubt.