Amazing Spider-Man #43 (December 1966) – “Rhino on the Rampage” – Stan Lee/John Romita
This one starts with The Rhino escaping custody and going on a rampage in New York to attract Spider-Man’s attention, since his only motivation right now seems to be revenge. We look in at the Daily Bugle and learn that Ned and Betty are now engaged and at Anna Watson’s house, Peter is mesmerized by Mary Jane (as am I). When they see the report on TV about the Rhino, MJ suggests they go check it out (lending credence to the revelation about her knowing Peter’s secret
even this far back) and they head into the city. Peter makes an excuse to leave (which MJ accepts quite readily) and changes to Spider-Man to tackle the Rhino. Spidey kinda gets his ass kicked and might’ve died if a cop hadn’t pulled him to safety just in time. Rhino thinks Spider-Man is dead and takes off, planning to complete his original assignment of kidnapping John Jameson. Peter finds a piece of Rhino’s costume stuck to some debris and takes it for analysis before dropping MJ off at her place. Peter got some photos of the fight and takes them to the Bugle, where he overhears Jameson talking about his son. As Spider-Man, he takes the sample of Rhino’s “hide” to Curt Connors and they come up with something to fight against it. Spidey shows up just as 
Rhino is grabbing Jameson and they fight again, but this time he uses the new chemical he added to his webbing to dissolve Rhino’s hide, leaving him vulnerable to a good punch in the face. As usual, Jameson isn’t the least bit grateful that Spidey saved his son, but John Jameson certainly is. On the way home, Peter runs into Gwen, Harry, and Flash and finds out Flash has been drafted to fight in Vietnam. I guess guys on sports scholarships didn’t get deferments back then … or maybe Flash registered for the draft? Anyway, it’s one of those topical references that doesn’t work anymore with Marvel’s sliding timescale.
This is a pretty good issue, with Peter and MJ getting to know each other a
bit, although he has to break a date with her when he finds out Aunt May is sick (again) because she ran out of medicine and couldn’t afford to get more. I thought the sad sack stuff was going to be gone now that Romita is plotting the book, but it looks like they’re keeping it up for a while longer. When Peter breaks the date, MJ doesn’t seem bothered; at the time, it was probably meant to show how flighty she was, but with the retcon we can assume that she was still conflicted over dating Spider-Man and was maybe relieved to have some time to process her feelings. The Rhino fights were cool and it 
was good to see Spidey defeating him with science. We also get Ned and Betty’s engagement, a cameo from Matt and Foggy (who were supposed to be representing Rhino), and the Rhino’s origin story. Flash’s Army stuff will define his character for years and maybe help mellow him a bit. We also get the usual touches of humour, my favourite being when Rhino breaks Spider-Man’s webbing and Spidey makes a meta-reference to the sound effect used (“Ftakt”).
Amazing Spider-Man #44 (January 1967) – “Where Crawls the Lizard” – Stan Lee/John Romita
This one starts with Peter sending Aunt May to Florida for a vacation. Apparently, Dr. Bromwell recommended it because she’s been so run-down lately. You’d think a train trip to Florida and wandering around by herself for two weeks would be more taxing than relaxing, but I’m not a doctor. Maybe Bromwell’s sick of Aunt May’s constant maladies and is trying to kill her off. Anyway, by one of those strange coincidences that only happen in fiction, Curt Connors is at the train station waiting for his wife and son (Martha and Billy, who you’ll remember from way back in issue 6), when he
feels himself start to change back into the Lizard again. He takes off down the tunnel to avoid hurting his family, leaving them wondering what the hell’s going on. Peter sees them and changes to Spider-Man to talk to Martha. He checks the tunnel and finds where the Lizard busted through the wall, but doesn’t tell Martha everything for fear of scaring her. Peter drops by the Daily Bugle to try to interest Jameson in some photos and Frederick Foswell starts wondering how Peter gets so many Spider-Man pix. Later, Peter runs into Flash, Gwen, and Harry at the Silver Spoon (the local ESU hangout) and ends up impressing everyone (with the possible exception of 
Gwen) when MJ drops by to take him out for the night. That night, Lizard is seen scaling the wall before busting into a jewelry store, so naturally everyone assumes it was Spider-Man. Spidey goes out to look for him and they mix it up briefly, but Lizard has his own plans and doesn’t want to waste time fighting. Spidey does manage to clear his name by letting people see the Lizard climbing a wall behind him, but he ends up falling and spraining his arm pretty badly. Peter is afraid people might figure out his secret identity because of the sprained arm, so he avoids going out and has to break another date with MJ.
This is a pretty good issue, although most of it is really set-up for next issue. I liked the scene at the Silver Spoon, with everyone meeting MJ for the
first time. Harry and Flash are definitely impressed that Peter is dating such a babe and Gwen’s obviously jealous. Of course, Peter’s interested in Gwen too, but MJ is a hard person to ignore. He’s even repainting his motorcycle because she said she hated the colour. When Peter breaks another date with MJ because of his arm, she seems kinda pissed off. I’m assuming she hasn’t heard about Spider-Man’s sprained arm yet, so I think she might be mad because she thinks Peter is flaking out on her for no reason. Part of the reason she might be attracted to Peter would be his stability and sense of 
responsibility, something she didn’t have in her home life and something she would’ve herd ad nauseam about Peter from Aunts May and Anna. So if Peter seems to be less dependable than advertised, it’s understandable she’d be mad (and once she learns about the sprained arm, she’ll at least get why he broke the date).