The Parker family has moved forward a bit, as this issue features that standby of stories featuring children: The ol’ time-jump routine! Your Major Spoilers review of Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows #13 awaits!
AMAZING SPIDER-MAN: RENEW YOUR VOWS #13
Writer: Jody Houser
Artist: Nick Roche
Colorist: Ruth Redmond
Letterer: VC’s Joe Caramagna
Editor: Heather Antos
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Cover Price: $3.99
Previously in Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows: “Jump eight years into the future with the web-slinging and wall-crawling Spider-Man family! Peter Parker and Mary Jane’s super-powered daughter, Annie, is now in high school. But when this teen isn’t in class, she’s swinging through the streets with her parents. After all, keeping New York safe from super villains is a family affair! But what new threat has emerged to menace the wall-crawlers?”
STILL LOVE THIS CONCEPT
This issue opens with Annie May Parker (there’s a joke in there someplace) in action against the Sinister Six, only for her dad to leap in for an unwanted assist. Thanks to an 8-year time jump, Annie/Spiderling is now a sophomore in high school, and she has no interest at all in Dad jokes and unwanted saves. Given that the villains are actually Danger Room projections by Wolverine, who is now running the Xavier school in this reality, her disdain seems justified. Still, Peter tries to be a good dad, offering to take her to a VR theme park she wants to go to before discovering that they just can’t afford it. Instead, their Parker Family Fun Day takes them to Coney Island, an outing that get interrupted by The Lizard! That’s when Spider-Man, Spinneret and Spiderling web up and take the fight to the scaly beast!
THE PROVERBIAL GREAT JUMPING-ON POINT
So, yeah, I am happy to see any story with the Parkers married, and having them both as superheroes (thanks to leftover power-tech from the villainous Regent, which allows MJ to share some of Peter’s spider-abilities, albeit at the risk of lowering his own power levels) is great. Better than that, though, is the family dynamic, with a realistic-feeling teen daughter who just wants to have her own life dealing with a helicopter dad and a mom who is trying to keep the family’s boutique afloat. The art is remarkable as well, loose and animation-inspired, providing some additional resonance for the all-ages tone of the story. With this issue’s focus on getting Annie/Spiderling a new, more appropriate code-name, and lots of story hooks to go forward with, the ‘Renew Your Vows’ creative team seems ready to make this a long-term series. And frankly, I couldn’t be happier.
THE BOTTOM LINE: ENJOYABLE STUFF
The idea of a super-family is a great one, as properties like The Incredibles have proven, but tying that to the life and times of Peter Parker makes for a nice update on that formula, and Annie May is a fun new addition to the various and sundry spider-women of Marvel history. Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows #13 is well-drawn, featuring realistic family interactions and serves as a great jumping-on point for any new readers, leading to a well-deserved 4 out of 5 stars overall, and leaving me wracking my brain for new spider-related names for the former Spiderling…
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Once upon a time, there was a young nerd from the Midwest, who loved Matter-Eater Lad and the McKenzie Brothers... If pop culture were a maze, Matthew would be the Minotaur at its center. Were it a mall, he'd be the Food Court. Were it a parking lot, he’d be the distant Cart Corral where the weird kids gather to smoke, but that’s not important right now... Matthew enjoys body surfing (so long as the bodies are fresh), writing in the third person, and dark-eyed women. Amongst his weaponry are such diverse elements as: Fear! Surprise! Ruthless efficiency! An almost fanatical devotion to pop culture! And a nice red uniform.
1 Comment
Thought this was a terrible issue, The new artist is a bad fit and Houser’s writing while being fine still comes off as heartless and boring like all her other books. The time jump was too soon and now the book becomes a parody of what it could of been.