Spider-Man’s Tangled Web #4 (2001): Severance Package

This is one of the best Kingpin comics of all time. 

Due to interference by Spider-Man (who appears only in shadow in this book), a Kingpin employee fails in his responsibilities.  The story is about the criminal trying to negotiate forgiveness from Kingpin.

Greg Rucka is an excellent crime-in-superhero-cities writer (see: Gotham Central).

And Edward Risso is a gritty artist who perfectly melds the symbolic (his portrayal of Kingpin in this issue makes the man over 9 feet tall at some points, expressing his power and presence) with street-level realism.

Greg Rucka and Eduardo Risso explore life as a Kingpin henchman

It’s also nice that the focus of the story–the henchman–is a killer. He is NOT sympathetic, and yet it’s impossible for the reader not to empathize with someone who knows he is going to die.

READ THIS.  It’s excellent.

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