This whole Rose/Black Tarantula crime war has only been going on for a few issues, but I’m already tired of it.
A new villain–Dragonfly–brings an offshoot ninja clan (from the Hand) to New York to kill a Daily Bugle employee while Rose hires Electro to kill them. Dragonfly never seen again after this, so don’t get attached.
The main thing here is that Electro gets his powers restored by Rose and Delilah (I don’t remember how he lost them, honestly, and the story doesn’t tell us). Spider-Man stops him from doing the killing, but Electro is still at large by story’s end.
After saving the bad ninjas from Electro, ElekTRA shows up. Was Tom DeFalco just picking characters with similar names? She’s there because the real Hand is now in town to kill the offshoot ninjas.
And then in #425, X-Man helps Spider-Man finally beat Electro. Spider-Man wears a rubber costume because that’s worked before and Tom DeFalco is writing this so we can’t expect anything new or fresh to come out of it.
Electro seems to die in the end. But we all know better.
This all feels very much like retreading. It doesn’t feel inspired. And speaking of retreading, the final panel offers a new Doctor Octopus.
He’s a she. That’s the innovation. She debuted during Clone Saga, but since I didn’t cover those issues individually, this is my first time posting on her.