Amazing Spider-Man #332-333 (1990)

Erik Larsen gets his turn in the future-Image-artists-drawing-Venom box. 

I wonder why Image never brought over writers like David Michelinie—since several of them worked with him?

Venom is not one of my favorite characters—it’s really hard to make him interesting because he kinda does the same thing every time.  These are early appearances of the Eddie Brock version, though, so you’d think there’d be some novelty here.  But there’s not. 

Venom/Brock stalks Peter Parker’s family

Styx and Stone are also in this story.  Remember them?  They work for a local crimelord who also happens to be the landlord of MJ and Parker’s apartment building.  Don’t remember them?  Don’t worry about it.  One more story and they’re gone forever.

I actually think they’re funny in this story, though.

I suppose it might have been cool if Brock Venom’s motives were a little more clear. 

On the one hand, he’s nuts and wants to eat Spider-Man.

But then here’s a part during the first fight (like most Venom stories, he and Spidey fight twice in the tale) where he saves a baby who was endangered during the battle, so he’s not a hungry alien just looking to eat people.  There’s some kind of morality here.  But why he thinks it’s okay to attack Parker’s family, who have nothing to do with his vendetta, isn’t very clear.

The story ends when Styx touches Venom (he’s got a “death touch” power) and seems to kill the symbiote.  Eddie Brock, stripped of the living exoskeleton, is taken to jail.

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I guess one thing that makes this story different is that Jay Leno and Malcom Forbes have a cameo.  Interestingly enough, Forbes died right before this issue came out.

As you can tell, I’m not a huge fan of this story. It’s perfectly fine, but it feels like filler.  At this time, Amazing was coming out every two weeks—it’s hard to maintain quality at that kind of a pace, especially with just one writer.

2 thoughts on “Amazing Spider-Man #332-333 (1990)”

  1. I agree with your assesment, Erik Larsen isn’t one of my favorites, but I generally like his work, and it’s pleasant reading. Larsen seems to have a great appreciation and respect for the 1960’s, 1970’s, and 1980’s material that preceded his entry into comics.
    This run of AMAZING SPIDER-MAN is best remembered for the Dave Michelinie/Todd McFarlane run beginning in 298 up through 323. After which Larsen took over the art chores.
    Aside from the initial Lee/Ditko run in 1-38, my favorite run is in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 224-351 by Roger Stern, with art by John Romita Jr. Stern is a terrific writer, who brings out so much of the preceding characters and continuity in the titles he writes, but in a very fun and non-pretentious way. (See also Stern’s run in DOCTOR STRANGE 46-73.)

    I also highly recommend the Michelinie and Romita Jr/Layton run in IRON MAN 115-156 (roughly 1978-1982), that is for me Michelinie’s best series. It was my favorite Marvel title when it was coming out, even over the Claremont/Byrne X-MEN issues, running at the same time.

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