Amazing Spider-Man #789 Review

Amazing Spider-Man #789 Review

Amazing Spider-Man #789 Review

Secret Empire may be over but the ramifications of the event will linger on across Marvel. Peter Parker is one of the characters that came out of Secret Empire even worse than when it started. Largely this is due to Peter being forced to completely destroy Parker Industries in order to keep all the technology developed by the company from falling into the hands of Captain America and Hydra. Though a noble decision that does not mean that everyone in the Marvel Universe will take Peter’s decision well. The aftermath of that decision looks to be the main driving force for this new story arc, “Fall  Of Parker”? Let’s see how things go with Amazing Spider-Man #789.

Writer: Dan Slott

Artist: Stuart Immonen

Inker: Wade Von Grawbadger

Colorist: Marte Gracia

Story Rating: 5 Night Girls out of 10

Art Rating: 7 Night Girls out of 10

Overall Rating: 6 Night Girls out of 10

Synopsis: Bobbie Morse tells Peter Parker to wake up and clean up the apartment as he has made it a mess since moving in after losing everything. Bobbi mentions that she has found a new gig and leaves Peter to clean up.

Amazing Spider-Man #789 Review
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Peter turns on the TV and sees a news report of how Parker Industries has fallen off a cliff after his decision and listens to how much the public hates him.

At Harry Lyman’s (Osborn) place Harry is trying to get in touch with Peter but is not having any luck. Harry has the nanny take the kids out of the room. He and Liz talk alone about how the recent events brought them back together. As they talk about if they should go public with their relationship Harry remembers that Flash’s party is tonight.

At the Daily Bugle office Peter arrives uninvited and calls Robbie Robertson out on his reporting of Parker Industries end. Peter brings up how his company helped stop the Carrion Virus, freed Symkaria and sacrificed everything to stop Hydra. Robbie highlights how in the end Peter let millions of employees and consumers down by ending Parker Industries without warning.

Peter apologizes and begins to walk out. Before he does he notices some errors in the tech editor’s story about Pym Microprocessors and gives him the information to make the corrections.

Betty reminds Peter about Flash’s party as Robbie smiles at what Peter just did.

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While walking through the city some people spot Peter and start chasing him down the street for how he made them lose all their money on his company and products. Peter is able to use his powers to escape in an alley.

Over at Flash’s birthday party everyone is having fun welcoming him back in time for his birthday. Flash, Harry, Aunt May and others have a side conversation on how bad things are for Peter, all as Peter overhears everything they are saying as he slightly opens the door to the party.

Bobbi gets back to her place and tells Peter to suit up as they have a mission.

Spider-Man and Mockingbird rush through the city to stop Griffin from destroying part of the city. During the fight some people call Spider-Man out on working for Peter, giving Griffin the opening to punch Spider-Man down the street. Spider-Man recovers and joins Mockingbird in the fight. He saves a guy’s food truck from being destroyed by Griffin while Mockingbird knocks the villain out.

With Griffin knocked out everyone starts cheering for Spider-Man.

Back at Bobbi’s apartment Mockingbird and Spider-Man get a drink and celebrate the win by making out. End of issue.

Amazing Spider-Man #789 Review
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The Good: Amazing Spider-Man #789 is a big shift in the status quo for Peter Parker. There are a lot of questions to the character’s future that Dan Slott and Marvel have created. Those questions make Amazing Spider-Man #789 a hard comic to gauge if it is a good or bad thing for the series moving forward

One thing that Amazing Spider-Man #789 gets right is how Slott has Peter’s supporting cast call him out on the impact of his decision to dissolve Parker Industries. This was especially effective during Peter’s confrontation with Robbie in the middle of the issue. Slott makes sure not to hold back on reminding Peter all the damage his decision caused to millions of people. Its that long-term planning that Peter forgets to think about. This scene also helped possibly position Robbie as the person that Peter needs to put his life together, which would be a great as Robbie has always been an underutilized supporting character in the franchise.

Though Peter was ready to make the decision in order to help turn the tide against Hydra during Secret Empire he clearly was not ready for the damage that he caused for the long term future. Slott did a good job showing how Peter is having a hard time getting his life together. Even though Peter has been in this position of having nothing it has never been like this before. He reached the pinnacle of his dreams as he was able to use his genius level intellect to reach a level only Tony Stark and Reed Richards were at.

Now after reaching that level there are a lot of questions as to where Peter will go. Slott already seems to be hinting that we could see Peter may continue using his scientific experience in a different way at the Daily Bugle. This wouldn’t be a bad thing since we see this in the real world using their second chance after a failed business venture to join the media world. That would be a good way for Peter to return to a familiar setting of the Daily Bugle that fans like without fully having to go all the way back to bumbling freelance photographer.

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On a similar note, it was good to see that out of all of Peter’s supporting cast that it was Harry Osborn who was sticking by Peter’s side. This was a good move by Harry as it shows how close the two have become once again now that they’ve rebuilt their friendship over the last few years. It also speaks to how much Peter and Harry have been looking out for each other.

Making things a bit more interesting is how Peter and Harry’s friendship may be affected by Liz. Though Harry and Liz are seemingly back together it does come off as the latter wanting something from the former from a business perspective. If that is the case we could see Liz driving a wedge between Peter and Harry without either person’s knowledge.

Stuart Immonen delivered some strong artwork for Amazing Spider-Man #789. There wasn’t anything breathtaking like some of his best Spider-Man work. But it is clear that Immonen is most at home in the Spider-Man world as he is able to balance out the character reactions during heavy dialogue scenes with fluid action sequences.

The Bad: When we got some teases at Peter and Bobbi getting together it was fun to see how their relationship was growing the direction it is now on is not as interesting. The way Slott is positioning the relationship now just seems doomed to fail with Peter using Bobbi more as an escape to be Spider-Man full time rather than figuring things out. This was a point that was driven home with how it was Spider-Man and Mockingbird making out in the end and not just as Peter and Bobbi. Maybe it’ll be different this time but anytime we have seen the emphasis be given to the superhero side of a relationship it never ends well.

It doesn’t help that Slott is seemingly pushing most of Peter’s supporting cast to the side as we saw Peter run away rather than face his family and friends. It’s not the Peter that fans have come to grow and love. It also does not help make characters like MJ, Randy and others look great as they were shown only to dump more gasoline to the fire that is Peter’s personal and professional life. At times like this it would’ve been better to see at least more than just Harry be positioned as a friend to Peter. By not having that it makes the supporting cast look weaker as we gain more of a focus on the Spider-Man side of this series.

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That brings up the part that may not be the best thing for the series as everything about the ending and teases for future of the series point to a focus on Spider-Man. Though this series is called Amazing Spider-Man, most fans are into this series for the Peter side of things, with Spider-Man being a great compliment to Peter’s own hardships. By not having a balance in that it could easily turn fans off who are looking for equal parts in development for Peter and Spider-Man.

The Spider-Man side of the issue isn’t helped by the fact that Griffin turned out to just be a “Freak of the Week” type villain. With how much Peter’s decision to dissolve Parker Industries it would’ve been better if the villain attack that Spider-Man and Mockingbird stopped was tied to that decision. It would’ve added to how much Parker Industries being no more is affecting the greater Marvel Universe. And that personal touch would’ve added some sort of meaning to Griffin’s attack.

Overall: Amazing Spider-Man #789 used the aftermath of Peter Parker’s decision during Secret Empire to kickstart an intriguing direction for the series. There is a lot of potential in having Peter searching for a way to recover now that he has lost his company, Parker Industries. At the same time there is plenty of things to worry about as that potential could lead to more of what has turned fans off to Slott’s run on the Spider-Man franchise. That fork in the road position Amazing Spider-Man is on puts the series in an interesting spot moving forward.