Publisher: Marvel Comics
Writer: Dennis Hopeless
Artists: Javier Rodriguez, Alvaro Lopez
Colourist: Javier Rodriguez
Editor: Devin Lewis
Release date: OUT NOW!
Price: $3.99
Marvel Comics
The logical high point for Spider-Woman seems to have been the Brian Michael Bendis and Alex Maleev spy drama from a few years ago.
This new Spider-Woman series takes a different route and presents a family-friendly version of Jessica Drew/Spider-Woman. Now the hero-turned-private investigator is like Jessica Jones but without the self-loathing and alcoholism. And she’s pregnant. The father’s identity is a subject of much amusement in Spider-Woman #1.
However, it turns out, Jessica Drew never wanted to be a mother, or even like children in the first place. But she is embracing her maternal instincts, first by passing the super-hero baton to Roger Gocking/Porcupine, and then by going on maternity leave.
Art chores by Rodriguez and Lopez show some very nice effects and the fight scenes are graceful.
The new direction for Spider-Woman swaps a spy adventure, set against a super-hero backdrop, with a soap opera set against a superhero backdrop. Spider-Woman’s problems are more bourgeois than life threatening. Or at least they’re supposed to be, and that is the tension that should be explored in future issues.
Reviewer: Joe Lovece
Reviews Editor: Steve Hooker