Review by Frank Plowright
Of all the alternate Spider-Men introduced in the 21st century Miles Morales is by some distance the most popular, yet this Gwen Stacy from an alternate world has quietly racked up a fair number of collections also. This wafer thin paperback contains the start of Spider-Gwen’s rebranding process to the more generally accessible Ghost-Spider.
To the credit of previous creators, her progression hasn’t taken the most obvious path, and as Spider-Geddon opens she’s just been released from jail. However, no sooner has she prevented a mugging than she’s swept away into the Spider-Geddon crossover, ending up on an alternate Earth. There’s Peter Parker, Mary Jane Watson and Harry Osborn just like on hers, and another Gwen as well. Credit to Seanan McGuire for not taking the obvious route here and shunting Gwen straight to Earth 616 with the majority of Marvel superheroes, and also for creating a readable story that doesn’t require any great knowledge of what’s going on the core series.
Perspective and foreshortening are weaknesses for artist Rosi Kämpe, which leads to multiple panels where people just don’t look right. It’s a shame, because in other ways Kämpe’s style is attractive. Her faces have personality, she supplies detail, and doesn’t baulk in the final chapter when multiple Spider-People are required.
The title story’s first chapter at first seems a mis-step after Spider-Geddon, but develops into an emotionally shredding experience. Due to a piece of technology keyed to her DNA Gwen is left as the only Spider-Man variant still able to shift between worlds, which means it’s down to her to let the families of the fallen know what happened. Gwen’s not in a great place herself, and it’s an extra burden, but as all Spider-readers know, with great power comes great responsibility.
Included to pad out an exceptionally slim book we have stills from the Spider-Geddon: Spider-Gwen video comic from McGuire and Alti Firmansyah. It’s much the same events as seen in the opening chapter, except as it’s prepared for video it’s simpler and transfers awkwardly to comics.
Forgetting that, this is a promising opener, leading to Impossible Year, or both are collected in the Spider-Gwen: Ghost-Spider Omnibus.
