Posted - July 20, 2014 | Updated : August 27, 2015


Marvel Knights Spider-Man 19
The Other Part Two




This issue is part of a multi-story arc involving all the Spider-Man titles, that's why we are beginning with part two here in Marvel Knights Spider-Man. We also have a change in creative teams as veteran writer Peter David comes in with artist Pat Lee.

Let's talk about Pat Lee's art.

It's ugly.

Simplistic. Rough. And Curious.

That's right. Curious. There's a different handling of the foreground and background parts of a panel. Look at this.


art sample

And this.


art sample

It's a "digital" quality.

Beyond that, during the early part of the story Peter is talking to Steve Rogers and MJ and his face is like this.


peter parker

No expression whatsover. And during the conversation the face doesn't change and I form the opinion that Pat Lee can't draw expressive faces. Turns out I was wrong. Peter was supposed to look that way. I'll explain later.

The reason I know I was wrong on Pat Lee's ability to draw faces is because of these series of panels.


mj watching tv

That's MJ watching Peter on tv in a bar. Look at the subtle facial expression changes as the newsreel progresses. Pat Lee can do faces just fine.

Then it hit me. MANGA. Pat Lee seems to be a manga artist.

Oh shit.

Remember Marvel Knights Spider-Man 5 where the biggest thing was a piece of paper? A credit card final notice? Well the piece of paper is back.


medical diagnosis

This time its not a credit card bill. Its a medical diagnosis of some sort. Serious enough so that the mood it creates permeates the whole story. This explains Peter's "wooden" expression early on in the issue.

Peter David shows his skill with dialogue in this funny banter about the remote control.


mj

Pat Lee also shows his stuff with this Iron Man/Spider-Man panel.


iron man and spider-man

Some nutjob has been stalking MJ and has an "incident"with her at a bar. Excellent panel sequence by Pat Lee.


bar shooter

MJ being MJ, she deals with the problem directly.


guy gets hit in the nuts

Here's another way to deal with something like that .

Also in this issue is the mysterious Morlun who is kind enough to tell us about himself.


morlun

We also have a tedious page and a half of psychoanalysis of Peter Parker by Peter David through MJ. Something about Peter having a morbid fatalism based on the death of his Uncle Ben. David/MJ actually makes a good point about Peter, time an time again, running out of web fluid at the most inopportune moments but he never builds an indicator gauge on the shooters, as if he wants to run out of web, intentionally putting himself in deadly danger - good point. Interestingly, to this day, no indicator guage. I'm bracing myself for more of this page long psychoanalysis from Peter David going forward. Tedious but informative; I hope he doesn't go overboard.

Till next issue.

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