I accidentally opened this comic book up to it’s last page first. I don’t normally do that, it’s not a habit, but it happened this time, and the final splash pretty much guarunteed at least 4 stars from me. Climatic and a perfect setup till next/this week(thank God it’s next week), and it really didn’t stop there.

I don’t think I’ve seen John Romita Jr.’s art look this good. And I’ve been following him since the late 90s with Howard Mackie’s (excellent) Spider-Hunt & Identity Crisis. Klaus Janson has always been my pick for JR Jr.’s pencils, and he continues to get more and more emotive with his pen/brush. The writing was generally top notch, with a few eye rollers (pretty much all of Bullseye’s dialog, but blessedly, there wasn’t much of it). Menace is about as hokey as the rest of Spidey’s recent “new” villians but in keeping with “the 70’s in the 2000’s” feel with BND, and works for a random “Baddie-of-the-Day.” 

What’s this new trend hating on Adi Granov? It seems ever since Iron Man: Viva Las Vegas it’s been in vogue to hate on the guy. And while I don’t think Extremis would’ve been percieved as so awesome had it been released post-Iron Man: The Movie, but geez! He’s still got some rad art chops; nothing at all to sneeze at. Did a fine job with the Eddie Brock “aside” (I prefer his Brock to JR jr.’s actually) and left me hoping he gets accompanying minis for the rest of the New Ways to Die.

All in all, great times. It’s the 2nd ASM story I’ve bough post-BND. Good on ya, sirs. With a great kick-off to this arc, here’s hoping the rest of it just gets better.