Amazing Spider-Man #15. Kraven makes his debut

(Cover from August 1964.)

"Kraven The Hunter!"

Written by Stan Lee.
Drawn by Steve Ditko.
Inked by Steve Ditko.
Lettered by Artie Simek.

As Clint Eastwood could tell you, a man has to know his limitations, and the Chameleon certainly does.

In case we'd forgotten about the menacing master of disguise - Spider-Man's first ever foe - he's back again. But this time, having decided he can't tackle Spider-Man himself, he brings in his best mate in all the world; Kraven the Hunter, who's something of a nutjob and lives only to fight things. He starts off by fighting some snakes and gorillas, down at the dockside, before turning his attention to Spider-Man.

The only problem is he's out of his depth and so he cheats.

The only problem is that doesn't work either.

So, he runs away and, when that doesn't work, he gets captured and deported. As a first outing for our villain it's all a bit of a wash out. Still, he may be a cheat, a braggart, a coward, a bully and a man who talks to himself but Kraven is at least persistent and he'll be back to mildly annoy Spider-Man on repeated occasions.

Someone else who'll be back is Mary Jane Watson whose name makes its first appearance here - although it has to do so without the company of the girl herself who's supposed to be meeting Peter Parker for a kind of blind date - courtesy of Aunt May - but pulls out with a headache.

It's just as well because, by this stage in the strip's history, Peter Parker has two girls, Betty Brant and Liz Allan fighting over him. How could the strip possibly find room for another? And just how did Puny Parker become such a babe magnet?

Amazing Spider-Man #14. The Green Goblin, Enforcers and the Hulk

(Cover from July 1964.)

The Green Goblin"

Written by Stan Lee.
Drawn by Steve Ditko.
Inked by Steve Ditko.
Lettered by Art Simek.


Value for money. Sometimes you have to check what's behind it.

Seeing how much is crammed into this issue, I assumed the price must have gone up and Marvel Comics were making an effort to cram as much in as they could to justify it.

But not at all. A quick look at the cover tells us the price is still 12 cents. But, even if it had gone up, we can hardly be accused of being short changed this month. Not only do we get the debut of the Green Goblin. we get the return of the Enforcers and Spider-Man's first meeting with the Incredible Hulk.

It's the debut of the Green Goblin that is of course the main event in this tale - although, at the time, it must have seemed to readers that the Hulk's guest slot was the bigger deal. We, however, have the benefit of hindsight and the readers of 1964 didn't.

It's an odd plan the Goblin concocts, tricking Spider-Man into agreeing to appear in a movie so he and the Enforcers, posing as fellow cast members, can attack him. There's really no need for any of this charade, they could have attacked him easily enough anywhere and at any time and it's a plan that does rely on Spider-Man being unbelievably stupid. He's stood in a room with the Enforcers and doesn't recognise them as the real thing, convinced they're just actors pretending. It's a scenario worthy of the old Adam West Batman series in its unlikelihood.

But you suspect that Steve Ditko's clear love of having battles take place in not previously seen locations, like sculptor's studios and film sets, was coming into play here. It gives him an excuse to stick Spider-Man in a desert and then in cave, neither of which he was likely to encounter in Manhattan. It was also a convenient way to bring the Hulk into the story.

So, how does the Goblin fare on his debut?

He comes out of it pretty well. This being his first appearance, he's not yet developed the out-and-out psychotic nature of later years. Here he's merely an ambitious novice criminal out to get himself some power by defeating Spider-Man. But the fact that Spider-Man fails to defeat him and that, at the end of the tale, the Goblin still has his secret identity intact marks him out, even at this point, as a major villain of the future.

Sadly, not major villains of the future are the Enforcers, as out of their depth against Spider-Man as Spider-Man is against the Hulk. Despite their boast that they take orders from no one, they're never going to be anything more than lackeys for more important criminals. It has to be said that even if you hired the Enforcers for nothing, value for money is one thing you would never claim to be getting.

Amazing Spider-Man #13. Mysterio makes his debut

(Cover from June 1964.)

The Menace Of Mysterio!"

Written by Stan Lee.

Drawn by Steve Ditko.

Inked by Steve Ditko.

Lettered by Art Simek.

Thirteen. It's unlucky for some.

Or have I already said that?

It seems to me I have. So, instead I'll merely say that, for Spider-Man's baker's dozen, we get the debut of one of my favourite Spider-villains of them all, as Mysterio makes his first appearance.

I mean, what's not to love? The man wears a goldfish bowl over his head, has eyes on his chest and walks around in a cloud of smoke. He also talks like a prize cornball. After all, how many people have you ever met who say things like, "Bah!" and refer to themselves in the third person? Quite frankly, if there's one Spider-Man villain I'd choose to be, it has to be Mysterio.

Mysterio, oddly enough, is more interested in being Spider-Man, as he starts the tale by committing a string of crimes while disguised as the arachnid adventurer. This being The Amazing Spider-Man, our hero doesn't respond in the time honoured manner by assuming there must be an imposter on the loose. Instead, he assumes he himself must be behind the crimes and doesn't know about it because he's going mad. Cue a trip to the psychiatrist.

Happily his malaise doesn't last long as Mysterio turns up and gives him a good pounding before Spider-Man escapes, hoping to fight another day. Oddly enough, this seems to put our hero in a better mood.

The fight scene in the second half of this story's fantastic. Steve Ditko was never a conventional super-hero artist and proves it here as Spider-Man and Mysterio battle each other on a movie set. The studio's clearly playing host to a science fiction movie when they barge in, meaning the fight takes place against a whole barrage of unworldly backdrops before the menacing master of illusion gets his come-uppance. Steve Ditko's in his element with this story, his background in drawing horror and fantasy comics coming in perfectly for his handling of Mysterio who, in his early panels, really does seem like some kind of supernatural, Dr Strange type, being.

On Peter Parker's domestic front, not only does our hero have Betty Brant swooning all over him but now Liz Allan's got the hots for him too.

And this is the man who claims he's unlucky in love.