Spider-Rama: Amazing Spider-Man #64

Welcome to Spider-Rama! Each Wednesday, Ben and Duy will look at a Spider-Man issue from the very beginning, in chronological order, and answer questions for various categories, inspired in large part by one of our favorite podcasts, The Rewatchables by The Ringer. Our goal is to make it to Amazing Spider-Man #200. Will we make it? Grab your Amazing Spider-Man Omnibus or crank up your tablet to Marvel Unlimited, and then tune in every Wednesday to find out!

AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #64
Spider-Rama
by Stan Lee and John Romita Sr. and Don Heck

Spider-Man fights the Vulture across the city with one arm! Plus, Mary Jane Watson gets a haircut for some reason.

POINTLESS TRIVIA

BEN: Villain appearance count:

• Doctor Octopus: 9
• Green Goblin: 7
• The Vulture: 7
• The Kingpin: 6
• Kraven the Hunter: 5
• Sandman: 4
• Mysterio: 4
• The Enforcers: 3
• The Rhino: 3
• The Lizard: 3
• Professor Smythe/Spider Slayer: 3
• The Chameleon: 2
• Electro: 2
• The Ringmaster: 2
• Scorpion: 2
• Molten Man: 2

BEN: “Gwen Stacy cries” consecutive issue count: 5.

DUY: Wow, she even cries twice in the span of two pages. And it's completely unnecessary. Remove the tears from those images and they're still effective.


WHAT'S AGED THE BEST?

BEN: The cover is subtly great. The soft pencil background really makes Spider-Man and the Vulture pop. I also like Gwen’s dress:

DUY: Robbie saving JJJ from certain death is great, and really highlights Robbie's character and integrity, compared to his boss.

BEN: Robbie is a good person, which makes him way less entertaining than Jonah.

DUY: No one is as entertaining as Jonah.

BEN: Gwen is!

WHAT'S AGED THE WORST?

BEN: This:

DUY: So I recently saw the explanation that the reason they cut MJ's hair here is because they gave Gwen MJ's hairstyle, and they were deliberately propping up Gwen at MJ's expense, which may or may not be the truth, but it sure is a conspiracy theory–laden way of looking at comics.

BEN:  I can’t imagine they’d sabotage one character on behalf of another back then.

DUY:  In addition to Mary Jane's "ginchy new hairdo," Gwen crying at every possible instance is annoying.

BEN: Five straight issues of crying.

NITPICKS

DUY:  My nitpick is that this is a terrible stretch of Spider-Man comics, and I am so bored, and they make it worse by decompressing every bad storyline into multiple issues.

BEN: The Heck era has been less than robust.

FAVORITE PANEL

BEN: I like the Vultures face, the rendition of Spidey, the weird background, the colors:

DUY: I swear my favorite panels is just the J. Jonah Jameson clipshow:

WHO WON THE COMIC?

DUY: It is so hard to pick any winner for this stretch of issues. Everything is so lackluster. Even Ditko's worst ones are at least interesting.

BEN: I nominate us as the winners, for our fortitude and commitment.

DUY: I'll take it.

BEN: Let us celebrate with the consuming of alcohol.

DUY: That's it for Spider-Rama this week.

BEN: Thank you, Stan Lee and Steve Ditko—

DUY: —for telling us we aren't the only ones.

Leave us a comment below or on our Facebook page. See you next Wednesday!