This is "From a Different Point of View," a feature where I discuss a comic book series with other people. Ever since the pandemic began, I've been doing twice-weekly reader chats about notable comic book crossovers, storylines or miniseries. We started with Secret Wars and then we did Knightfall and now we're starting with Maximum Carnage!
Each time around, I'll share a chunk of our discussion.
When last we checked in on Maximum Carnage, we were discussing Spectacular Spider-Man #201, Maximum Carnage Part 5, "Over the Line," by J.M. DeMatteis and Sal Buscema, with letters by Joe Rosen and colors by Bob Sharen, edited by Danny Fingeroth and Rob Tokar.
Carnage has escaped from custody and gone on a rampage in Manhattan, along with Shriek, Doppelganger and his newest addition to the team, Demogoblin. Spider-Man, meanwhile, has teamed up with Venom and Black Cat to try to stop them (as well as Cloak, whose partner, Dagger, was seemingly murdered by Shriek), even though Mary Jane begs him to stop to keep himself safe.
The heroes had just recently suffered a loss against the villains and Venom and Black Cat are both upset that Spider-Man stayed behind to help them rather than chase after Carnage by himself. Black Cat and Venom then split from Spider-Man and Spidey...went to Aunt May's house in Forest Hills?!? His father then gave him a dark speech about how the world is evil and you have to do whatever you can to survive. A shaken Peter heads back to the fight, questioning all of his beliefs.
What happens next?
Brian Cronin: Peter's whole deal is that he often makes the wrong choice at first.
Writerboy: "I Am The Spider" was the first time I realized these people did not feel morally obligated to give me good comics in exchange for my money
Flavio Sette: Heh
Brian Cronin: But yeah, Spider-Man typically makes the wrong call and then adjusts.
Brian Cronin: So that works for this story.
Brian Cronin: He makes the wrong call, but then adjusts.
Brian Cronin: But then "I am the Spider" just kept going and going
Writerboy: Like a nihilist Energizer bunny
IntriguedStranger: The worst part was the character assassaination to boost up Ben Reilly in the arcs that followed but I've taken us off topic here. I try to think of Max Carnage like a dumb blockbuster and take the characterisation as shorthand in that way. It doesn't excuse the inconsistent writing but it helps me re-read it. I love DeMatteis but he clearly wanted to be on a Batman book with the angst. Ravencroft was just his Arkham etc.
Tom A.: Of course, this story doesn't call out him going to his Aunt's house to whine as being the wrong call.
Brian Cronin: Yeah, good point, Tom.
Flavio Sette: I just love that panel of Venom tossing a car up in the air for no reason.
Flavio Sette: Venom is so dedicated to protecting the innocent he’ll just toss a car up into the air, guaranteeing it’ll crash on top of someone.
Sean Whitmore: Yeah, it feels like this story would have us believe Peter ever deigning to work with Venom was the wrong call
Writerboy: Venom talks about recruiting more cutthroat characters for his team, but does he ever get anyone besides Cat and Cloak?
Sean Whitmore: Morbius, next issue
Writerboy: Riiiight, I forgot about Morbs
Brian Cronin: The whole Venom/Black Cat/Cloak scene was a major waste.
Brian Cronin: A. WE CAN'T WAIT!
Brian Cronin: "Oh, okay, I guess we can wait."
Brian Cronin: B. THEY'RE GOING SO FAST!
Brian Cronin: Meanwhile, they're clearly meandering through the city.
Sean Whitmore: Venom and Cat showing up seconds too late here is like something out of a Roadrunner cartoon
Tom A.: At least Cloak apologized for just leaving them instead of using his teleportation to save them.
Tom A.: Well, technically he just apologizes for leaving.
Brian Cronin: How dare he!
Brian Cronin: Black Cat needs no saving!
IntriguedStranger: Maximum Carnage also has a surfeit of Marvels monster characters, with carrion, doppleganger, shriek, morbius and the even more Spawn-ish than usual Nightwatch.
Flavio Sette: Speaking of Carrion...
Tom A.: Oh yeah, all that's missing would be Vermin.
Flavio Sette: I'll reiterate my point from the first chat: why is Carrion in this story?
Sean Whitmore: Oh God, how did Vermin not make the cut?
Flavio Sette: I imagine DeMatteis vetoed his inclusion.
Sean Whitmore: He was even in Ravencroft at this point!
Flavio Sette: Or they just forgot he existed.
Brian Cronin: Yeah, Carrion's inclusion is just bonkers.
Tom A.: Carrion was part of a retcon over how the Jackal's clones weren't real clones, right?
IntriguedStranger: yeah Carrion is such a weird fit here and literally just floats around not adding much. What's the best aspect of the overall story? is it Cap's appearance?
Writerboy: Yup
Sean Whitmore: Carrion goes full-on calling Shriek "mother" later, it's bonkers.
Tom A.: Only it later turned out that they were real clones and Carrion was just some weird side-effect thing of failed cloning or something.
IntriguedStranger: All that high evolutionary stuff needed to be sorted out.
Brian Cronin: Carrion was part of a number of different retcons
Writerboy: Yeah, they had to do a whole ish of Spider-Man Unlimited or something to retcon the original Carrion retcon
IntriguedStranger: He was "carrion" a lot of the weight of various storylines...
Flavio Sette: Rimshot
Sean Whitmore: Was Demogoblin actually inside the restaurant eating with the rest of them? How much of that nonsense did he put up with?
Brian Cronin: "WHEN ARE WE GOING TO GET TO THE SINNERS FACTORY?"
Sean Whitmore: "I must purge the sinners...mm, good breadsticks."
Flavio Sette: God, it really is like they're a family on a road trip.
IntriguedStranger: What would have been interesting but would have required planning ahead would have been if Peter's fake parents werent as affected by the madness cause they're programming was default "be nice to Peter". some hint of what was to come would have been nice.
Flavio Sette: "Are we there yet?"
Sean Whitmore: I can't look at Demogoblin in this story without remembering how he dies a few months afterward.
Sean Whitmore: Saving a child from a falling building.
Tom A.: Yeah, it's clear that they hadn't planned the robot parents thing at this point.
Flavio Sette: Intrigued Stranger, as Brian has mentioned, they hadn't come up with the whole "the Parkers were robots" plot.
Flavio Sette: So Demogoblin dies the same way Captain Stacy and Ben Reilly died?
Writerboy: The "psychotic middle class family" thing does make a nice grim running gag, at least
Flavio Sette: Saving a little kid from getting randomly killed.
IntriguedStranger: Yeah there was a 90s X-Men feel to that. We'll work out that simmering subplot at a later date.
Brian Cronin: That was it precisely.
Brian Cronin: Michelinie complained about it later, that he was told, "Here ya go" and he didn't know what to do, since he had no idea what the endgame was.
Flavio Sette: Heck, in Captain Stacy's case, they BOTH die because of falling debris.
Tom A.: I don't think the riots here work. It's normal for riots to happen in times of chaos, but it's hardly ever just random civilians killing each other just because. The looting and wrecking stuff makes sense though.
Sean Whitmore: That's down to Shriek, though, right?
Tom A.: "I saw some mass-murdering villains killing people on TV, you know what, I wanna go out there and kill people too!"
Brian Cronin: That's the interesting thing, Sean.
Writerboy: Well, they're setting up the later reveal that Shriek is doing it here
Brian Cronin: That's where they end up with in the end.
Brian Cronin: But ARE they setting that up?
Brian Cronin: I would hope so.
Brian Cronin: And I believe they are.
IntriguedStranger: yeah lets give them the benefit of the doubt there
Brian Cronin: But I almost wouldn't be surprised if that was a happy accident.
Tom A.: Oh, Shriek is driving them crazy? I guess that makes sense.
Flavio Sette: I guess all those people heard Richard Parker's whole "people are scum" bit and decided to prove him right just to fuck with Peter.
Brian Cronin: Yeah, Tom, that's where it ends up, with Carnage being SO evil that he helps drive her powers further than normal.
Sean Whitmore: It wouldn't shock me either, but I'm trying to think if the other writers even touch on that aspect of Shriek's power
Flavio Sette: Like I said a couple chats ago, the people of New York seem to be purposely fucking with Peter Parker.
Writerboy: The Rodney King riots were about a year past at this point; you have to wonder how much of an influence that was
Brian Cronin: Definitely huge influence.
Sean Whitmore: All the bits I remember of the heroes talking to looters was in Spec
Next time, we see how Spider-Man reacts to the riots. It's dark. If you have any Maximum Carnage thoughts, feel free to share them at brianc@cbr.com!
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