Amazing Spider-Man (2018) #30 (Lgy 831) Review: The Bogenrieder Perspective

In which Norman has an identity crisis, and people remember.

Amazing Spider-Man (2018) #30 (Lgy. 831)

“Absolute Carnage, Pt 1”

Writer: Nick Spencer

Pencils: Ryan Ottley

Inks: Cliff Rathburn

Colors: Nathan Fairbairn

Letters: VC’s Joe Caramagna

Editors: Nick Lowe and Kathleen Wisneski

Editor-in-Chief: CB Cebulski

Plot:

Back during ASM 24, Kindred visits the cell of Norman Osborn, telling him that he won’t be able to kill Peter, but that as a consolation prize, he “broke him long ago.”

After a botched attempt to retrieve Norman Osborn from Ravencroft to remove the remaining chunks of Symbiote from him, Peter is now attempting to keep Dylan Brock (Long story short, he’s Venom’s son) and Normie Osborn safe from Norman, who is serving as Cletus’ number two in the Symbiote invasion of the world by Knull, the Symbiote God. Long story short, Norman begins thrashing Peter, and despite his best attempts, Peter’s distracted mind flashing back to Harry’s party from ASM #105 keeps him from pulling through, and the issue ends with Norman standing over a defeated Peter.

Thoughts:

I think it’s important to note that this is a tie-in to an event. I’m hoping to churn out a review of Absolute Carnage review around the same time as this review, but this is the rare event where I felt like I didn’t have to read the central event to understand what’s going on here; Peter’s desire to save Normie and Dylan (Whose presence is kinda linked to Donny Cates’ Venom, but it’s brushed over and hand waved away by Peter’s shared confusion on the matter) can be seen as self-contained against an escaped Norman; it’s nice to have that added context, but it’s easy to appreciate a story that can stand on its own (As opposed to stories that were derailed by Civil War II and Secret Empire; ASM has actually had a history of handling event tie-ins rather smoothly, but it’s a criticism of tie-in books overall.) and still be entertaining.

I think something to get out of the way real fast is that I appreciate this as the arc and issue to bring back Ryan Ottley as the penciller. While it would have been nice to have him on the Syndicate arc, it’s only been four issues, and I think that this was a smart place to bring him back. Ottley’s most well-known works involve him reveling in gore, blood and the slaughter. And given that Peter is fighting Carnage, a character known for his high body counts, as well as the amount of blood Peter loses, I think he and his crew were an inspired choice for this. It also does work as a selling point; as the artistic anchor and appeal for Spencer’s run, his return and the content he’s drawing works very well as a way to influence sales for regular readers who normally would drop the title during an event tie-in.

Something that I need to address is that Spencer actually goes out of the way to make this somewhat essential reading for people invested in the Kindred mystery. Along with the appeal of a self-contained book, Spencer dumps arguably some of the most important hints to Kindred’s true identity in this issue, where people would be the least suspecting to look for it. And as much as it might be bait, it’s a very clever way to keep readers interested during what would usually be a slow month for readers. I think Mark did a fantastic job of dissecting Kindred’s true identity, so I’m not sure if there’s a ton for me to add (At least, not without copy/pasting what I’ve already said and what Mark said in his review regarding what we know.) aside from a tinge of doubt; going back and reading Transformers: More Than Meets the Eye and remembering the mystery of Tarn’s true identity, I’m questioning whether or not Spencer is leading down a huge red herring regarding Kindred’s true identity, but I’m not sure Spencer has the critical leeway that James Roberts did to pull that kind of twist off.

Regardless, I think what matters most is that I was engaged by this issue. Kindred simply monologuing to Norman while it flashes between perspectives of Peter getting the crap kicked out of him by Norman and going back in time to ASM #105, Spencer I think did a really good job of not only structuring the pacing of this issue, especially with the added baggage of tying into an event. Fantastic writing, beautiful art, I’m genuinely excited to see how Peter bounces back next issue, and to hopefully find more out about the Kindred mystery, and a good tie-in to an already excellent event. What more could I ask for?

Final Grade: A+