Amazing Spider-Man (2022) #55 Review

One of the biggest lessons life throws at you as you grow up and as you navigate through adulthood is not just how to tackle your responsibilities and how they affect you, BUT that you also have a responsibility to yourself to take care of YOU. It’s a lesson even I have only recently learned, and I am still doing my best to put it to practice everyday. As you get older, we all have things we end up wanting to do, especially things that only satisfy our needs. That can often be lost in our responsibility to others, whether it be for a job, caring for a loved one, or…saving the city of New York from crisis after crisis every night. Amazing Spider-Man #55 is another issue that directly highlights Zeb Wells’s ability to specifically relate to the adult demographic in ways that some Spider-Man series just often neglected. 

This issue opens with Spider-Man telling us that a new Stilt-Man has emerged, jokingly asking us if we even knew there was a new one because he just found out about them. He defeated them off-panel prior to this issue, rather decidedly as he admits, and we’re just thrown into the aftermath, or after-swing if you will, as Spidey is off to meet Shay for a date. If you’re unfamiliar, Shay Marken is Peter’s latest love interest, a nurse at Ravencroft. Peter is late, and if you’ve kept up with Wells’s run, you’d know, and he even tells us, this is their third date, and the last two had gone horribly so him being late this time is not a good omen already. As he meets Shay again, even she reminds him of that fact. 

At this point, they sit for dinner and Shay points out he has a black eye. She asks how Peter got it, and he dodges the question, not even realizing he had one. She says he’s trouble and as he laughs it off, Shay asks him again, how he got a black eye and in classic Spidey fashion, he can’t. Shay entertains it a bit and then goes on to ask why and we have Peter talk about how he takes on too much responsibility for everyone, that it may be too much. A classic response really not only from Peter but really from anyone who can’t explain why anything “bad” happens to them, because it’s very clear they don’t take the time to take care of themselves. Especially in the world we live in, it feels like you have to do so much just to get so little back. Whether you’re 25 or 65, it’s so easy to get lost in your everyday routine of work, making the people who oversee your work happy, but possibly running yourself ragged. 

Shay then proceeds to tell Peter that he also has a responsibility to himself, to make sure he gets what he wants and needs. She goes on to explain how SHE ensured she made it on time to this date, showing up an hour early for work at Ravencroft, busting her tail to make sure she got off at 5, even doing work while she was on lunch so that she can make it to this date on time and ready because she wanted to. That she takes what she wants seriously. This entire conversation was so mature and resonated so well. There’s a lesson of intentionality in it, if you want something, ensure you make the time for it. There’s so many cases of people not even eating because they believe their work is too important. Of course there are cases where you absolutely can’t, but in that case make time for it elsewhere. We all have hobbies and things we like to do in our off-time, if we don’t make time for them, we’d never be able to live the life we WANT to live. Take that vacation you’ve been wanting to take. Kick your feet up every once and a while, whatever needs to be done, will get done. 

Peter reassures her that he wants this to work, but as he speaks, Rhino and Screwball are seen fighting outside and Peter again disappoints Shay, as he must cut this date short…at least that’s what we think at first. Peter decides to actually go out as a civilian and tell Rhino and Screwball to relax for one night because of how hard it is for, well anyone, to score a date. They sympathize, so Peter heads back inside, to Shay’s surprise and declares he wants to make this, whatever it is, work and kisses her, and their date seems to end up going well, for once.

I loved this issue. It’s an issue that echoes how I felt in my last Spider-Man article, that when Zeb Wells is allowed to, he really is able to hone in and write stories that relate and resonate deeply to adults. Comics sometimes tend to lean too far into the fantastical, in ways that can seem like they’re made for children. Those aspects are always welcomed, it’s nice to dream and reach for the stars every now and again, but I find there being a lack of real adult themes to learn and appreciate, especially ones that relate to the everyday adult. It’s nice to have stories like these, especially in Amazing Spider-Man, it’s the perfect place for it. Peter is the regular man of the Marvel universe so having more stories where he experiences learning these lessons that we all learn growing up is always nice. 

The art in this issue is also very good. This issue focuses a ton on facial expressions and Emilio Laiso nails every single one so that you can really feel how Peter and Shay are feeling with each sentence. There’s a moment where Shay is drawn the same way three times in a row but in the second she squints at Peter in disbelief, and while it’s a small detail, it’s a very significant one that changes the tone of her dialogue. It’s small things like that, or Shay sitting back and folding her arms, Peter looking away nervously, etc that make the conversation flow as well as it does. Laiso’s transition of expressions throughout this issue is just wonderful. Dialogue to dialogue, the art fits extremely well and gives this conversation-heavy issue a lot of room to breathe in the art department. Beautiful work by Laiso, this is my first introduction to their work and I was very pleased. 

What makes this story even better is that Shay is a relatively new civilian character, she takes care of supervillain patients at Ravencroft and she kind of represents a mature challenge for Peter. She’s not MJ, no love interest will ever be for Peter. However, while we’re in this period of Peter and MJ not being married, I feel like this is the first interesting relationship he’s had since their divorce. I don’t see this relationship going far frankly, I don’t care if it does, that’s not really the point of this. Peter is an adult, he’s allowed to date around and I feel like the point is more so showing that. Peter doesn’t have to be this man who is hopelessly waiting for Marvel to let him be married to MJ again. He CAN be this man who very deeply is still in love with his ex-wife but tries his best to move on and have a life. THAT is the most interesting thing you can do with Peter at this moment, with regards to his love life. And I feel like Zeb Wells nails it every time.