Amazing Spider-Man #553
Freak-Out!
The drug addict known as the Freak has emerged from his cocoon a misshapen, skinless, monstrosity that is befitting his nickname. While the gathered NYPD officers try to make sense of this horror, Spider-Man tries to figure out how to handle this latest threat.[1] Before Spider-Man can act, the Freak tries to flee the scene and is shot in the head by Alan O’Neil. The creature then falls down a service shaft into the sewers below. Watching the Freak as he goes, Spider-Man witnesses, the monstrosity begin wrapping itself up in another cocoon. With the danger over, Spider-Man leaves but not before hearing Vin and O’Neil arguing over him. Spider-Man isn’t sure what’s worse, that Vin wants him arrested for being a vigilante, or the fact that O’Neil likes having Spider-Man around to blame things on.
As Spider-Man is wondering how things could get worse, events coming together that will make life more complicated for the wallcrawler. At the Bar With No Name, the villains demand a refund from the Bookie, but he convinces them to roll all their bets over to a pool to determine when Captain America is coming back from the dead.[2] While back at the scene of the crime, Carlie Cooper arrives on the scene to collect a sample of the creature. The officers on the scene all wonder why. Cooper points out that knowing everything they can about the Freak will allow them to handle it should it return or if there turns out to be more of these monsters. By this time, Spider-Man is changing back into his civilian identity, cursing the fact that he has come back out of hiding and figures its too late to go back from keeping a low profile with the Spider-Tracer Killer and Menace still on the loose.[3] He thinks that maybe he’s going crazy but dismisses this idea as well.[4] However, when Peter turns in his photos of the Freak, the DB’s new owner, Dexter Bennett, isn’t impressed by them. He then tells Peter to get down to the Hollister press conference as he is probably going to announce he is running for mayor of New York. He reminds Peter that the DB is backing Russell Crowne so the pictures can’t look good or he will be fired.
Later, Peter arrives at the press conference and begins taking photos of Bill Hollister at unflattering angles. Peter feels bad enough and is spotted by his daughter, and Harry’s girlfriend, Lily making him feel even worse. At least when Peter turns in the photos he relies on the fact that Dexter Bennett can’t remember his name. At that same moment, Carlie Cooper is working late trying to determine what created the cocoon that evening. That’s when she is visited by Curt Connors, who tells her that the lab where he is working on a stem cell project was broken into earlier. This all starts making the cocoon make sense and she allows Connors to take a sample and examine it himself.[4]
Meanwhile, the Freak emerges from his newest cocoon and feels different. Looking at his hands he is shocked to discovered that they are now webbed. Finding a changing room for sewer workers, the Freak looks in the mirror and sees that his body has taken on characteristics of a rat and waterfowl, Looking even more hideous than before, he blames Spider-Man for his current predicament and vows to make the wall-crawler pray.
While at Mount Sinai Hospital, despite efforts made by his wife, J. Jonah Jameson manages to get a copy of the DB and is furious over what is being considered a lead story.[5] However, Jameson doesn’t realize that this is his former newspaper and it is taken away by one of the nurses before he can learn that his wife sold the Bugle to Dexter Bennett.[6] At that same moment, Dexter Bennett is calling Peter Parker and assigning him to photograph Crowne speech in Chinatown. Peter agrees to take the assignment and, before leaving home, tests out a new device that he invented. Weaved into the spider emblem on his costume, it makes Peter’s camera automatically focus on him when taking photos of Spider-Man in action.
Meanwhile, the Freak emerges from the sewers disguised from a city worker. His hunt for Spider-Man is delayed only long enough for Freak to murder a hot dog vendor and eat all the food. While at the downtown police precinct, extra officers are being assigned to ensure that Randall Crowne doesn’t get murdered like Lisa Parfrey.[9] By this time, the Freak has decided that he needs to get high before he continues his hunt and has been looking for Raymond’s meth lab. However, when he comes across a scrap of Spider-Man’s ripped costume, he realizes that he can follow the wall-crawler’s scent.[10] At that same moment, Raymond, the drug dealer orders his meth cooker to get to work even if the ventilation in the building is broken.
At the Russell Crowne speech, Peter Parker snaps photos when the event is interrupted by the Freak, who has followed Spider-Man’s scent and demands the wall-crawler come out. Officer Vin Gonzalez and Alan O’Neil are on the scene and when they try to shoot the Freak in the head again, they discover that the monster is now bulletproof. This creates a distraction that allows Peter to slip away, set up his camera and change into Spider-Man. As the wall-crawler battles the Freak, Randall Crowne refuses to leave the stand. The mayoral hopeful orders both combatants to stop because they are destroying public property. However, the Freak ends up lifting up a metal statue and tosses it toward Crowne. When Spider-Man tries to stop the projectile, he discovers — to his horror — that the web-shooter is now jammed.
Recurring Characters
Spider-Man, Freak, Vin Gonzalez, Alan O’Neil, Bookie, Hydro-Man, Wrecker, Ox, Trapster, Bulldozer, Carlie Cooper, Dexter Bennett, Joe Robertson, Lily Hollister, Bill Hollister, Curt Connors, J. Jonah Jameson, Aunt May, Russell Crowne
Continuity Notes
Spider-Man decides to save the police officers even though they think he’s a serial killer. Since Amazing Spider-Man #549, Spider-Man is a person of interest in the so-called Spider-Tracer murders where the victims were found to have spider-tracers on their bodies.
At the time of this story, Captain America is dead after having been gunned down in Captain America (vol. 5) #25. He will be brought back from the dead in Captain America: Reborn #1-5.
Spider-Man faced the Menace in Amazing Spider-Man #550-551.
Peter remarks about how both Norman and Harry Osborn were both able to become the Green Goblin and forget their crimes. The Osborns were prone to selective amnesia, the facts:
Norman Osborn was the Green Goblin starting in Amazing Spider-Man #14. He started suffering bouts of selective amnesia following his battle with Spider-Man in Amazing Spider-Man #39-40. He would remember his double identity in Spectacular Spider-Man Magazine #2, Amazing Spider-Man #96-98, and Amazing Spider-Man #121-122. Osborn has not had any selective memory loss since he faked his death post-Amazing Spider-Man #122. The only thing Osborn has forgotten is Peter’s double identity like everyone else when Mephisto altered reality in Amazing Spider-Man #545.
Harry Osborn had a mental break thinking his father was murdered in Amazing Spider-Man #122, becoming the second Green Goblin in Amazing Spider-Man #136-137. However, after psychiatric care, he forgot Peter’s double identity or that he was the Green Goblin when he was released in Amazing Spider-Man #151. He was later forced to remember he was the Green Goblin when his psychiatrist Bart Hamilton took over the role in Amazing Spider-Man #176-180. He later remembered he was the Green Goblin in Web of Spider-Man #47, then remembering that Peter was Spider-Man in Spectacular Spider-Man #179-183. Harry hasn’t been the Green Goblin since Spectacular Spider-Man #200. Although he remembers his past criminal career, he also no longer remembers that Peter is Spider-Man thanks to Mephisto’s spell.
When considering if he is going crazy, Peter decides that he doesn’t want to go down that road again. This is a reference to Amazing Spider-Man #24, when Spider-Man was tricked into seeing a phony psychiatrist who turned out to be Mysterio in disguise.
Connors states here that he is haunted by the law of unintended consequences. This is a veiled reference to the fact that Curt Connors has regularly been transformed into the Lizard since Amazing Spider-Man #6.
One of the newspaper headlines warns that there is a blizzard on the way. This blizzard hits in a big way in Amazing Spider-Man #555-557.
Marla sold the Bugle to Bennett in Amazing Spider-Man #547 after Jonah suffered a heart attack the previous issue.
List Parfrey, one of Randall Crowne’s opponents running for mayor was accidentally killed during a fight between Spider-Man and Menace in Amazing Spider-Man #551.
This scrap from Spider-Man’s costume comes from when Spider-Man ripped his costume chasing after the Freak before his transformation, last issue.
