Avenging Spider-Man Primer

There is not a whole to I can really say about Avenging Spider-Man. After years of there only being one Spider-Man title, Amazing Spider-Man, this book saw a brief return of multiple monthly Spider-Man books. The title tells stories in the spirit of Marvel Team-Up, with each story featuring Spider-Man teaming up with another character in the Marvel Universe.

The series saw a rotating cast of writers which included Zeb Wells, Greg Rucka, Dan Slott, Mark Waid, Katheryn Immonen, Ty Templeton, Kelly Sue DeConnick, Cullen Bunn, and Christopher Yost. Artists on the title included Joe Madureria, Greg Land, Leinil Yu, Marco Checchetto, Stuart Immonen, Terry Dodson, Aaron Kuder, Gabrielle Dell’Otto, Paco Medina, Mike Allred David Lopez, Steve Dillon, Jay Leisten, Gerry Alanguilan, Wade Von Grawbadger, Rachel Dodson, and Juan Viasco. I’m probably missing a name or two, but whatever, you can find more detailed credits elsewhere.

Each story arc was self contained and only ran for a maximum of three issues, if that. There’s not really much to go say about it other than that until issue #15.1. That issue follows Amazing Spider-Man #700 which ended with Doctor Octopus switching bodies with Peter Parker and taking over as Spider-Man. This put it in line with what was going on in Superior Spider-Man.

Whereas the previous issues are your typical Spider-Man team-up fare, I like the later issues of the title because it takes Doctor Octopus and forces him to endure the type of fun, one off team-ups that Spider-Man would find himself in. Even as he endures these indignities, Otto is still running schemes in the background. It also saw a consistent team working on the book with Christopher Yost taking on as writer.

Eventually, the title was cancelled after 22 issues and replaced with Superior Spider-Man Team-Up to keep it in line with the Superior Spider-Man line of books that were being put out at the time, but we’ll cover that series elsewhere.

While Avenging Spider-Man was a short lived title, a new Marvel Team-Up book would pop up in 2019 to continue the tradition of team-up books (although that series primarily featured Ms. Marvel and was had a very, very short run.)