TITLE: What's New, Pussycat?

Summary

Felicia Hardy, otherwise known as the Black Cat, has been living the good life in Los Angeles. She has given up her life of crime, but she's still enjoying the fruits of her past labors. Like any smart criminal, she put her ill-gotten gains in more traditional investments to live a legitimate lifestyle. Felicia gets a call about a missing friend who was last seen in Manhattan, so off she goes to New York to find out what happened.

Meanwhile, Spider-Man is out looking for the drug dealer that supplied the heroin that killed one of Peter Parker's student. The search leads Spidey on an interesting car chase that has him surfing on a trashcan lid (you have to see it for yourself). After taking down the small-time dealers, he finds out that the supplier goes by the name of Mr. Brownstone.

The pusher also tells Spider-Man that he introduced the dead student to Hunter Todd, a Hollywood A-List actor who has a taste for teenage boys. By coincidence, Hunter Todd was also seen with Felicia's missing friend. The two trails leads Spidey and the Cat to literally bump into each other, and they crash into Hunter Todd's loft.

At that moment, Hunter Todd happened to be talking to Mister Brownstone. As Spider-Man and the Black Cat shake off the effects of falling through a window. Todd and his date mysteriously begin to OD on heroin, even though neither had recently taken the drug. Somehow, Brownstone caused the overdoses to prevent Todd from talking. To be continued...

Opinion

This is a first issue of a four-issue arc, so the bulk of the comic is devoted to setting up the story. Smith is working with well-established characters in Spider-Man and Black Cat, but the Cat has been MIA for a while. He "seamlessly" recounts her recent history in the form of introspection while the Cat is swinging around. Smith properly sets up the plot, although it was almost too convenient how Spidey and the Cat end up bumping into each other.

But what would a Kevin Smith comic be without a few homosexual references? This book has all the usual Smith touches as well - pop culture references, sex, drugs, witty dialogue... you name it, it's in there. These aren't bad things - in fact, they're the exact qualities that make Smith an excellent comic book writer. It's just that his style occasionally overshadows the substance of his story, and this comic exhibits this problem.

Still, Kevin Smith's B-material is still better than a lot of comics that sees print. At the risk of sounding like a Kevin Smith fanboy lemming, almost everything that he writes is worth reading. There is no doubt that Spider-Man/Black Cat will sell like hotcakes. Smith has a large fanbase that will buy everything that bears his name. The trick is to convince non-Smith followers to pick up the book.

So what else does this book have going for it? How about the art of hustband and wife team, Terry and Rachel Dodson? Their style is distinctive, and shines whenever the Black Cat is on the page. Terry's version of Spider-Man is clean, even simplistic. One detail (or lack of) that bugged me is when Terry skips Spider-Man's webbing on his costume. While the un-webbed Spidey doesn't look bad, it almost feels like Terry was cutting corners.

Conclusion

This serves as a sample of what we can expect from the team of Kevin Smith and Terry Dodson. When the creative team takes over Amazing Spider-Man, the ongoing title will be in good hands. Kevin Smith is not for everyone, but if you have a bit of fanboy/fangirl in you, this mini-series is worth picking up.