Throughout the first three volumes of Nick Spencer's run on The Amazing Spider-Man (which covers the initial fifteen issues), the writer has been setting up something huge for our friendly-neighbourhood web-slinger since the beginning, most notably with an unnamed new villain and the classic Spidey baddie, Kraven the Hunter. Whilst the former still remains a mystery as he continues to lurk in the darkness with what sounds like a personal vendetta towards Peter Parker, the latter's plan is now in...

Honestly this one sort of felt like the first actual story in the entire nick spencer run. There are themes here of sacrifice (vs murder), fatherhood, responsibility, instinct, honor, values, and how all these things intersect and inform each other. It's a pretty cliche premise, somewhere between The Most Dangerous Game and The Hunger Games, as Kraven the Hunter kidnaps all the animal themed Supervillains (also kidnaps spiderman) in New York and traps them in central park with a hundred ultra-po...

I really don’t know what to think of this, Spencer’s first Big Event Unser the Spidey big top. Was it fun? Good? Momentous? I really can’t decide. Was it An Event? Assuredly - one story, one block of time, one villain (team), and one goal? Yes.Was it worth my time? Meh. Do I regret reading it? Not really, but I also don’t know that I’ll ever remember it as one of the Big Deals of Spider-Man lore. Nothing like a Superior or Spider-verse or even Big Time. Not anywhere near as bad as One More Day o...

This gets all the stars from me because of the Gibbon story line. That broke me in two. I was very moved by this volume and I consider this the best so far in this Spencer run.

Honestly, I wasn't a big fan of this one. Kraven the Hunter has always been a Spider-Man character I've liked and I absolutely loved the goofy one that showed up in the Unbeatable Squirrel Girl. This version, instead, treats Kraven as a Complete Monster that is utterly without any form of morality as well as killed that version. Kraven has grabbed the majority of Spider-Man's animal themed villains and put them in Central Park before starting a big ol' hunt. It's part of his attempt to also get

Kraven redux. At least MJ is back. Thanks, Atlanta-Fulton Public Library, for allowing me to sample the Nick Spencer run.

It’s annoying that people keep coming back to Kraven even though fandom agrees that the definitive Kraven story has been told - why sully the legacy of a classic? But maybe Nick Spencer wasn’t reading Squirrel Girl.“Hunted” is a riff on that other Kraven story, the moody 80s JM DeMatteis one, and is at its worst whenever it’s directly referencing it - how my heart sank when I saw *that* lower case font. There’s a meta-thread running through the story that anticipates the inevitable question - wh...

In a spiritual successor to Kraven's Last Hunt, Kraven rounds up all of Spidey's animal themed villains (There are a ton of them.), trapping them in Central Park to be hunted down. Spencer actually wrote an interesting story here, also tying into Grim Hunt when Kraven was resurrected. Adding in Arcade always makes for a fun scenario as well, no matter how cliched his character has become at times. Spencer establishes a new status quo for a lot of Spidey villains here. The HU issues were interest...

Kraven The Hunter is back, and if you're an animal themed hero or villain, you're in trouble. Trapped in Central Park with a group of indestructible hunters, Spidey must navigate a way through the conflict, save Billy Connors and the Black Cat, and defeat Kraven all before the mysterious bug villain that haunts his dreams sets his sights on Mary Jane!Everything Nick Spencer has been doing with Spidey's world so far has been building to this story, and it's well worth it. For the most part, Spide...

This was pretty good but I can't help but feel like I wanted more. Kraven is up to his old tricks. He wants the Spider dead. Instead of going after him head on and failling for the 100th time he decides to play it smart and capture a bunch of other insect like heroes and villains and use them as weapons to kill each other. But more than that he lets rich pieces of shit use robots to hunt and kill them. The twist and turns keep coming as the end results have our hero at odds on who to save and wh...

Dang it, I really wanted to dislike Spencer's run, but this arc was exceptional. It's a much better sequel to The Amazing Spider-Man: Kraven's Last Hunt than previous attempts. While it isn't perfect throughout, it contains much more depth and meaning than the other Kraven stories.A quick comment about the TPB, there are just a couple tie-ins, and they are placed in reading order through the trade. One of the best parts of the whole story was a tie-in on the origin and life of none other than th...

A dynamite spidey tale with a bit too much filler in between. Spencer continues a pretty good run on Amazing Spider-man with the arc he has been building to since The Amazing Spider-Man, Volume 1: Back to Basics. Spencer does a great job with his characterization of Kraven the Hunter. Kraven is a stoic man of few words but when speaks there is a bit of nobility to his voice. The plot to this arc is simple enough. Basically unbeknownst to Spider-man Kraven has hired Taskmaster & Black Ant to capt...

G A R B A G E ! ! !Spencer is just de-evolving EVERY DAMN CHARACTER leading to a lame nostalgia parade with infinite flashbacks, just like Disney's Star Wars new trilogy!Spencer's run by far, is the worst run this millennium in ASM. And unfortunately there are more crappy issues until I catch-up.I bet that once he has de-evolved EVERYONE in a 70s-80s era status, he will do a crappy mega crossover to kill some unknowns.Oh God how much I miss Slott...

So far, I've enjoyed everything Nick Spencer has written and I quite enjoy his particular style and recurring themes, but this is the first time he really disappoints me. Apart from the great first volume, the series was rather decent, with everything building to this event, and it totally falls short.First, to talk about the story itself, it's boring and not creative at all. I always felt like I missed some part, the volume takes time to explain what's happening and from the moment we know the

As others have said the best volume in Spencer's run to date, not only a very solid interpretation of the ways of Kraven, but a whole raft of foreshadowing for the rest of his run. 8 out of 12

Wow this was really good, Spencer absolutely killed it on this story definitely the best part of his run by far. This is a spiritual successor to Kraven’s Last Hunt which is my all time favorite Spider-Man story. At first I wasn’t fond of the idea of Kraven being back since his death was such an iconic moment but Spencer managed to make it work. I also really like the .HU issues that highlight some of the characters featuring in here it gives them a lot of depth. I’m also really liking Spencer’s...

I had been sitting on the issues comprising the Hunted arc for a while now, I'd fallen a fair bit behind on ASM and wasn't really looking forward to catching up. This is a book where, no matter the author, it's always been hit or miss for me, and Spider-Man in general hasn't really had any storylines that have done for me since like the 90s. But I have to say I was pleasantly surprised with Hunted. There's a lot going on, but it's well-crafted by Nick Spencer and it makes good use of a lot of st...

While reading through the Marvel Masterworks reprints of The Amazing Spider-Man, I encountered the first appearance of a lesser-known Spidey foe, the Gibbon. The Gibbon wasn't exactly what you'd call even a B-list or C-list level of villain for Spider-Man. Beyond the hook of the Gibbon wanting to be an ally to Spider-Man (mirroring a bit Spidey's attempts to join the Fantastic Four back in the day), I'd argue there wasn't much memorable about the character.So, imagine my surprise when reading th...

An interesting idea. Compelling and well paced. I especially liked the use of side stories where you either got to see things from a different perspective or learn the whole truth about a supporting character's story that was altered or embellished in the main story.The tone was odd though. The prologue and epilogue are strangely comedic almost in a winking, "too good for this" sort of way, and the rest of the story is somewhat dour. It does not mix well. It was almost like Spencer said I know S...

Yet another disapponting volume by Spencer. The plot is very predictable and Kraven's motivations dubious at best if not plain stupid. Starting from there it's hard to give a damn to whatever happens next.Kraven is as pompous a fool as ever, translating in a way too long and way too wordy story with few lines or siuations really worth noting.The homage to the great "Kraven's last hunt" is nice, really, some scenes being basically redrawn, but alas that's not enough to pull the story up to someth...