**** (four of five stars)
Favorite Quote: "You're lying!! And I'm gonna kill you...and keep killing you...until you beg me to stop!!" -- Flipside, being all logical
Summary
Flipside hugs Spidey so tightly that he chokes him, causing Miguel to shove Flipside from him and call him a cybernetic psycho. Flipside cries at the rejection and one of Packrat's men tries to comfort him. However, Flipside lashes at the comforter with his talons, slicing his throat and announcing that they were having a moment and he didn't need him interrupting. The troop dies as the rest of Packrat's men watch in horror, intimidated. Flipside, now sporting a Venomesque tongue, turns to Miguel in anger. Meanwhile, Tyler and Dana are having dinner, where Tyler insists that Miguel exaggerates most of the bad things that he says about him. For example, Tyler says that he didn't get Miguel addicted to rapture, but instead gave him a non-addictive sample contrived to give him a bad trip so that he wouldn't touch the stuff. (He claims that he knew of Miguel's interest in designer drugs, sparked by his need always to be experimenting.) Tyler then turns the discussion to him, noting the death of his wife and the murder of his son by a "rogue madman" have left him feeling lonely. He asks if he's really that bad and Dana says that he isn't, leaving her confused. Outside, a mysterious woman watches, commenting, "So, that's his game.")
At Packrat's base, Packrat is outraged over his man's murder while Miguel (and an observing Flipside) uses the base's computer system to try to figure out what Flipside is. He confirms that he's some sort of artificial construct and hypothesizes that either his logic circuitry has deteriorated over time or that it never worked in the first place. Just as he begins to find a failsafe override, Flipside interrupts, saying that he thinks Miguel is trying to hurt him. He attacks and the fight explodes into the main room, where Packrat and his men open fire on Flipside. However, despite being shot full of holes, Flipside is fine and tears into Packrat and his men. Packrat yells at Spidey to help them, but Spidey says that they're on their own, since they're the ones who wanted to revive Flipside in the first place. In Mexico, Gabe tries to tell Kasey the truth, but she, um, distracts him. At the base, Packrat's gun blasts a huge hole in Flipside but fails to stop him. Flipside pounces on Packrat, but he's saved when Miguel stops him. Flipside asks why he cares about them and Miguel responds that he doesn't: he just doesn't care much about himself. Flipside announces that he can help Miguel with his suicidal tendencies and puts Miguel's head into the gaping wound in his body (from Packrat's gun), suggesting that he'll either suffocate or the closing wound will decapitate him. Miguel ponders letting Flipside kill him, but decides that it can't end like that. He grabs an energy cable in Flipside's back and tears it from him while he yanks free his head. Flipside says that he needs the cable and attacks, but Miguel uses it to choke him, decapitate him, and then smash his body into the wall. Packrat and his men celebrate the win, but Packrat turns the gun on Miguel. Miguel growls, "Move," and Packrat lets him leave. After Miguel departs, Packrat watches him on a surveillance device and suggests that they chase him after giving him a sporting chance. However, when he turns, he discovers that Flipside has recovered, killing his men. Telling Packrat that he does like a chase, Flipside tells Packrat to run. (A scream is then later shown.)
Miguel returns to Nightshade where he's reunited with Xina. He tells her that he had been hiding and, when he asks about Angela, he can see on her face that she had died. Xina rails against Spider-Man being overrated, since he wasn't able to save Angela. They visit her grave and Xina laments that all Angela's work in life proved to be a waste. Miguel declines to return home with Xina, saying that he meant it when he said that he needed to get away from the city, his mother, and his brother. A tearful Xina departs, leaving Miguel alone at Angela's grave.
In the back-up story, Angela and Xina try to convince Miguel to testify at Kron's upcoming hearing. Xina asks to speak to Miguel in private and Miguel lays into her, telling him that she's crazy to think that Kron is actually going to be expelled with Tyler as his father. Xina asks how he could be so cavalier since Kron attacked and humiliated her, but Miguel responds that she just laughed when Kron did the same to him on the football field. He tells her that it's about him being a punching bag, since the wrong people have the power. Xina tells him that he has the truth on his side, but Miguel counters that Socrates did, too, but it didn't help him much. Xina says that she'll go to the hearing and, if Miguel were a man, he'd do the same. Miguel offers that he can't win: if Kron stays, he's dead, but if he gets tossed, Tyler'll come after him. Miguel then has a dream where his family is evicted from their home, his father beats him, and Kron wins Xina. At the hearing, Tyler plays off Kron's attack as "rambunctiousness" and not sexual assault and Angela calls for the witness, Miguel, who's seen trying to hitch a ride outside the school.
The Review
Although I'm not hugely thrilled with the return of a potentially suicidal Miguel, I thought this issue was a real return to form. Leaving Miguel on the verge of a hero's journey into the wilderness to clear his head sets up not only an exciting story but also the next step for this title once this journey ends. But, David also gives us a good time in the process here, with the insanity of Flipside, a horrifying combination of Carnage and Deadpool.
The Good
1) Again, I wonder where we're going with Tyler wooing Dana. David does a great job of showing how excellent Tyler is at manipulation, spinning a web for Dana about how he's all alone, despite his fortune and power. While technically true, it's clearly not the whole story, something that Dana (again, not the sharpest knife in the drawer) doesn't suspect. Along those lines, I thought it was interesting that David gives us more detail about Kron's death, but little actual information. Tyler claims that Kron was killed by "rogue madmen," but, given the source (and the victim), it clearly wasn't as accidental as Tyler makes it seem.
2) The brutality of Flipside really keeps the reader on his toes the whole issue. You just legitimately had no idea what he was going to do next after he unexpectedly slices the guy's throat. I mean, when he suddenly had the Venomesque tongue? Crazy. I just loved the whole horror-movie vibe, like when he reappears fully assembled at the end and tells Packrat to run.
3) David again reminds us that Miguel isn't Peter Parker here. Although his conscience may get the better of him in the end, Miguel does, after all, abandon Packrat and his troops to Flipside, since, in his words, they're the ones that wanted him revived in the first place. It's a good reminder of what a reluctant hero Miguel is. He does the right thing in the end, but he's not necessarily happy about it.
4) The idea of Flipside killing Miguel by suffocating him within his body was, um, gross. But, it did at least seem to force Miguel to confront his somewhat suicidal tendencies of late and make him realize that he didn't want to die that way. Of course, his inability to prevent Angela's death seems to be just another log on the fire of his depression and I wonder how he's going to find his way to a good mental place. Based on his conversation at the end of the issue and the title of the next one, Route 666, we seem to be going on a classic journey in the wilderness and I'm excited to see where David goes with that. I've seen hints of the 2099 world in other series, but I think that it'll be interesting to see Miguel in a different environment.
The Unknown
1) Is the mystery woman watching Tyler and Dana outside the restaurant Conchata? Or someone else?
2) David seems to set up Xina as an Aunt May figure here, making her hate Spider-Man (or, at least, dislike him) due to his inability to save Angela. David had appeared to be moving us full speed ahead in having him reconcile with Xina, but this speed bump is a clever one.
3) I really do wonder about Flipside and hope that David finds a way to tell that story before the series ends!
The Unsure
In the letters pages, several people have complained about the young Miguel back-up stories. At first, I thought that they were OK, since they really teased out the relationship between Miguel and Tyler. But, I'll admit that I'm not really sure where David is going with them now. I thought we were bringing it to a close with Kron's impending expulsion, but the last two issues just seem to be dragging out the story. I wonder if David is setting up the fact that the beginning of Tyler's beef with Miguel came from his eventual testimony, but I really wonder if it's that simple. At any rate, I do feel like, at this point, I'd like David to wrap up these back-up stories and focus more on Miguel in the present.
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