It's interesting to me how cheesed people get with me picking on the Lee/Ditko Amazing Spider-Man days. I thought I had tipped over a few sacred cows already, but none so much as maligning the unfortunate Peter Parker. You'd think I'd stop. You'd think.
Which, of course, just leads me into Amazing Spider-Man #13, which had the first appearance of Mysterio. The idea was an interesting one: To defeat him, one had to figure out how he accomplished mind-boggling illusions. Well, in this case, not even he knows:
He would later admit that he had magnets in the soles of his shoes. However, since magnets don't work on bricks, he himself had no idea how he managed to attach himself to the bridge like that. It was probably a Wile E. Coyote "I don't know this is impossible so I'm doing it" moment.
On to issue #14, which brought about the first appearance of the Green Goblin and the return of the Enforcers:
It looks like tearing up phone books is how Ox is passing the time, but this strikes me as the sort of thing you could really only do once. Did he have a pile of phone books there, or did he just glue it back together so he could rip it again?
Annnnnnnyway, the Green Goblin comes in and announces he's the new head cheese. The Enforcers take issue with this, until the Goblin demonstrates his awesome power thusly:
Seriously? A few sparks? What are they, magpies? It seems like Spidey could have saved himself quite a few lumps over the years if he saved some sparklers from the Fourth of July.
And, of course, it would have been hilarious had the sparks come out of the Goblin's middle finger, but you already know that.
Here's a power I didn't know Spidey had:
Chest expansion? I'm not really sure what "(his) power of chest expansion" is. Was he bitten by a radioactive pufferfish?
Alright, my grumblies! Start yer gripin' in the comments, and I'll see you tomorrow!
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8 comments:
Even if Mysterio had magnets in his shoes and somehow ooooooh I don't know there was something metal on the other side of the bricks??? It would take ungodly strength to stand like that. Must have been some other trick he was using and he just didn't want to tell Spidey all his secrets.
Sparks from the finger tip? Maybe they had already seen what comes next after those sparks??
"Power of chest expansion"?? If that aint a Greg Brady moment nothing is.
Personally, I have no problem with picking on any character. Dumb is dumb, no matter who it is, so go for it...
Mysterio:
Mysterio supplied the Chameleon with equipment to impersonate Spidey, using suction cups to climb walls, so his using the same gear himself is not unreasonable.
The Enforcers:
Once the bored Ox shredded the phone book, he probably was going to start on the furniture in the run-down room, but the Goblin's sudden appearance distracted him.
The Green Goblin:
Think of the sparks popping out of his finger as the equivalent of cocking the hammer on a pistol and you'll see why the Enforcers backed down.
(Hey, the guy FLEW into the room! He obviously had some high-tech stuff on him...)
Spidey's "chest expansion":
Before being bitten by the radioactive spider, Peter had sent away for the Charles Atlas "Make Yourself a Man" kit seem on the back cover of comic books, and, with the Proportionate Strength Of A Spider™, such isometric techniques have awesome results... ;-)
I don't care what anyone else says, the Enforcers are awesome. Possibly the most awesome characters in Spidey's rogues' gallery.
And of the Enforcers, the most awesome is clearly FANCY DAN. I would read the hell out of a series about Fancy Dan!
Spidey's had the power of chest expansion from Day One, but puffing out one's chest is an action usually associated with pride, so Pete's 50 years of moping and wallowing in self-doubt have given us few glimpses of the power in action.
Nevermind Mesmero's magnetic shoes, I've still never figured out how Spidey's "clinging" powers work through the fabric of his gloves and the soles of his boots.
As to Mysterio's shoes, I have to point out that when he was bragging about his brilliance, he showed only magnets (not suction cups) on his shoes. He also had springs in them so he could jump via leap-frog.
So, the suction cups hadn't come around yet.
"...he showed only magnets (not suction cups) on his shoes."
Unlike heroes, villains don't give away all their secrets at one shot. ;-)
Besides, considering how much equipment he was carrying around, he may have just forgotten he had them on. (He was new at this super-villain stuff, you know.)
Thankfully, he don't have to activate them, and they worked when he went horizontal on the wall!
Right, I think I'll side with the idea that Mysterio was lying and pulling Peter's chain. HOWEVER, for a physic guy Peter was dumb as a brick if he thought Mysterio had ultra powerful brick magnets.
Two, I'm sure Ox would have done many forms of casual destruction if he had the time.
Three, I agree with the above fellow that pointed out that GG flew into the room and then had a sparky finger. A criminal in new york even in those days had to be dimly aware of super powers and so a wise one might want to listen rather than rush into a fight.
Alkaseltzer!
Lazarus Lupin
http://strangespanner.blogspot.com/
the Antimatter of taste
Wow. I was impressed that you didn't make any Pamela Anderson jokes with the "chest expansion" thing. Chalk one up for good taste, I suppose.
You disappoint me, sir. >:/
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