Spider-Douchery #19: Human Torch, Sandman, and the Enforcers

The story starts with Spider-Man stopping a robbery like he usually does.

It makes less sense  up close, except it doesn't

The rest of the fight scene is actually pretty good for the time.  As compressed at the story is, like usual, the artists did manage to get a lot in.  No backgrounds, but it's too early to be picky.  As least it's not urine yellow.

There's an armed robbery happening two feet away. Would you mind being a little more concerned?

Sadly, the crowd watching is full of talking mannequins, as no one even moves as one of the thugs runs through the crowd to escape.  No one backs away in fear, they just talk about Spider-Man like that's all they know how to do.

You could do something that would make sense.  Then again, no one else would be as fabulous.

Then he runs away from the police, which the artist forgot to draw and the letter forgot to give sirens for.

Then we move on to Jameson on a talk show about how much Spider-Man sucks.  Does no one but the Human Torch have a life outside of Spider-Man's?

Is he related to Godzilla or is he just mad New York shrank?

And then we're off to the Human Torch whining about something in another comic just before he gets literally roped into yet another plot thread.

Was the author told to speed up in places and slow down in others and he got confused and wrote a different sequel for each?

Dude, can you pay attention to physics at least slightly?

Yes, it's The Enforcers again. you're favorite group of...what are these guys actually?

Anyway, one managed to catch The Human Torch.  With a normal lasso.  While he was flying above tall buildings and they're on the street.  And no one is around to notice.  Well, at least someone bothered to remember to add in a background.  And yes, they capture him, thanks to the combined efforts of Sandman and a fire extinguisher.

I'd say the Human Torch needs an adult, but that's exactly what's going on

It took all of six pages to tell us all of that and the readers have only learned Spider-Man has bothered returned to crime fighting and that The Human Torch can be defeated by a cub scout.

Unfortunately, Sandman accidentally spills the beans that Spider-Man is back in action.  Fortunately, no one cares and we can move on to some filler with Peter Parker.

It's actually pretty good filler of him and his aunt interacting like family--very close, but not clingy.  Remember this.  You'll miss it.

At school, everyone's excited to get back into Flash's Spider-Man Fanclub.  Flash si so happy about Spider-Man coming back that he forgets all his bruises are gone within a day.  Lash and Liz have an argument about...something, and then Flash decides to argue with Peter over even less.

How dare you have feelings!

After school, Peter nearly walks into Crotchpuncher going for a stroll.  If you're wondering who's stupid enough to walk past a school in their super-villain costume when it just let out, the answer is: a moron.  Which shouldn't be surprising, given that all members of The Enforcers decided to use int as their dump stat.

Spider-Man follows Crotchpunhcer into a house, hoping Crotchpuncher will lead him to the other Enforcers.  Hey, maybe this is where he lives?

No, this is where everything is contrived by the plot, common sense be damned a long time ago.  Of course, there are villains hiding behind each door and they find Spider-Man crawling on the ceiling.  And of course they all tackle Spider-Man instead of running away in hope he can't catch them all.

And we're back to fighting like Looney Tunes

They fight for so long that the police actually notice the disturbance and show up.  With five guys no less.  it's not like they handle anything serious for more than once every 20 issues.  That means Spider-Man runs away, having captured no one at all and The Human Torch still captured.  Yay.

Later, Peter goes to work and Betty introduces him to her 'friend' Ned Leeds.  Already you feel sorry for him for being with Betty and she can't even admit they're a couple.  She starts apologizing to Peter about how she acted and then, when he accepts her apology and decides to move on to something relevant, she starts crying about losing him.

Wanna celebrate me doing what I was supposed to be doing in the first place by watching me slack off?

Next, Jameson storms out of his office and into...his office I guess, telling Peter to piss off if he hasn't gotten any work done.  For being angry, he seems pretty rational dealing with freeloading freelancers.

So, who else is looking forward to the movie with her in it?

Sadly, the good(ish) writing stops there.

The comic takes an entire page to show Sandman and The Enforcers plan to use The Human Torch as bait to catch Spider-Man and kill him. No, they don't do it, they just plan on it. No, we don't need any of it.

Then he goes to bother Jameson. He just shows up, calls Jameson names, and then leaves.  That's it.

Oh, and to make the last scene with Sandman and the Enforcers even more pointless, Spider-Man goes around threatening people asking for their whereabouts because he doesn't want to wait around for them to announce their trap.

"Yeah, we're experts at losing!"

He sneaks into their hideout, partly because of skill and partly because lookouts get bored and leave their posts.

God to see he's got his priorities back

Spider-Man tries to save the Human Torch, but is ambushed by Sandman...being sand.  I guess he's got spider-intelligence too.  Then the Enforcers teleport in to help gang up on Spider-Man as planned.   They don't come in through doors and they weren't hiding; they're just suddenly there.  The fight is pretty long.  It goes from page 16 to page 20.  The next page, sadly, is taken up by Spider-Man and the Human Torch defeating SandMan and the Enforcers, but immediately both become useless and acting like toddlers once they are only fighting Sandman.

Yep, Spider-Man won't shot shooting webbing and the Human Torch won't stop flying in front of where the webbing is aimed.  So Spider-Man shoots more web and the Human Torch gathers more up.

But their temper tantrums don't matter in the slightest.  The cops came from who know where and tackled Sandman.  In fact, they fight so well, the actually arrest him when the Human Torch and Spider-Man don't bother to help and just watch.  Our heroes, ladies and gentlemen.

Peter goes to work to sell photos of the fight (I hope he didn't include the ones where he screwed up fighting the Human Torch) and then asks Betty out to ice cream.  She says she has a date with Ned, but when Peter is happy for her and gets the message loud and clear and leaves, she's upset she lost him.

The comic realizes hos stupid her plot is, so the writer uses the last page to wash it out of our brain by showing some mystery man (who looks a lot like Crotchpuncher, as sadly that's not a red herring for the audience, it's just bad art) following Peter Parker home and calling a mystery boss who demands Peter be watched every minute for days.

It's good that they at remembered which plot threads lead to suspense and which just fill up the page.

WHAT THE HELL IS HE SWINGING ON COUNT: 1
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