Whatever a Spider Can’s Superior Spider-Man #32 recap

Doctor Octopus is back! That’s right folks Superior Spider-Man returns for a two-part extension to is critically acclaimed comic-book run that not only shows us the exploits of Doctor Octopus’ Spider-Man when he traveled forward in time during the Superior Spider-Man arc but also helps to set up the events of the next big Spider-Man event, the Spider-Verse. Here’s our recap.

The issue starts with Otto’s trademark superior narration that partially describes the events that happened at Horizon Labs where Spider-Man 2099 and Superior Spider-Man switched places. We see Superior Spider-Man blame Peter Parker, Spider-Man 2099 and Tiberius Stone for what happened as he slowly realises that he’s still alive having contained the temporal energy meltdown, however his body is ‘unmoored’

Doctor Octopus realises that he’s floating through time, as he gets glimpses of all of the different earths and universes. He surmises that he could end up anywhere due to time being fragmented. However as soon as he gets his bearings having landed in a specific universe at a specific time he realises where he is.

Why, he’s in the 2099 universe of course. The 2099 security attempt to apprehend Spider-Man, mistakenly believing he’ll run away like Miguel O’Hara used to. However a slightly more sinister and potentially superior Spider-Man attacks the security smashing their hover vehicle. Miguel’s brother Gabe picks Doc Ock up and mistakenly (and understandably) identifies him as Peter Parker from the heroic age.

The pair discuss Superior Spider-Man not remembering Gabe, and Gabe tells him he is this era’s Spider-Man’s brother. Gabe takes Spider-Man to Miguel’s apartment where the holo-agent (not in the form of Lyra) appears. Doctor Octopus says he just needs to know where to get the right equipment and sends Gabe away because telling him why would be a time paradox. Superior Spider-Man wastes no time locating the facilities storing the equipment he needs.

We then get a fun double-page spread of panels showing Superior Spider-Man robbing various companies to get the equipment he needs. He takes something from the Stark/Fujikawa North America Headquarters and then earns the ire of Tyler Stone who sends the full force of the Public Eye and the bounty hunter Venture after Superior Spider-Man to no avail.

We then see that Doctor Octopus has assembled the device allowing him to travel back through time to his own world and period. However he’s also quite clearly spent some time adapting his holo-agent to resemble Anna Marie, the love of his love for whom he sacrificed himself as Spider-Man, thus bring Peter Parker back to life.

After making sure the snap-back protocol is working (allowing him to return to 2099 in the case of danger) Otto attempts to travel home. Instead of home Spider-Man arrives in a strange world full of rubble and burning buildings where he discovers the corpses of Mr. Fantastic, the Thing and the Human Torch as well as the body of Spider-Man, the fifth member of the Fantastic Four. Otto deduces that this must be an alternate universe where Spider-Man joins the Fantastic Four and snaps-back to 2099.

We then see Otto’s further attempts to get home, each time he ends up in the wrong place and each time there’s a dead alternate Spider-Man. We see dead Spider-Men from the House of M storyline, a dead Iron-Spider from the Civil War storyline and a dead armored Spider-Man. Otto notices that there are similarities between all of the dead Spider-Men and resolves to do more tests and find out more information.

We then jump to what appears to be an Indian Spider-Man evading someone with a two-pronged energy weapon that matches the description of thew weapon used to kill the other Spider-Men. The Indian Spider-Man struggles to save innocent bystanders and get away from his attacker which almost results in his death.

We then see Doctor Octopus saving the day and kicking the attacker away. He then quickly explains the situation to Indian Spider-Man and tells them that they must leave now. Superior Spider-Man tells Indian Spider-Man that he’s raising an army of Spider-Men to fight back. Indian Spider-Man mistakenly believes he’s the first recruit however it is soon revealed that Superior Spider-Man has already amassed a fair few Spider-Men, with Spider-Man Noir, Six-Armed Spider-Man, Spider-Bitch, Spider-Monkey and Black Ops Spidey standing there.

We then have a small short-story of Black-Ops Spidey explaining his background. Basically after Gwen was murdered by the Goblin this Spider-Man realised he had to start killing his enemies to truly stop them. We see that he’s been trained by Wolverine and has killed Kraven the Hunter.

We then see a large two page spread of the same enemy from earlier with the two-pronged energy staff (who I believe is called Karn) fighting Black Ops Spidey and Wolverine. We see that Wolverine has just been impaled by the energy staff. On the next page we see Wolverine’s Adamantium skeleton and it’s revealed that Karn really has killed Logan.

Black Ops Spidey then acts quickly to prevent a woman named Alex from getting hurt by knocking her out and then luring Karn away. Spidey tricks Karn into stabbing his energy absorbing spear into a Shi’ar technology generator thinking that it’ll stop his attacker. However the generator barely harms Karn. Karn is ready to kill Black Ops Spidey when Superior Spider-Man shows up to save the day again convincing Black Ops Spidey to go with him by promising to kill Karn. Superior replies with ‘That horror will die or we all will”.

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