Spider-Man's Tangled Web, Vol. 1

Rating:
Summary: Great, except for the first story
Review: I would have given this book at least four stars if it didn't include Garth Ennis's three-part story The Thousand. It introduced a really silly villain who was supposed to bully Peter Parker as a kid. I hate it when characters who are supposedly part of the backstory come out of nowhere and I hate it even more when they are just silly. He had no motivation for wanting to kill Spiderman and take his place. The plot was just lame, which is a shame because Garth Ennis is one of the greatest comic writers ever. Having said that, John McCrea's art is brilliant! He uses a different style that I have never seen him use before. It relies less on shading and more on simple linework and colouring effects.
Thankfully, it gets much better from here on. Greg Rucka of Detective Comics fame offers the best story of the collection with the simple yet effective Kingpin story Severence package. Its offers an interesting insight into the way the Kingpin runs his organisation and has one of the best portrayals of the character ever.
Flowers for Rhino, based on the brilliant short story Flowers for Algernon, is one of the few instances that the Rhino is portrayed as a character you can feel for. Its a love story, believe it or not, in which the Rhino gains intelligence.
This book collects the first few stories from Marvel's Tangled Web series, which is one of the best Spider-man books in a long time. The still going on and the stories are still excellent so you might want to search for individual issues if they are not reprinted in trade paperback form.

Rating:
Summary: Great creators bring a fresh look at Spider-Man's world
Review: Marvel Comics have been resurrecting the sales and popularity of their flagship character, Spider-Man, in the past year. It seems so obvious, but a big part of the character's resurgence has been due to the quality of writers and artists employed on the various monthly books. Tangled Web falls outside the "ongoing continuity" of the two main "core" titles, Amazing Spider-Man and Peter Parker, telling self-contained stories that focus on Spider-Man's world, as opposed to the lead character himself. The first volume of Tangled Web stories make up this book and within the pages you'll find the single best comic book produced this year. That story is the one-issue "Severance Package", a tale of the New York underworld. The Kingpin of Crime summons one of his hitmen, who has failed to carry out an order due to Spider-Man's interference. This story is the essence of Tangled Web: the people on the edges of the Spider-Man story, some never seen before, others (such as the Rhino, featured in the third story in this collection) who have been, at best, second-rate supporting characters, but in these stories become interesting characters in their own right. Fans of crime fiction should buy this book - it ranks alongside other current gritty mainstream comics such as Powers and 100 Bullets.