Featuring: Spider-Man
Release: October 8, 1964
Cover: January 1964
12 cents
Written by: Stan Lee
Illustrated by: Steve Ditko
17 pages
The cover calls this a special “Tribute-to-Teen-Agers” issue. I don’t really appreciate the significance of that. There are teenagers in this issue, and most issues of Amazing Spider-Man, a series which stars a teenager.
Significant couple panels. Last time Peter will wear glasses. The implication is that his spider-powers fixed his eyesight, but he’s continued to wear them anyway.
We learn Peter’s science teacher is named Mr. Warren. It’s not his introduction, though. We met him in Amazing Fantasy #15 and Amazing Spider-Man #2. He went unnamed, but Ditko drew him distinctively. I’ve been calling him “Peter’s science teacher”. Similarly, I called Liz Allan “Peter’s blonde classmate” until we learned her name. We still don’t know Mr. Warren’s first name.
The Living Brain answers questions in mathematical code symbols: The sequence “4B9510” is visible. The “B” might indicate hexadecimal. ASCII is a common standard for encoding english with numbers; it was just being developed as this comic came out. As the Living Brain is uniquely advanced compared to our world, ICM likely developed a unique encoding scheme as well. Nonetheless, if you’re curious about the history of encoding schemes in our world, I found this a good read.
Brian Cronin discusses the question of whether Flash Thompson is a bully here. General wisdom is that he was. Now, he was a far more stereotypical bully in Ultimate Spider-Man and the 2002 Spider-Man film, physically attacking Peter. He is less physical in the comics. The shove discussed above is pretty rare. Flash notes he’s been wanting Parker to agree to a fight for months. Traditional bullies don’t wait for their victims to agree to a fight. However, he is a verbal bully. He often picks on Peter and says mean things, though Peter is quite happy to reciprocate. I find it somewhat weird that the school is sponsoring this fight.
In the end, we get the question of whether Flash is Spider-Man. This is good for Peter, as he does need to explain why Spider-Man has twice now seemingly been on hand at Midtown High.
Peter pretends to lose the message with the Brain’s guess at his secret identity. I hope he at least decoded the message himself to see if the Living Brain correctly guessed his identity. That’s useful information.
The best thing about this story is Ditko’s design for the Living Brain. The subject of robot design in pop culture is of mild personal interest. This won’t be Ditko’s last contribution. It won’t even be the last robot with a cool design he pits Spider-Man against.
To see what else was going on in the pop culture landscape, here’s a brief glimpse at some robots (or robot-like designs) in film, television and comics, from 1919 up through 1963.
Rating: ★★★☆☆, 58/100
Significance: ★★★☆☆
I read this story in Amazing Spider-Man Epic Collection vol. 1: Great Power.
The scans are taken from a reprint in Spider-Man Classics #9, 1993. The cover focuses on this issue’s backup story, which we’ll be covering next. You’ll find it’s rather misleading.
You can also find this story through Kindle.
Characters
- Peter Parker/Spider-Man
- Living Brain
- Liz Allan
- Flash Thompson
- Peter’s science teacher/Mr. Warren
- Mr. Petty
Story notes:
- Living Brain invented by International Computing Machines (ICM) Corporation.
- Class-derived Spider-Man facts: 5’10”, 160 lbs, often sighted in Forest Hills…
- Second time Peter’s school is attacked by super-villains.
#130 story in reading order
Next: Amazing Spider-Man #8, Story B
Previous: Fantastic Four #22
