It’s a Marvel Comics week at Nerdophiles! Renee reviewed and enjoyed both Spider-Man and Jessica Jones, check out what she thought about each below! Read on – and let us know what you thought in the comments.

Renee’s Reads

Spider-Man #20

Author: Brian Michael Bendis
Artist: Nico Leon
Publisher: Marvel Comics
★★★★☆

Issue #20 picks up two weeks after Miles beat up a room full of villains in a fit of rage and Miles’ conversation with Ganke about whether or not he should even be a superhero. After some deliberation, Miles decides that he is going to go to Tokyo because he is tired of pretending to be normal.

Ganke encourages him to go, and Miles finds himself meeting Tomoe, the woman who runs Japan’s superhero contingent, after beating up a band of miscreants. Tomoe tells Miles to leave, and Miles is contacted by a suitcase telling him to meet someone there.

One of the reasons that I love Miles Morales’ Spider-Man, is that it has been addressing many political, social justice and relatable family issues in the most recent run. Miles handles all of this really well for a teenager, even though now his solution is to impulsively run away from his problems. However, in the grand scheme of things, Miles is attempting to find his own identity in spite of difficult and important social and political issues surrounding him.

Jessica Jones #12

Author: Brian Michael Bendis
Artist: Michael Gaydos & Javier Pulido
Publisher: Marvel Comics
★★★★☆

The Maria Hill mystery is wrapped up in this issue of Jessica Jones, and I couldn’t be more satisfied with the conclusion. Jessica has reunited with Luke, and they make their dysfunctional relationship function for them. Luke even runs to Jessica after her office is blown up, but Jessica has already figured out the Maria Hill mystery and read the report telling her who was behind the hit on Maria.

Jessica finds Maria and essentially lets her know that she understands that there are times that people make terrible decisions that change the core of who they are. Maria’s character shows that she regrets some of the things that she has done in her life, but also acknowledges that she has done worse things further in her career than what she chose to forget.

Despite Maria’s questionable life choices, she isn’t a wholly terrible person, as she does inform Jessica that S.H.I.E.L.D has lost Kilgrave and that S.H.I.E.L.D wasn’t planning on looking for him. The issue ends with Jessica sitting shocked and alone at the bar.

The writer and artists beautifully make the point that some actions strip people of their humanity and despite the good that they do, they will never get it back. Michael Gaydos and Javier Pulido depict this through different art style choices between the main story line and Maria’s flashback. They further depict this by perfectly capturing the emotionality of younger Maria’s reaction to her graduation assignment, which was to kill a boat of people and Jessica’s calm response as she listens. 

Renee Marriott is a staff writer at Nerdophiles.