Writer: Elliot Kalan
Artist: Marco Failla
I have been waiting for this issue for the longest. When I heard that Spider-Man would be teaching at the school under Logan’s request I remember thinking, “Smart. Very Smart”. It made sense, a hero that has been ostracized by the media from day one guiding teens being ostracized for just being who they are. Parker might not be a mutant but he is someone that can relate in doing the right thing and still getting shit for it because of who you are. The only difference is Spider-Man wears a mask which for those with vastly visual mutations doesn’t make a difference.
If you check Taj’s review for Amazing Spider-Man, he praises Dan Slott’s risks and direction with the wall crawler. Well, I’m not familiar with Elliot Kalan writing but I knew within the first few panels of reading this issue he gets Peter Parker character. We’ve seen Parker out of his element before but never to the capacity where he is now being placed in charge of mutant students in such a dire time as well. It isn’t clear if the Axis story line is running along with this but I hope it isn’t because unlike the big cross over this book is fucking fun.
We open up with Storm not seeing why Logan would want Parker as a teacher, even Iceman who is boys with Parker thinks he has no right in mutant affairs. The fact that they don’t know Parker’s identity plays a big part in the issue and whether or not he is spying on them for Shield, The Avengers, etc. Peter plays the “Well Wolverine wanted me here sooooooo where am I putting my stuff at?” card which everyone has to abide by.
We get a great look at Spider-Man working with the troubled teens (of course Julian Keller is in this lol). This is hilarious because he is teaching them about responsibility and ethics yet even in his 30’s Parker can be such an immature adult as he shuts down the students giving him the substitute teacher treatment. Marco Failla’s art is such a good tone for this issue, it’s light, fun and he captures Peter’s personality via body gestures gracefully since we won’t be seeing him mask-less in this series (as it appears so far).
The only issue I had was with Storm telling Spider-Man she doesn’t like him. The X-men and Spider-Man have a vast history of working with each other, we’ve seen these two team up prior before as well (Storm was questioning if Parker really needed Cap and Bucky salt shakers), and he was her wedding. Plus Toad was still a janitor at the school and we saw him depart in the prior series. Aside from that, This issue was perfect. I like seeing Peter Parker in a teacher role, this is different for him and since Wolverine thinks there was a mole in the class he assigned to Parker we’ll get to see him play a bit of a spy as well.
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