The Living Brain Spills the Beans
Written: Dan Slott
Art by: Giuseppe Camuncoli
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: September 21, 2016
Marvel Comics
Review by: Branden Murray
As this journey with Spider-Man continues, all paths are leading to the long awaited and heavily teased Clone Conspiracy crossover. With the last couple issues setting the tone for what will be happening in this series’ future, we take a brief timeout here in issue eighteen, to recap some past events involving Spider-Man, Doc Occ, Anna Maria, and the Living Brain. So, what has our six armed friend been up to, while hiding out in the Living Brain, and why is he still so angry? My personal opinion; I think it’s that haircut Doc Occ rocks. Who wouldn’t be angry with a doo like that? So, let’s dive in here to see if the Doc finally gets that fade he’s been clamoring for, and what else we got going on, in Before Dead No More part 3.
Marvel Comics
Review by: Branden Murray
As this journey with Spider-Man continues, all paths are leading to the long awaited and heavily teased Clone Conspiracy crossover. With the last couple issues setting the tone for what will be happening in this series’ future, we take a brief timeout here in issue eighteen, to recap some past events involving Spider-Man, Doc Occ, Anna Maria, and the Living Brain. So, what has our six armed friend been up to, while hiding out in the Living Brain, and why is he still so angry? My personal opinion; I think it’s that haircut Doc Occ rocks. Who wouldn’t be angry with a doo like that? So, let’s dive in here to see if the Doc finally gets that fade he’s been clamoring for, and what else we got going on, in Before Dead No More part 3.
Things kick off as Dan Slott uses the beginning of the issue to recap some past events from the last few years. The most important thing to take away from all this is specifically how Doctor Otto Octavius was able to get his consciousness into the Living Brain’s robot body. With Otto now under disguise as a Parker Industries “employee”, he bides his time trying to come up with a plan for a new body while simultaneously keeping tabs on the love of his life, Anna Maria. See, Otto and Anna used to date back in the day, when he took over Spider-Man’s body during the Superior Spider-Man arc. It sounds crazy, but was very good and you should read it. Long story short, Peter ended up winning in the end and returning things to relative normality. Normal except for the whole Doc Occ now living inside a robot and secretly working at Parker Industries, the company Occ himself created disguised as Peter. Spoiler’s man, damn.
Anyway, our past eventually catches up with our present and we see the Living Brain, still as Otto, remaining in the same position as before, friend-zoned by Anna. Eventually our story progresses to the point where Anna and the Living Brain arrive in New York. It’s here, at the Baxter Building now owned by Peter, that things really take a turn for the worse when the Living Brain undergoes a little maintenance from Pete. The combination of a few too many of their innocuous insults in the resulting conversation, and things just never coming up Milhouse for Otto eventually get the best of him. Otto lashes out and attempts to attack Anna and Peter, who quickly transforms into his Spidey getup, with the help of some Parker tech.
As the action unfolds, Spidey attempts to get Anna Maria to safety as the Living Brain continues to attack. Eventually, a light bulb goes off in Spider-Man head and he uses his web to hit the commands on the robot to initiate the self-destruct sequence. As the Living Brain goes KA-BLEWY, that tricky Otto is able to escape once more, this time via a Spider-bot used to upload his consciousness in the first place and he now looks to be headed for New U. Dun dun dun.
There is not much forward progress in this issue, but what it does an excellent job of is recapping Otto’s current predicament for anyone who hasn’t consistently read Spider-Man comics over the last few years. The art by Giuseppe Camuncoli continues to be some of my favorite at Marvel with his action scenes always a treat to look at.
Bits and Pieces:
Before Dead No More part three continued its job of amping up the tension before this event officially kicks off in October. In the words of former Jets linebacker Bart Scott, “Can’t wait”! (←explanation point –Eric Shea)
Anyway, our past eventually catches up with our present and we see the Living Brain, still as Otto, remaining in the same position as before, friend-zoned by Anna. Eventually our story progresses to the point where Anna and the Living Brain arrive in New York. It’s here, at the Baxter Building now owned by Peter, that things really take a turn for the worse when the Living Brain undergoes a little maintenance from Pete. The combination of a few too many of their innocuous insults in the resulting conversation, and things just never coming up Milhouse for Otto eventually get the best of him. Otto lashes out and attempts to attack Anna and Peter, who quickly transforms into his Spidey getup, with the help of some Parker tech.
As the action unfolds, Spidey attempts to get Anna Maria to safety as the Living Brain continues to attack. Eventually, a light bulb goes off in Spider-Man head and he uses his web to hit the commands on the robot to initiate the self-destruct sequence. As the Living Brain goes KA-BLEWY, that tricky Otto is able to escape once more, this time via a Spider-bot used to upload his consciousness in the first place and he now looks to be headed for New U. Dun dun dun.
There is not much forward progress in this issue, but what it does an excellent job of is recapping Otto’s current predicament for anyone who hasn’t consistently read Spider-Man comics over the last few years. The art by Giuseppe Camuncoli continues to be some of my favorite at Marvel with his action scenes always a treat to look at.
Bits and Pieces:
Before Dead No More part three continued its job of amping up the tension before this event officially kicks off in October. In the words of former Jets linebacker Bart Scott, “Can’t wait”! (←explanation point –Eric Shea)
8.0/10
I feel like I've been waiting for something to happen with Ock for what feels like forever but I kind of struggled to get through this issue because I found it too damn boring. It isn't like Brain/Ock is just showing back up in this book for the first time in forever. If the readers need this much catch up what have they thought the 20 or so times Ock has been shown in the Brain's eye's? It really just felt like a boring grind of a read just to get to a point for Ock to move on to someone else. Gave this a zzzzzz/10
ReplyDeleteHaha ya in didn't enjoy all the erecap myself but anyone not down with Superior Spidey is now up to pace and we can move forward. I'm ready for the crossover and done with before dead no more if it continues like this. NOTE per slott on Twitter CLONE CONSPIRACY isn't he main title in Oct and Amazing will be a back up so that weird
ReplyDeleteHaha ya in didn't enjoy all the erecap myself but anyone not down with Superior Spidey is now up to pace and we can move forward. I'm ready for the crossover and done with before dead no more if it continues like this. NOTE per slott on Twitter CLONE CONSPIRACY isn't he main title in Oct and Amazing will be a back up so that weird
ReplyDelete