With Kraven the Hunter right around the corner, it only made sense to review one of the characters best story.
Kraven's Last Hunt (formerly called Fearful Symmetry: Kraven's Last Hunt before the Fearful Symmetry part was dropped from the title) was a 1987 storyline published in order of Web of Spider-Man (1985) #31, The Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #293, The Spectacular Spider-Man (1976) #131, Web of Spider-Man (1985) #32, The Amazing Spider-Man (1976) #294, and The Spectacular Spider-Man (1976) #132. The story arc was written by one of my many favorites, J.M. DeMatteis and drawn by Mike Zeck.
The story is, Kraven has hunted and killed every animal known to man, expect one, Spider-Man. To prove once and for all he's his master, Kraven not only shoots and buries Spider-Man, but dons his costume and fights his villains. With this level of insanity, it's gonna be one crazy final confrontation between The Wall-Crawler and the Emperor of the Wild.
- Negatives
I've got nothing.
- Mix
Nope, nothing here either.
- Positives
One thing that you'll love about this is it's pacing. I read this in one day and in only a couple of minutes. The story just goes by quickly primarily because DeMatteis doesn't waste a single page on something pointless.
Then there's Mike Zeck's art. While he's not on top favorites list Mike's art is really good. The best aspect of it the shifting emotions. Mike shows a character's full expression with just four panels. One example is this sequence.
To give full context Mary-Jane isn't in the best state of mind right now, I'll give full details for the story portion. So we see at first she's killing the rat because like said previously she's not in the right state of mind. But then in the third panel we see she's regretting what she did, and in the last panel she's running away in disgust. And that's only one of many masterfully done moments. Then when it's not being like that then there's moments where it just looks awesome. Like this!
If you say you don't want this as a wallpaper then you're lying to both me and yourself.
The last thing I'll praise is the story, OH MY GOD THE STORY! Years prior of reading this I never would've guessed that Spider-Man would work in a psychological thriller until I read this, and years later it's still amazing. There's many fantastic aspects of the story so I'm gonna go through them. One being we get four different psychological perspectives. We've got Kraven being driven mad because of his constant feelings of failure. Spider-Man is going through some things because he has this fear of the grave. A second villain is going crazy because of his fear of the outside world and thinks he's in a better place living in the sewers. And the reason for MJ not being in a good place is because Spidey's been gone longer than usual and she's worried her husband (yeah remember when these two were married and it gave us get stories?) is either missing or worse dead. Now what about Kraven? His name is in the title so how is he as the villain? Now I haven't read too many Kraven stories but even I know this is the craziest he's ever been. How crazy? Well because of the feeling of failure has driven him insane Kraven believes that Spider-Man is some sort of mystical creature and he wants to prove he's superior by not only killing him and wearing his costume (or skin as he puts it), but also believes if takes some sort of mysterious cocktail of drugs that'll make him even stronger...yeah he's gone off the deep end here. So if you like your villains crazy, this one's got you covered. Now why should you like this story? It sounds depressing. Well yeah, it's a dark story, but it's not gonna leave you feeling miserable. How? Well Spider-Man is naturally shakened up by the events. He's clearly anger by what Kraven has done, but he doesn't allow himself to become cruel. He still goes out and tries his best. A matter of fact throughout the story he doesn't allow himself to be broken not only because he's supposed to be the hero, but because of the love he has for Mary-Jane. Might be a little clichéd but it works. So while it's dark it gives you hope at the end.
I love Kraven's Last Hunt, it's in my top list and I could re-read this after the review, even though I just read it like two hours ago.
My final rating is, A MUST READ!
Man this was a fun one. Due come back on Saturday, Dec 14th, for my review of Kraven the Hunter. Until then, enjoy the rest of your day.
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