Spider-Man Burns Simon Krandis

Panel two, with Simon's excessive stuttering, promotes the theory that he's making this up as he goes along. Panel three made me laugh. It made me laugh a lot, actually, because of Spider-Man's sarcasm. If there was any justice, tomorrow's comic would be Simon getting all flustered and Mary Jane smacking Spider-Man in the back of the head for being so callous. In any case, Spider-Man totally burned Simon Krandis, and I think that's as super-heroic a victory as we're going to get.

The Persuader: Joseph Krandis!

Hannerz got it closest, hypothesizing that the Simon Krandis was the Persuader's father. Good job.Anyway, now that Simon Krandis is suddenly remorseful that his brother (whom he was paying to be a thug, no less) is dead, he'll go along somewhat quietly. I'm sure the rest of the week will either feature the aftermath of Simon's confession and capture, or he'll prattle on about his mother and father wanting a better life or something. The only thing I'm confused about is why the Persuader (or Joseph Krandis, if you like) called his brother "Krandis" so often instead of Simon. Perhaps he had amnesia or something. We'll find out tomorrow, I guess.

Also: have you chosen your own blogventure?

The Truth About the Persuader?!

Blah blah blah, recap recap recap, truth about the Persuader... wait, what? The truth about the Persuader? So he isn't just some thug with a shoddy nickname who sacrificed himself for Mary Jane? Against all odds, I'm kind of interested, though I know it will prove to be boring and rather redundant. Still, might be good for something.

Also: They should move that body pretty soon, I think.

The Persuader: Now Actually Dead

Huh. So the Persuader wasn't dead yet. He could have spoken up and maybe someone could have done something for him. If not save his life, then at least get him a pillow or something. Spider-Man just had to get the last word in, though.

Also, Simon Krandis has the right idea. He just should have put it into effect when Spider-Man and Mary Jane were first distracted by the Persuader, not when they're done with him.

Ah, and Spider-Man had another cameo yesterday:Won't little Jeffy be surprised when he learns that Spider-Man makes deals with the devil?

The Persuader: Still Dead

04/02:Spider-Man utilizes his exploitation power in the first panel. He has the proportionate expository ability of a spider! Meanwhile, Mary Jane is in shock that the Persuader killed himself for her. Simon Krandis is, most likely, making a quick escape while Spider-Man stares dumbly at his wife who, in turn, is staring in shock at the Persuader's body.

04/03:Spider-Man artfully ignores the dead body and asks his wife if she's all right. Truth be told, Spider-Man is probably in shock (pun not intended) and doesn't know how to handle this situation. He obviously wants to ignore the Persuader's lifeless body for as long as he can, but can't really comfort Mary Jane since she's all worked up about that same lifeless body. This will take about a week to resolve, I think, all while Mary Jane reiterates that the Persuader gave his life for hers and Spider-Man just sort of stands there. If Simon Krandis hasn't made it to Mexico by then, the man is a lot dumber than previously thought.

On a side note, I'm going to be very surprised if "Cleats" doesn't show up here at some point this week.

The Shocking End of the Persuader

I honestly wasn't expect this to happen this soon. Maybe Wednesday at the earliest.

Love and Death-traps

03/26:The Krandis Mansion has remarkably thin walls if Spider-Man can hear his wife's screams from a hidden subterranean cave.

03/27:The mansion does have one death-trap, it would seem, and only one. Well, two if you count the booby-trapped windows, but those are really outside the mansion.

03/28:The Persuader takes a surprising turn by wanting the woman he loves to be happy, no matter the cost. I was half-expecting the Persuader to attempt to take down Spider-Man himself in order to win Mary Jane, but only after taking out Simon Krandis. Also, how is Spider-Man going to fit through that tiny door?

03/29:Ah, it was just faulty perspective. As for the death-trap itself, the machine that activates it looks like something from an old science fiction movie. Also, if I'm correct in assuming that the door Spider-Man is headed towards is the same Mary Jane is headed towards, it brings up several questions. Namely:
1) Why is the doorknob on the left side of both sides of the door?
2) It looks like wood, and I'm pretty sure wood can't conduct electricity.
3) Isn't it sort of foolish to have a door leading from your stately mansion into your subterranean cave? I mean, if the door was hidden behind a grandfather clock that'd be one thing. Just out in the open like that, though? That's asking for trouble. Don't even say that it's fine because it's booby-trapped, because then Simon Krandis would be sending the Persuader out with dead servants all the time since they touched the door. Perhaps that's what happened with Jimmy Godero.

False Prediction

Simon Krandis is obviously planning to have the Persuader hurl Mary Jane into Spider-Man like a harpoon. It'll be worth seeing, it will.

Professor Unambitious

For today's post, instead of talking about today's strip, I shall announce that I have decided to start calling Simon Krandis by a codename: Professor Unambitious! The man could do so much more with his resources, such as the cave and hired thugs, but neglects to do anything more interesting than kidnapping Mary Jane to get to Spider-Man. With a monocle and a lab-coat, Simon Krandis could easily become the nefarious Professor Unambitious. He could even keep the Persuader on the payroll as his traitorous second-in-command, and I'm sure he could find something to do with Jimmy Godero. If he could find Jimmy Godero. Alas, but Simon Krandis suffers from a criminal lack of ambition, and so we shall have no monocle or lab-coat. He shall forever be Professor Unambitious to me, though.

List of Things (I Am Tired)

1) Krandis should seriously be a super-villain. He has a cave under his house, for god's sake, which you get to from his garage.
2) I'm undecided about the "Batman" reference.
3) The Persuader just wants to be told that you're not romantically involved with Spider-Man so he can move in. He suspects nothing, and is undaunted by the fact that you're married.

Shoddy Metaphors

03/14:Spider-Man does not have webbed feet, though his frequent ally Howard the Duck does. Also, I don't think the death warrant metaphor is really a good fit for this. I mean, they don't go to people's deathbeds and make them sign their death warrants before passing away and therefore it would be foolish to think that someone you're about to kill in some way would sign one. It'd go like this:

[Spider-Man swings in through a window]
[Simon Krandis emerges from the shadows]
Simon Krandis: Greetings, Spider-Man. Now, I must insist you sign this death warrant so that I may kill you.
Spider-Man: Are you crazy? I'm not signing that thing!
Simon Krandis: Drat! Foiled again!

I realize this is a long way to go to basically say it's a shoddy metaphor.

03/15:An underground entrance? Snazzy! Also, really freaking paranoid.

03/16:Here we see Spider-Man using logic, and acknowledging that Simon Krandis has become insane. We are also reminded of the Persuader's Mary Jane lust, and another shoddy attempt at metaphor by Simon Krandis. What's worse is that the NEXT box points this out, and when they take take off their duty of teasing us to point out that your metaphor is shoddy, that's bad.

Simon Krandis: Faithless

It's sad when your hired muscle is showing more intelligence than you are. It's also sad when you don't have any faith at all in your exploding car.

Career Paths

Simon Krandis is insane if that's the best way he could think of to kill Spider-Man. All I can say is that the evil costumed super-geniuses lost a great one when he decided to become a thuggish businessman. Case in point: He has a thuggish henchman with a codename. Give each of these guys a gaudy costume and, in Krandis's case, a codename and you'd have a pretty decent evil super-team. Also, it has never been more obvious that the Persuader openly loathes Simon Krandis and will kill him for Mary Jane.

Mish-Mash

Everyone who had their money on the chivalrous bruiser theory, it looks like your bet is about to pay off. Simon Krandis has gotten his hands on a martini (or perhaps just a remarkable simulacrum) and, at this point, our happy trio has been driving around for about a week. In order to make myself feel better, I'm going to assume that Jimmy Godero is waiting around Krandis's apartment with a lead pipe.

I would also like to call shenanigans on Sunday's "NEXT" box. Rather than getting an amnesia storyline, we get one panel of Spider-Man trying to remember things, a panel of him remembering those things, and then we cut back to the Krandismobile. To be fair, though, it did say "OUT OF MEMORY?" The answer is apparently no.

Format-O-Rama

1) So the plot, thus as it is, thickens. I enjoy how we went from someone trying to buy the Bugle through nefarious means to someone trying to steal Mary Jane through nefarious means. Does anyone but Spider-Man remember the Bugle at this point? And what about Jimmy Godero? Where the heck did he go?

2) Technically, he's hired to strong-arm people into doing things. Of course, he could be Simon's general hired goon and driving the car is part of the package.

3) I wonder if the people Simon hired ever got suspicious when Spider-Man would then proceed to not leave the apartment for extended periods, or when Peter exited the apartment at some point after Spider-Man entered without Peter having been seen entering the apartment or Spider-Man having been seen leaving the apartment. All in all, Peter "Pieces" Parker did a shoddy job of protecting his secret identity.

Mary Jane: More Competent Than Her Husband

You know, Mary Jane has faced down both the Persuader and Simon Krandis in the past and come out of it unscathed. On the other hand, her husband (who is a super-hero) has gotten his head handed to him a number of times. In fact, Mary Jane faced down Spider-Man as well. This means that Mary Jane is a far more competent character than her husband, a fact which should come as a surprise to no one.

Oh, and Mister Stan Lee? Could we maybe find out how Spider-Man survived a close-quarters explosion pretty soon? Ah, and where Jimmy Godero got to? If we could do that soon, it would be much appreciated. (Notice how I acted like Stan Lee actually reads this thing. I know darn well that he doesn't, and so that counts as being whimsical or something.)

Simon Krandis: BAD-ASS

Simon Krandis is a bad-ass!

How much of a bad-ass is he?

He's such a bad-ass that he ASSAULTS WOMEN!

Seriously, Mary Jane: RESTRAINING ORDER. Oh wait, I bet she's going to press her Spider-Summoner bracelet and Spider-Man, though wounded, will valiantly come to her rescue. Also: what happened to Jimmy Godero?

Note: I do not actually think that assaulting women makes you a bad-ass. In my opinion, it pretty much just makes you an ass.

The Fate of Spider-Man... Er, Still not yet.

All this does is let us know that the Persuader is there, too. Oh, and it kind of hints that maybe they know Peter Parker and Spider-Man are one and the same. Either that, or Spider-Man's explosion is just a bizarre coincidence that would work in Simon Krandis's favor.

Oh, and I hope we never see Simon Krandis smile like in panel three again. That's creepy.

Also, some people are working on a fan-animated (fanimated?) Spider-Man series. They need a bit of help, though, so click here for some more information.

The Return of Formatting

1) While Jameson is probably holding up two fingers to illustrate the number two, it also looks as if he might be flashing the peace sign to someone 0ff-screen, perhaps some sort of hippie or beatnik.
2) There's not much to say about panel two.
3) I have never heard anyone say this, and have no idea why someone would doubt its veracity. There's no reason to think that paranoids would not have enemies, and presumably they'd have a lot more, if only in their head.
4) This is the most realistic Jameson/Peter panel in this storyline. Peter's facial expression is priceless.
5) This panel merely reminded me of "Pinky and the Brain", and made me wonder where Jimmy Godero went.
6) If I were Mary Jane, I would get a restraining order against this guy as soon as possible.

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Off to the See the Krandis

Okay, whatever. I do like Jimmy Godero and the Persuader skipping off down the road in panel three, arm in arm. This had better end in Jimmy Godero slicing Krandis's throat, though. My god.