Peter Parker And Miles Morlas Collide.
Joe Quesada once said that if the Mainstream universe and the Ultimate Universe crossed over, then that would signify that Marvel had "officially run out of ideas". Well, that claim was broken with Spider-Men, as Peter Parker travels to the Ultimate Universe and met his Ultimate Universe counterpart successor, Miles Morlas. I don’t think this type of story would work if Peter met his Ultimate counterpart, as there would be no point. Thanks to Michael Bendis killing off Peter however, it makes the scenario much more interesting. We get Peter stuck in the Ultimate Universe where everything is different.
A huge payoff to this book is the characterization and interactions. Bendis is known for giving characters a lot of dialogue, and he always had a great handle of the Ultimate Universe. He jumped right in naturally with mainstream Peter Parker as his personality is pretty similar to his ultimate counterpart (with the only exception is one is an adult and one was a teenager). Not only do we see Peter interact with Miles, but he interacts with Nick Fury, the Ultimates, and even Aunt May and Gwen Stacy, which makes the middle part of the story touching. Mysterio was an interesting choice for the villain, as it did reveal some major revelations about the mainstream version and his ultimate counterpart.
When I saw that Sara Pichelli would be the artist for this, I thought it was a great choice. Her work with both Ultimate Comics: Spider-Man series have been nothing short but excellent. The world in the Ultimate Universe looks so vivid under her pencils and layouts. She nails it with the character expressions and actions as they feel like they’ve come to life on page. The details are there. Add in the coloring with Justin Ponder, and it really does come to life. What impressed me the most is how slightly distinctive she makes the Mainstream universe and Ultimate universe.
I only have a few minor problems with this book. First, it’s not clear on how Mysterio was able to gain access to travel to different universes. And if he knew that Spider-Man of the Ultimate Universe was killed and everyone knew his identity (not to mention, possibly his loved ones), couldn’t he used that to his advantage in the mainstream universe? Also, the Ultimate Universe is somewhat more realistic based, and I would have liked if some current events was discussed besides Peter’s death (like Ultimatum, Reed Richards, The mutant problem etc.) For a minor complaint, I wished Spider-Woman could have made an appearance, as she’s connected to Peter in her own way.
Overall:
By the time you finish reading this, you might be in shock with the ending, as it ends with a huge tease on Bendis’ part. Still, Spider-Men is a great crossover that could open some new possibilities for both universes.