Night of the Hunter!
Part of CV's Top 100 Spider-Man Universe Stories - reviewed!
This first appearance of Kraven the Hunter ranks up there with the first appearance of Doctor Octopus as one of the greatest of the early issues of The Amazing Spider-Man. Unlike the contrived setup of the Green Goblin fight last issue, this one makes perfect sense. The Chameleon is back in town and when he narrowly escapes capture by Spider-Man, he reaches the conclusion that he will never be safe as long as Spider-Man is about. Thus he contacts the one person he thinks can successfully hunt down and kill Spider-Man, a big game hunter named Kraven.
The writing here is very strong - there's a love triangle between Peter, Betty and Liz... and it gets even more complicated when Aunt May arranges a blind date for Peter with the Watson's daughter. Then Kraven seems to ally not only with The Chameleon, but with J. Jonah Jameson on the side. The final battle between Kraven and Spider-Man is one of the best fights in Marvel's Silver Age - the two seem so evenly matched.
More issues like this please!