Underwater Lair, rerally?
Starting with the cover: I wouldn't have known this had I not just read Supergods, but the cover is a parody/homage to a famous Flash cover.
This story features the Sinister Six, as promised on the cover. They have been promoted as the villains of the next big Spidey-event and this issue felt like both a filler issue between arcs and an intro to the motives of the current Sinister Six team. It's funny that there's been so much talk of comic book death over the last few months, because the main impetus for this new SS formation is that Dr Octopus is dying. So he wants to go out with a bang. The Doc is one of the most famous Spidey villains - do you really think they'd like him die forever? That part aside, the fact that he has an Underwater Lair seems a bit Silver Age to me. I mean, Dan Slott is the master of tongue-in-cheek humor at Marvel, but it's not as though Doc has some special affinity to Octopuses. He just happened to have 8 waldoes fused to himself. It was a bit and I found myself thinking "really?!?"
The plot - one group of villains against another was fun. After all, they're despicable people - of course they'd hate to see another villain succeed. Especially one with an ego like Doctor Octopus. I also really loved the exchange between Sandman and Wizard.
I thought it was really bold of the writers to not have Spider-Man appear AT ALL in the book that bears his name. That took guts and I applaud them for that. Nothing super special here, but maybe it will turn out to be huge with the new Spider-event of 2012