A Review for Rhino
We start out with Harry Osborn and Dr.Kafka in a therapy session. JM DeMatteis provides us with a chilling scene of Harry at his worst and craziest when he becomes enraged with Kafka. I was surprised when Harry jumped after Kafka only to find that, luckily for Dr.Kafka, he was behind bulletproof glass. As he is being led out, he begins taunting Spider-man by saying Peter, only to follow it up with Peter Pumpkin Eater. What a curveball! I didn't see that coming at all; I thought for sure he was going to try and give away Spider-man's secret, or at the very least, gode him into another fight. This was clever on JM DeMatteis' part, to say the least.
Meanwhile, we see Rhino charging through the foggy streets of New York. He's on the hunt for his next target. We learn that he has taken up a job for the money so that he can send for his family and provide a better life for them. We get to see a very human side to a character too often written as a static, boring, one-dimensianl character. With JM DeMatteis at the helm, we see an all too relatable Rhino, one we can sympathize with. This being a Spider-Man book, one can only assume he is after the wall-crawler; I mean, look at the cover.
WRONG! It's Peter Parker he's after! Saved from the Rhino's charge only by his spider-sense and reflexes, Peter is left to wonder why the Rhino would be after him? Then it dawns on him Harry is the puppet master when Rhino all too gladly shouts that he knows his secret. Peter can't let the Rhino see him leap out of the way like that again, lest he further convince the Rhino he really is Spider-Man. Furious and nearing a breaking point, what with Harry's constant tormenting and his knowledge of Spider-Man's greatest secret looming over his head, Peter is able to get away and furiously lay into Rhino as the Spectacular Spider-Man.
After a sever pummeling, he reveals that Osborn paid him to only go after Parker, and that his quarrel isn't with Spider-man. He then goes on to say that he doesn't even know what secret Harry was talking about, only that saying he knew a secret of his would really unnerve Parker. He says that he only did it for his family in a series of panels wonderfully rendered by our pal, Sal Buscema. With this series of panels explaining Rhino's motives and how miserbaly beaten and sorry he looks, we can truly see just how human he really is under his rough exterior, and feel sorry for him in return. Spider-Man just stands there. And then subsequently lays down a conclusive blow upon the Rhino and webs him up for the police! Spider-Man, at least in my mind, felt just as sorry as we, the reader do. But what Rhino did is still wrong, and no motives should justify the attempted killing and harassment/torture of another human being.
I want to point out that his decision to take the Rhino in, is what SHOULD have happened in "Spider-Man 3" to Sandman. It perfectly demonstrated that Spider-man feels we have to live up to the responsiblity of all of our actions, no matter what the motives may be; in both Rhino and movie Sandman's cases, their familes.
Our story ends with a creepy, deranged Harry Osborn in his cell uttering "Gotcha!".
I couldn't ask for a better and more fitting Rhino story thanks the the creative, as always, talents of JM DeMatteis and Sal Buscema.