Comics Corner: The Spectacular Spider-Man 140

 

Title: The Spectacular Spider-Man
Issue Number: 140
Release Date: July 1988

Highlights

• First appearance of Aggie's Pub
• Spider-Man sees Robbie Robertson in a hospital bed from outside the window, and confirms the rumors are true that he is crippled, and possibly paralyzed by Tombstone, who broke his back
• Peter goes to the Bugle, and while there, Ben Urich says he overheard Robbie's phone call to him the evening of his injury, and questions what he was told
• Peter simply says that Robbie was gone by the time he got there
• Tombstone pays Robbie a visit in his hospital room, and whispers something to him that we don't get to know
• Robbie is left terrified
• Spider-Man goes to Aggie's Pub looking for answers, and asks the questions the only way he knows how, by breaking heads and windows
• Spider-Man learns from the bartender that the Arranger hired Tombstone
• A thug bares a weapon down on our hero as he's questioning the bartender, but a shadowy figure shoots him before he can pull the trigger
• Spider-Man gives chase, but can't catch up
• In his office, the Arranger talks to the Kingpin, but the call is cut off when Spider-Man pushes down on the receiver of the phone
• Spider-Man threatens harm on the Arranger if he doesn't tell him where Kingpin is, but the criminal just laughs, and shows him he has the threat on tape
• Spider-Man responds by breaking his television, only for guards to overhear the noise, and chase him out of the building
• The Arranger still has Roland Rayburn captive, and drugged up, needing the man to agree to use his mental powers of persuasion for Kingpin
• Under the influence of the drugs, Roland agrees
• Tombstone informs the Arranger that, "He is here," and that "he was spotted at Aggie's Pub"
• He's referring to the shadowy figure who saved Spider-Man's life
• The Arranger smiles, and comments that it's all working out as Arranged
• Peter and Mary Jane go to the hospital to visit Robbie, and Robbie asks to speak to Peter alone
• Robbie asks if Peter still has the tape he left him, and when he says he does, is told to burn it
• When Peter says he won't, Robbie tells him that Tombstone will kill his wife Martha, and son, Randy, if he doesn't
• As Peter walks down the hospital corridor with Mary Jane, telling her about what Robbie asked, the mysterious figure listens from a nearby room
• Peter goes to see Ben Urich at the Bugle to ask his advice
• While there, Ben gives him a phone message, and upon calling, he's told by the mysterious stranger to meet him on Liberty Island in one hour, and that he knows about the tape
• Rather than going as Peter Parker, Spider-Man shows up to the Statue of Liberty, and is greeted by gunfire, as the shadowed man runs off
• Spider-Man tackles the man, discovering it's the Punisher, who promptly points a gun at him
  
• In a cliffhanger ending, the Punisher demands the tape, and to know where Tombstone is
  

Low Points

• None
  

Oddities

• Editor's Day Off: The Arranger tells Roland Rayburn, "We need your powers of of mental persuasion, Roland."

Rating (based on a 1 through 5 Stans grading system)

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