Books like Marvel Masterworks: The Amazing Spider-Man, Vol. 1

1960’s comics have a certain style that is either fun or ridiculous, depending on your point of view. Villains engage in a lot of expositional speeches, nobody is ever seriously hurt in all of these superhuman battles (somehow), and the dialogue is awfully campy. That said, if you are a fan of the Stan Lee style there is a whole lot to enjoy here. This collection contains Amazing Fantasy #15 (Spider-Man’s first appearance, telling the familiar origin story) and the first 10 issues of The Amazing Spider-Man. Along with The Fantastic Four, The Amazing Spider-Man was probably Marvel’s best series in the early ‘60s. The goofier style of ‘60s comics fits well with the wisecracking webcrawler, and subplots involving Peter Parker’s high school problems, Aunt May, or his love interests provide some variety. Mercifully, these issues avoid Marvel’s early obsession with ludicrous alien invaders and communist plots (at least for the most part). Instead, this collection includes the first appearances of Electro, The Lizard, The Sandman, and Doctor Octopus:Personally, I think these Stan Lee stories are fun and I have been slowly making my way through the Masterworks series. This is the best one I’ve read so far, and if someone were to buy/read just one Marvel Masterwork collection I’d recommend this one. You get to see the story from the very beginning, watch the development of some famous Marvel villains, and (most importantly) the quality of the storytelling is simply better than almost anything else Marvel was doing from 1961-1965. 4 stars, recommended.