Issue(s): Web of Spider-Man #16, Web of Spider-Man #17
Cover Date: Jul-Aug 86
Title: "Underworld!" / "Missing in Action: The Magma solution"
Credits:
David Michelinie - Writer
Marc Silvestri - Penciler
Kyle Baker / Vincent Colleta - Inker
Adam Blaustein - Assistant Editor
Christopher Priest - Editor

Review/plot:
Marc Silvestri becomes the regular artist on this series for a little while beginning with these issues. Kyle Baker inks him on #16 (and will again on #18), so it's hard to get a sense for his linework due to Baker's heavy style, but you do get a sense for his layouts, and he and Baker work well together.

This issue starts with Peter Parker being desperate for cash - exemplified by the fact that he doesn't even have any clean clothes and therefore has to wear the ridiculous shirt you'll see below - and so he goes to the Daily Bugle and tries to sell some reject photos to Robbie. But instead he is swept into JJ's new part of the building...

...where he has finally revamped Now Magazine, with Joy Mercado being the first reporter (note that Peter seems surprised to see Joy, despite being told in Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #115 that he was helping Joy on her last assignment for the Bugle before transferring to Now).

JJ has an assignment for Joy and Peter to go to Appalachia and investigate some potential unrest at a factory there. But when they arrive they find that there's no unrest, and instead everyone is getting paid off and they don't like reporters snooping around. They wind up getting into a fight with the locals...

...and are rescued by a woman named Charla who is also in trouble. Her son, an autistic kid named Seth Hanks that excels at math, has been taken.

The cover of this issue and the intro scene where the boy is kidnapped show a character vaguely reminiscent of Freddy Kruger...

...but he's really got nothing to do with the story. Just a farmer who helps kidnap the kid.

Peter and Joy help the woman investigate, and wind up getting captured by armored goons in gas masks.

And they turn out to be working for the obscure Magma.

You'll notice that Peter has managed to get away and switch into his Spider-Man identity. But unlike some past stories, there's an active concern about this; Peter had been fighting the regular goons without his costume earlier but at this point he's realized that he needed to be Spider-Man to help Joy and the mother and boy.

As we saw in Spectacular #115, Joy is not surprised to see Spider-Man show up.

We learn that after Magma's first defeat, he got hired by Roxxon to research natural geothermal power sources. He's been using the autistic boy Seth to calculate how to beam energy that can excite electrons of any matter, essentially creating bombs anywhere on Earth. And this is just a means to an end in pursuit of his goal to "providing the world with cheap energy without the moronic restrictions applied by left-wing ecological dreamers".

Magma may look like a He-Man figure wearing a cheese grater, but thanks to Roxxon he's definitely well-funded and he's a challenge for Spider-Man.

Spidey berates himself for his "childish" wisecracks during the fight, which sounds like a real identity crisis to me.

Spidey/Peter (he changes back and forth as necessary) manages to help the others escape...

...but he himself winds up getting caught in an explosion while in final battle with Magma.

This kicks off a Missing In Action mini-event that involves all three Spider-Man titles.

I'm using the word "event" instead of "crossover" because it's really just some unrelated stories that happen to take place during Peter's absence, and the reason Peter is missing isn't really important. In that sense, Magma works as well as anyone as the villain here, and he does have a cool underground base and a unique motivation (that also makes him a natural fit for Roxxon).

It's pretty amazing how different Silvestri's pencils look with Colletta instead of Baker...

...and i'm not sure that the art on either book represents Silvestri's "pure" style, but his art definitely hasn't fully evolved to its signature look yet.

Quality Rating: B

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: Amazing Spider-Man #279 and Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #117 are part of the Missing In Action event and take place while Spider-Man is missing. The last page of issue #17 here with Joy Mercardo wondering what happened to Peter/Spider-Man is repeated at the end of those issues (although i think it makes more sense to think of that scene as happening earlier than the events of the other issues or else Spider-Man hasn't really been missing that long yet). Missing In Action ends with Spider-Man's red and blue costume destroyed, which affects placement of his brief appearance at Iron Fist's funeral in Power Man & Iron Fist #125. Additionally Spider-Man has just finished repairing the tear in the black costume from Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #116 "this afternoon", which means we shouldn't see him in the black costume between that issue and this arc.

References:

• When Peter and Joy are first accosted by the local townies, Peter holds back to try to not give away his secret ID until Joy reminds him that she already knows he can fight from Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man annual #5.
  
• Peter has the option of fighting Magma's goons but he's afraid that Joy and Seth's mom will get caught in the cross-fire the way bystanders got shot while he was fighting Sin-Eater in Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #108.
  
• Spider-Man fought Magma before in Marvel Team-Up #110, but he says it was mainly Iron Man that beat him that time. Magma's flashback completely glosses over his other appearance in Iron Man #169-170.

Crossover: Missing In Action

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

The neat thing for me about the "Missing In Action" story was the covers of the issues that month combining into one big picture. I saw this when Spider-man had it's Secret Wars 2 crossover. But, it was still a new concept for me. Plus who can forget the Black Cat's battles with the Foreigner & Dr. Strange?

The "broadcast power" Magma sought in this story is the same as in the Aladdin Effect Graphic Novel, which Michelinie co-wrote. In fact, there's a lot of common elements in the two stories- a small town easily corrupted, a small child that holds the key to everything.

This is the second issue in a row where I feel as if Michelinie is using villains suited to Iron Man in Spider-Man.