Issue(s): Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #81, Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #82
Cover Date: Aug-Sep 83
Title: "Stalkers in the shadows" / "Crime and punishment!"
Credits:
Bill Mantlo - Writer
Al Milgrom - Penciler
Jim Mooney - Inker
Eliot Brown - Assistant Editor
Tom DeFalco - Editor

Review/plot:
Boomerang and the Punisher work out a jailbreak, but Punisher turns on Boomerang as they are escaping, ensuring that he is returned to prison.

He goes after some drug addicts, shooting them with rubber bullets to force them to tell them where they got their drugs: the Kingpin. Later, Spider-Man finds Cloak & Dagger standing over the junkies and initially assumes that they were responsible.

The Punisher is definitely losing it, firing a machine gun into the home of a man slapping his wife, and then firing at litterers.

But killing the Kingpin isn't an unreasonable goal, and Cloak & Dagger decide that it's a good idea. Spider-Man, on the other hand, is against killing, so he tries to stop them.

It doesn't work out very well for them, though, as the Kingpin is more prepared to fight than they assume.

Cloak & Dagger escape, but the Punisher is knocked out and turned over to the law.

Also in this issue, Peter Parker teams up with his landlord Mrs. Muggins against a multi-racial gang of drug addicts.

If your delicate sensibilities are upset by that drug paraphernalia, here's the cleaned up version from the Marvel Tales reprint. Thanks to S for pointing this out.

Here's the scene with Spider-Man's past love interests that includes Dagger, as also mentioned in the comments by S.

Quality Rating: C+

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: Takes place after Peter quit grad school in Amazing Spider-Man #243. Amazing Spider-Man #244-245 takes place before the conclusion of this story in Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #83.

References:

• Peter quit grad school in Amazing Spider-Man #242-243. Also in that arc, he was attacked by a mysterious android, and he's still trying to figure out who sent it (we know it was the Mad Thinker).
  
• Spider-Man visits the Black Cat in the hospital, where security is extra tight since Doctor Octopus attacked in Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #79. She later decides to go out on her own.
  

• Spidey teamed-up with Cloak & Dagger in Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #69-70.
  
• The Black Cat was injured in Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #76.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: Marvel Tales #220, Marvel Tales #221

This was most likely an attempt to "dispose" of the Punisher, seeing as he wasn't really a heroic protagonist and Jim Shooter may have found him embarrassing(and the fact that Frank Miller was done with him).

#81 has a weird moment where Peter is thinking about how the Black Cat is different from the other women he's been romantically involved with, and for some reason Dagger is included in the drawings of those women.

There's also a very strange panel just after the Mrs Muggins mugging which is a close-up of Peter's shoes for no reason?

I've added those scans. The "shoe" scene is to show the muggers' drug gear.

As for Peter's interest in Dagger, there was a similar scene in Spectacular Spider-Man #75 and things get really weird in Cloak and Dagger #3 (vol 2).

Re:shoes - that's funny, my copy of this is a Marvel Tales reprint that I guess decided to edit out the drug gear, so that panel is just Peter's shoes and an empty floor! It was very odd, now I know why!

That is pretty funny. Habit--? I don't see any evidence of a habit, Mrs. Muggins. What are you talking about?

I've put up a scan from the Marvel Tales version. Which is actually the version i have in paper copy, and i didn't notice this, so thanks for pointing it out.

So what am I supposed to be seeing here Mrs.Muggins?

"Habit...? Oh Yes, I see now. They satisfied their daily habit of cleaning your floor."