Issue(s): Web of Spider-Man #33, Amazing Spider-Man #295, Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #133
Cover Date: Dec 87
Title: Life in the Maddog Ward: "What's the matter with mommy?" / "Mad dogs" / "I am... spider!"
Credits:
Ann Nocenti - Writer
Cynthia Martin - Penciler
Stephen Leialoha / Kyle Baker / Josef Rubinstein - Inker
Jim Salicrup - Editor

Review/plot:
After the past two months of Kraven's Last Hunt, we have another Spider-Man story that crosses over between the three Spider-Man books. This one only lasts a single month, and is by Ann Nocenti and former Marvel Star Wars artist Cynthia Martin (credited as Cyndy Martin here). It delves into the sensitive topic of mental illness, rarely a winner for Marvel.

And to be honest with you, all Ann Nocenti characters sound like this to me.

The story is that a corrupt businessman gets in trouble when his mentally ill wife starts complaining about his illegal activities, and so his handler, the Kingpin's Arranger, arranges for the wife to be put in an insane asylum, in the Mad Dog Ward. When the kids try to visit their mom, it's threatened that the whole family will be put in the ward. The family happens to live near Aunt May, so Peter Parker bumps into the kids while the mom is being taken away, and he later shows up in time to rescue one of the children. But he gets hurt and winds up being taken into the ward himself.

Peter's costume is removed when he's first brought into the hospital...

...but he's soon plied with drugs and has trouble remembering who he is...

...even after convincing one of the non-corrupt nurses to help him investigate.

The Kingpin uses the Mad Dog ward to create soldiers.

And the head doctor knows that their new patient is really Spider-Man.

They schedule his friend for a lobotomy.

I don't know what's going on here.

But Spider-Man kind of gets his act together...

...and faces off against one of the super-soldiers...

...while the crazy mom's husband has a change of heart and comes back to the hospital to force her release.

The Kingpin maintains plausible deniability in all of this...

...so after Peter escapes and comes back the next day with Ben Urich, it's no surprise that it's all cleaned out.

Honestly, despite my jokes about her writing style, a topic like this is right up Ann Nocenti's alley. At the same time, though, this is a pretty disposable story dressed up as an "event", and it does borrow heavily from stuff like One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. If it has anything unique to say about mental institutions, i'm missing it. Cyndy Martin's clean artwork is fine, and it's interesting to see her with three very different inkers, but the Bill Sienkiewicz covers (here, here, and here) plus the topic of madness prime you for a more experimental experience.

Quality Rating: C

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: N/A

References:

• Peter says he's still recovering from the fight with Vermin from Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #132.
  
• The Daily Bugle is also putting up a picture of Spider-Man fighting Electro, which i guess must be from Amazing Spider-Man annual #21.

Crossover: Life in the Maddog Ward

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

Captain Hero, Doctor Hope and Brainstorm all reappear in Spider-Man 29-31.
This story has a major plot hole in it- why didn't the Kingpin have pictures taken of Spider-Man's face so he could find out his secret identity before sending him to the asylum?

Added those characters. Thanks.

What a huge letdown this must have been to fans following the Spider books at the time. You just come off of one of the greatest Spider-Man stories ever and you get three issues worth of Ann Nocenti's hogwash with some truly terrible art. The pits.

I liked the story. It was no Kraven's Last Hunt, but these two stories are the only time I was interested in Amazing or Web during this period. Hey, if you're going to knock off something, you could do worse than Ken Kesey!
Outside of Peter David on Spectacular, I lost interest in Spider Man for a long time after the Black Costume Saga. Honestly, outside a few writers on the title, I haven,t much cared about Spider Man books since the mid-80s.

As a nine-year-old at the time, I thought these issues were a very good follow-up to Kraven's Last Hunt. The similarly downbeat tone certainly impressed me. The Sienkiewicz cover of PPSM blew my mind. These issues were exciting and terrifying, much like the Kraven's story but in a different way.

Even though the PPSM cover is the tamest of the three, the switch from a black background to white was really striking.

Is it just me or does the doctor look a bit like Richard O'Brien's character from Shock Treatment?

What Chris said. I was also only 8 or so and these issues were creepy to me. I did like the concept of Spidey fighting with his top tied around his neck like a cape, and there is a cute exchange between Spidey and the Nurse at the end where she thinks "he really IS Spider-Man" that I remember liking. This project is making me relive my childhood and I love it.

This was the follow-up to Kraven's Last Hunt? It's like they said, well, we tried a storyline with great writing and great art. Let's try one without either.

Or maybe this is just what happens when Jim Shooter is no longer around.

Just read this today for the first time. I think it's a very fun, creepy story. Straightforward but never boring. And this is coming from someone who normally doesn't have much patience for Nocenti's prose.

Fnord, as far as the cheap tease you mention, doesn't Part 2's cliffhanger make it pretty clear the lobotomy is meant for Peter's friend patient Zero? (Peter was already labeled Patient 366 earlier in the story as the scans above show).

Looks like you're right, gfsdf gfbd. I think when i get caught up in an Ann Nocenti fever dream, i just start skimming. I've removed that line.

I'm glad other people like this story, and i can see why, but looking at it just now made me exhausted all over again.

A few years ago I wrote an in-depth piece about this storyline on my blog...

https://benjaminherman.wordpress.com/2013/08/24/strange-comic-books-spider-man-life-in-the-mad-dog-ward/

I thought it was a good, interesting, unusual story, and it led to me becoming a fan of Ann Nocenti's work. Of course your mileage may vary.