It's rare that I give such a low rating but this was a poor issue of ASM. The "humor" and story by Joe Kelly was all over the place. A lot of action scenes in which nothing really happened. The "Silicon Six" characters that have zero impact on the story or the reader. Bizarre "pee pee" jokes, again. That "love her like a sister" line at the end was just wrong on so many levels. And I hate to say it but the Dodson's art looked very rushed and sketchy at times.
NOT a recommendation. more

Before I give my thoughts about this issue, I wanna talk about this series overall. It's currently heavily disliked by the vocal part of the ASM fanbase, and especially this issue's leaked panels just added fuel to the fire.

Wells' style is very BND-esque. And tbh, his stories would fit more with BND that happened ~15 years ago than now. Especially since we don't know what caused this "Wells' BND", 10 months later. So, overall, I don't like the premise.

But Wells' run hasn't had the time to shine either. 20 issues in and only abouty half of them are actually part of Wells' own run. Only half of them are not tie-in, anniversary issue, part of an event or written by a guest. So it's still too early for me to say this is the worst run ever, we haven't really seen what the run could be. Since I feel like it never had the opportunity to even shine from the start. Like only 10 issues of this run have actually been Wells moving forward his own storyline. And that is not a lot.

I say all this, to give an idea that I do not dislike this run. It has ideas I disagree with, some I dislike heavily, but most of them work because Wells writes them pretty okay. I dislike feeling that they come from BND -era, but I still enjoy issues that actually go somewhere.

This issue itself just didn't work for me. Dodson's art was very messy and most of this issue was just action. That had bad art. Kelly's dialogue was mostly okay, but the second part made this whole two-parter feel rushed and forgettable.

And the final pages? I thought with added context they would flow better, make more sense, but... nope. It feels very out-of-place, maybe because guest writer wrote it, but... I don't get it. And Felicia dating Peter is not something I hate, but for now it hasn't shown to be worth it, especially since Jed did wonders with Felicia's character. The pairing is cute and if MJ isn't the focus, why not have Peter date Felicia. I just hope it goes somewhere and isn't forgotten in the following three months. Felicia deserves better.

So this issue was a mess. Just... not good, even if I enjoyed the first part. And Peter and MJ are not happening. I really hate the idea, but let's pretend I accept it. The next arc will focus on what Peter did 6 months ago (because of MJ) which feels... odd? To first say Peter doesn't love MJ that way anymore to immediately jump to a storyline where them caring for each other is the main focus (so much so that Peter fights FF and works with Norman). And that just feels odd? Like what is this run trying to do.

I started this by explaining my thoughts on Wells' run. Why? Because I wanted to say that even if I didn't like this issue that much, disliked Dark Web heavily and this run's plan is very perplexing, that doesn't mean Wells' run is "the worst ever". Because it really isn't. The first arc is really good. And this run has had so much potential. But I just wish this was an actually 20th issue of Wells' run and not the 10th "placeholder-issue". But because this is just a placeholder and Wells' run hasn't gone anywhere still like only 10 issues (1-5, 7-8 and 11-13) have actually been his own thing.

Yeah, mostly rambling. So TLDR: 4,5/10, mostly bad because the art, "MJ is like a sister to me" didn't help.
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What a waste. There is no end to this cycle rinse and repeat. Dodsons were poor on art and gave a very rushed job. What a waste of time and money.