So, The Vulture in the first story and The Tinkerer in the second, the Spiderman series was going great guns in its second issue. With the backstory firmly created in the first issue, Stan Lee and party decided to pencil in some supervillains for Spiderman.

Synopsis

In this issue, Peter Parker begins working for a world famous scientist, Professor Cobbwell. While his school teachers are happy with him, his colleagues and peers begin tagging him as a book worm, and he ends up not being the most famous kid in school.

Now, like every other intern, Parker’s life is not just about working on what he is, but also doing the chores that the Professor tells him to. This brings in contact with a man known only as The Tinkerer, who repairs the electronic devices of important men for only a dime.

Parker find this fishy, and his spider sense tingles when he reaches The Tinkerer’s lair, but he has no option but to leave. After all, the intern has to do only what his employer has told him, isn’t it?

Back in the Professor’s lab, he senses the same tingling, and our costumed superhero is perplexed. He senses the same tingling when he was at The Tinkerer’s lab!

As Professor Cobbwell leaves for the day, Spiderman investigates the radio, and finds some unique devices. Our braveheart hero decides to investigate further.

Well, Spidey finds out that The Tinkerer’s repair shop is just a front for an alien race that has a unique plan to take over the world. They have inserted a device in the electronic devices of all the important men, so they can decipher their user behavior and spy on them.

In fact, the alien race is snooping on the defense plans that are being discussed by an Army Major even as Spiderman finds out about their dastardly plan.

Spiderman is found, and there’s a skirmish between the aliens and Spiderman. Though Spidey overpowers all of them, he is finally captured after a device is thrown at him. He is held captive in a special cell, which Spidey comes out through with his webbing.

There’s another skirmish now, in which one of the control panels is hit and there’s a major fire. Spiderman escapes, along with The Tinkerer and all the aliens. As people see Spiderman escaping from the chimney, they wonder whether it was Spiderman who set the building fire.

Discussion:

The first issue had Peter Parker get accustomed to his role as Spiderman, and the next issue had him first fight against a common criminal The Vulture, and the third story pitted him against an alien race!

That escalated quite fast, didn’t it? Well, the one common thread in all these stories is electronics. A miniature camera, a device that stops the Vulture’s artificial wings, and special devices in radios that allow people to spy on others.

We need to stress here that though electronics may seem to be portrayed in a bad light, it is finally an electronic device that Spiderman uses to beat The Vulture.

If comic books are a picture of the situation back then, we are guessing being in the electronics business was not a very idea at that time. In these issues, along with the larger than life characters like an alien race and a flying thief, new electronics is at the heart of the subject.

The Spiderman character has also grown tremendously in the initial issues, and the writers have made it a point to elaborate on how Spidey is getting things done.

We are looking forward to read the other adventures and discuss them. Are you? Tell us all about in the comments section below.