Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #30 – “Emergency”! In the previous installment, an imposter Spider-Man has robbed a bank and smeared the spidery one’s good name! Later, when the imposter Spider-Man holds up a jewelry store, Peter Parker clad in his outfit tries to neutralize the situation by talking to the police and ends up getting himself shot with gun bullets!

Between these two specific events, Gwen Stacy is going to stay at the Parker household while Captain Stacy is away at the *checks notes* Police Detectives Conference in Atlantic City? Sounds like a good front for boning hookers for a week. At any rate, MJ is less than happy about this awful arrangement. Parker insists that everything will be ok and that she should trust him, but MJ’s problem is that she doesn’t trust Gwen. Drama ensues and Parker is being an oblivious child about it.

That’s enough recap for now! Somebody shut me up.

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #30 [January, 2003]
Written by: Brian Michael Bendis
“Emergency”

Another issue, another provocative Spider-Man pose. I think I’m getting the vapors.

Spider-Man is bleeding everywhere after having been shot right through the shoulder. Police stand right above him, guns trained. “Don’t you move a muscle or I will blow your head off!!”

One twitch and this police officer will blow him all right. Blow him right to heaven. The police manhandle the little nerd and cuff him. “Oh no! Oh no!” he thinks, writhing in pain and about to be taken right to the clink. It’s an embarrassing spectacle. Lookie-loos are everywhere. He gets read his Miranda rights and one officer aims to unmask this kid once and for all. Now he’s gone and done it! You don’t mess with the mask, son.

Still cuffed, Spidey does a backflip onto a police car and leaps away before the cops can say “boo” (because that would be dumb, why would any of them say “boo”? Come on). A rain of bullets flies toward him, but Spidey is too swift! Too fast! Too handsome! He cannot be bulleted!

Scaling a building and taking shelter on a rooftop, Spider-Man tries to tear free of his handcuff prison. Mask off past his chin, he struggles and says “ow” a lot. Head swimming with a fearful soup of disjointed thoughts, he gains the strength of a 90-pound woman whose baby is in peril and rips those handcuffs apart!

Far out, man.

The mating call of the spider: “Guh– guh– guh– guh–”

He’s not even safe upon the roof! A helicopter fixes its big damn bright spotlight on the kid. “This is the NYPD!! Freeze where you are! Lie on the ground with your hands over your head or we will shoot you!!”

BLAM! BLAM! SPING! SPAKK! They didn’t even give the kid a chance! He frolics away quickly.

While the officers in the helicopter argue with each other, Spidey loses them.

“I had him in my hands! I had him!” Officer #1 says as the two of them skulk around the buildings with their flashlights.

“I know!” replies Officer #2.

“In my hands!”

“So am I going to have to listen to you whine about this for the rest of my life?”

Wimp. Rub some dirt on it.

Meanwhile, Parker is hunkering down behind a dumpster, clutching his shoulder like he got seriously injured or something. “God! I’ve been shot! I- I- I- don’t know what to do… I didn’t think– I- I didn’t…”

Something goes “Ploosh” and then we get a scene change to MJ in her bed writing in her diary. Ever since the “Bridge Incident” (I don’t remember if that was from Green Goblin #1 or Green Goblin #2, but it’s ONE of the two! Glad I could be of service), she’s been having nightmares. Nightmares about bridges and incidents. She is interrupted by a phone call from Aunt May. Not HER Aunt May. She doesn’t have an Aunt May!

“Peter?! Yeah – he’s here. He’s in the bathroom,” MJ tells her, and it’s not entirely a lie. Parker, after all, went to MJ’s just to slip into something a little more comfortable and then prance around in the night getting shot at. “Yeah – he’s – I don’t know what he’s doing in there,” she adds, implying that he might be jerking off furiously. Aunt May is satisfied and tells her nephew’s fuck friend to come home since it’s late.

The phone rings again immediately. Petey Parker from a pay phone (lol) calling collect (lolol). Of course she accepts the charges and is overjoyed that Parker is ok! Well, not at all ok. But ok enough to make MJ pay for a phone call.

“Mary… help me…”

Aw hell no! Downtown in the middle of the night? Alone? Are you mad, gurl? Peter Parker ain’t worth that nonsense! But, nevertheless, she ambles through what looks like a really, really shitty part of town looking for the bleeding kid.

She finds him in the garbage.

“Oh, my God! Oh, my God! Peter! What happened?” she cries as Parker looks like dogshit. MJ is freaking out. She brought some clean clothes and a first aid kit and a SARS blanket and these cool blue pills she got from her dad. *shakes bottle*

“We have to get you to a hospital.”

“They’ll arrest me! I don’t – I don’t know what to do,” he winces.

“We have to call your Aunt May!” Aw hell no. In the middle of the night? Are you mad, gurl?

Uncle Ben ate a bullet! Remember?! Are you mad, gurl?

Man, Uncle Ben was shot. Aunt May doesn’t need any more of these bullet shenanigans. MJ, with tears streaming down her face, realizes what needs to happen…

All but kicking and screaming, Parker insists that they need to avoid the ER. “They’ll call the cops,” he reminds her. “You have to do this,” she reminds him. “Just – just do it.”

Like a living Nike commercial.

So he just does it. He gets a lot of stares from the current ER clientele while he walks right up to a doctor standing near the front desk and collapses in his warm, waiting arms. Emergency! Let’s fix this dork up!

MJ looks as forlorn as you could possibly be while Parker gets worked on like a car in a mechanic’s shop.

“Hey Mike, has he moved?”

“Nope. Out cold.”

“His vital signs are strong.”

“Strong – they are through the roof.”

“Oh, finally, here comes the police.”

Parker perks up a little.

“Officer?”

“Doctor Costanza?”

“Yes. Thank you for responding.”

“What do we got?”

“We got a John Doe. Kid comes in – gunshot wound to the shoulder.”

Back and forth. No ID. Different shirt than the one he was shot in. Doctor Costanza likes his chicken spicy! Sorry, had to throw that one in there. In the one second it takes for the cop to draw the current, poof. Parker’s gone. Bed is empty. Doctor Costanza’s gettin’ upset!

It appears he has leapt through a ceiling tile. “I swear,” the doctor gibbers, “we never – we never left him alone.”

Suuuuuuure you didn’t. Meanwhile, MJ is in the waiting room with her large Macy’s bag at her feet, slightly open. Open enough for the old woman sitting next to her to catch a glimpse of the Spider-Man costume packed within…

MJ notices the woman staring and closes the bag with her knees…

Officer Fuck asks the people in the waiting room if any kid has run through lately. You know, recently. Within the last minute or so. I’m sure you’d remember if you saw him. Argghh. Fine.

Doctor Costanza calls in the security troops!

Are you mad, gurl?

MJ, having been identified as possibly the girl that came in with the injured boy, starts booking it the fuck on out of there once danger starts looming. I’m glad this all went well.

By the time the doctor, police, and security leave the front door, MJ is nowhere to be seen.

“Oh, my God – I’m going to faint,” MJ breathes, smiling from ear to ear. Parker, still wearing his hospital gown, gives MJ a full view of his butt.

Since they have no money between them and Parker is too hopped up to swing them both home, they go over their options: 1) use MJ’s ATM card, or 2) yeah, let’s just do that.

So Aunt May tried to wait up, splayed out on the couch with remote control still in hand. She stirs, wakes up, checks Peter’s room and finds him asleep. Safe and sound. She stares daggers at him, but since he looks like such a cute little puppy dog, her expression softens. She quietly leaves the room.

When the coast is clear, Peter grabs his shoulder with a loud “Aagghh!” Loud enough for, like, Aunt May to hear, come on. Are you mad, gurl?

The news is currently airing a report on Spider-Man’s whereabouts and intentions. A one Sergeant Bullit has a very important message: “Vigilante behavior will not be tolerated in this city – masked or otherwise. We have been lenient on people like this Spider-Man – but those days are over.”

Spider-Man – this delinquent from the four corners of Hell – wears a mask like coward. Now the people know why. And the masked criminal will pay for what he has done.

“Ow,” Parker grunts.

Final Thoughts

I look forward to seeing just how Parker will be able to pull a fast one on Aunt May. Bullet wounds are hard to hide… I’m told.