Written by: Seanan McGuire

Art by: IG Guara

Colors by: Ian Herring

Letterer: VC’s Clayton Cowles

Release Date: June 17, 2020

Price: $3.99

Johnny & Susan Storm are back on Earth- GS, and it’s not looking very pleasant for Ghost- Spider. But why would super powered child star influencers be on Gwen’s bad side? Well, it all gets a bit confusing when it comes down to the details, especially on a story that was thrown into readers hands without a proper conclusion to the first six issues. Gwen is given an ultimatum and seems to have given up something very important to her, with her self proclaimed promise to get it back we conclude this story with no real outline of where Ghost-Spider or this title series is going from here.

I binged issues one through ten in order to get the full story of Gwen this week. I will say, it was harder to find the correct issues, due to the sheer amount of titles Gwen has just being introduce six years ago. The intro to this series was great, story beats were steady and pacing was great, but issue seven the start of this Johnny & Susan story hit the breaks hard on the pacing that Seanan McGuire had set up since issue one. Johnny & Sue shouldn’t be that hard to introduce. I mean, they are classic characters, but with the gray line of a multiverse, McGuire needed something that made this version of the character worth reading. It’s just unfortunate that they weren’t very interesting, well at least with how quickly this story began to move. There’s a lack of motivation and reasoning in Johnny & Susan as they (SPOILERS).

Gwen and her father continue to butt heads in this issue, for the exact same reasons they get after one another in previous issues. This relationship is in a continuous loop of; yelling, understanding, and hugging. McGuire seems to have put this formula together for their relationship just to fill pages in this issue. The big picture in this issue is the encounter with Johnny & Sue which takes seven pages which accomplishes nothing. The encounter ends exactly where it started, a full seven pages just to fill the page count. Now don’t get me wrong since issue five, when IG Guara came into this title, the art has been great. Really fits the tone of the book, and is very pleasant to look at when action is on and off the page.

I am not aware of any reasons McGuire would rush this story, but from the reappearance of the siblings to their “secret origin” shown in this issue, all the way to the ending we see with them and Ghost-Spider. It felt very rushed, the lack of character development destroyed this story. Ghost-Spider is one of the many titles to officially go digital only, which in most cases, seems to be the ticking time bomb to cancellation.

Final Thoughts:

Ghost-Spider has/had potential, given where Seanan McGuire started this series and how the new series was pitched, Gwen should have made a permanent move to Earth 616 to attend college, made new friends and deal with her angry thoughts towards the new C.R.A.D.L.E. law. We may never see that story, but let’s be honest with ourselves, Ghost-Spider will most likely be rebooted soon, and given a a seventh shot with another writer.

5.5/10