Spider-man: Secret of the Sinister Six [Hardcover]

The Sinister Six are still following the directives of the Gentleman, but they are getting restless to resolve his plan. Especially those who are rebelling against his authority, Doctor Octopus mainly.

Spider-Man is still besieged by doubt over the origin of Pity, the newest Six member. Implications from the previous novel in the trilogy pointed to her being his sister, but there are still considerations to support the contrary.

The story moves along very fast, and is the first among the Marvel novels really to have some graphic violence. But it is not too gratuitous, keeping in character with the murderers it is related to. Sometimes the story might seem a bit disjointed due to the narrative style of going back several minutes in time to describe what was happening off-stage, as it were. There are some twists near the end, but they are not too surprising. There is good resolution and updating with regard to the comics, as Castro fills in a bit on what the future holds for our villains after this novel occurs. The very end gives us some revelations that, to me at least, seemed tacked on. A certain character appears to provide these new insights. The only part of this interaction that I liked was the reactions of Peter and Mary Jane to finding this person in their home. Now THAT was funny.

I liked this book, as it really kept to the comic book perceptions of the characters. However, there were an atrocious number of typos, grammar errors, and just poor editing, even for a first edition like this. It really detracted from the reading experience, so my advice is to wait for a later edition; hopefully this issue will be rectified. Spidey fans should definitely like this one.

This is a terrific book- it doesn't take itself too seriously, there are some interesting details provided about Spiderman's double life and it ends the series nicely, while leaving room for future superhero adventures of course. Villains get what they deserve and characters who really, desperately needed a happy ending get it. I have to disagree with other reviewers- the ending was as fun and satisfying as the rest of the book.

I am a huge fan of Spiderman comics and the movies. I saw this book in a used book store and I had to pick it up and see what the Webslinger was up to. I had picked up the previous book and it was pretty good, the Day of Terror showed that Spiderman wasn't intimidated by the Sinister Six and he was willing to take them all on.

This book was pretty good and it stayed pretty true to what happened in the comics. There is mention of a lot of the event comics that led up to what happened in this book including Onslaught, the Asgardian fire demons, and the Atlantian invasion just to name a few.

Plus throughout the book we have constant references to other super heroes and other super villains plus things that happened in the comics over the years. That is something I really liked, it made me smile to hear Spiderman reference things that happened in comics I have read.

***SPOILERS*** ***SPOILERS*** ***SPOILERS***

The book does have a LOT of pop culture references, sometimes to the point where you almost wanna say enough is enough! When they start mentioning Super Mario and Homer Simpson it kinda made me roll my eyes and wanted to get back to the action.

There is also WAAAY too much killing in this book. In the comics the Sinister Six are always causing property damage, but we never really see them flat out KILL someone. In this book people are being killed as a result of their actions. It was a different angle on things and it wasn't something I really liked.

Also, the main villain of this book, the guy who is plotting everything and paying the Sinister Six to do what they're doing, is named "The Gentleman." He has his little lackey with him that he named "Pity," and he keeps her in servitude to him, but he is WAAAAAY to rough on this girl! He yells at her, belittles her, insults her, starves her, beats her, makes her sleep in horrible places, and do humiliating things. He goes way too far. Seriously! Emperor Palpatine would tell this guy to lighten up! Even the members of the Sinister Six: Doc Ock, The Chameleon, Electro, The Vulture, and Mysterio, all of which are murderers, have kidnapped people, stolen and caused millions of dollars in property damage even tell him that he's going too far and tell The Gentleman that if he doesn't stop hitting her that they'll quit the team and kick his ass.

A mistake that the author makes repeatedly is that he refers to the Empire State Building as "The Empire State." If you say, "The Empire State" you are referring to New York State, because New York is nick-named, "The Empire State." I know it's a minor thing but it's something that kinda bugs me.

I will admit that this book is awesome the way it shows Spiderman racing all over New York trying to stop the villains from doing what they are doing. The fights are great as well! Setting super hero battles in the middle of the worst snow storm in New York City history was a stroke of genius that I would have never really thought of if I was writing a Spiderman story and I have to tip my hat to the writer for thinking of this!

In the end I was very glad to see that Doc Ock took his revenge on the Gentleman and he refused to be taken advantage of anymore. Also the twist at the end really comes outta left field and was something I didn't see coming. I wondered where the Chameleon had went and we find out at the end that he also had a master plan of his own!

The epilogue was kinda disappointing. The writer has Wolverine show up, ditch the bomb that was hidden in the Parkers' house and tie up the last few remaining loose plot threads. It seemed kinda rushed like it was thrown together at the last minute by the author to wrap up a few things he forgot about.

Then in the final part of the epilogue we find that Pity did survive the crash into the ocean, but she is in Maine on a journey of self-exploration. She is walking along the side of the road and she is literally picked up by the Scooby-Doo gang. I'm serious, a van shows up and four people are inside, their descriptions match the gang perfectly and they even have a Great Dane with them. They want to find out how she got there and they state that, "it's a mystery!" That was just stupid!

***END SPOILERS*** ***END SPOILERS*** ***END SPOILERS***

So in the end I really enjoyed reading this book and it was something I recommend this to fans of Spiderman and the Sinister Six!