Black Widow Vol. 2: The Tightly Tangled Web

Black Widow Vol. 2: The Tightly Tangled Web (2015) Nathan Edmondson and Phil Noto

This is the second volume of Nathan Edmondson’s Black Widow run, and although I enjoyed it, parts of it were difficult to follow because I am not immersed in the Marvel Avengers world. Winter Soldier, Punisher–apparently Black Widow appeared in these stories, and they integrated those lines back into her story, but for these, if felt like something was missing, even with the backstory blurbs.

Interestingly, X-23 appeared, and although I have read some of her story lines, it didn’t seem to matter, for the part she played here.

Mind you, I really really like X-23 / Laura, so I was predisposed to be happy to see her, and I now want to check out more of what she’s been doing since I last read about her.

Or perhaps I just really like damaged and complicated female characters.

Actually, there’s not really a perhaps about that.

I particularly liked the art in this book–this series, truly.

Natasha and Laura are very much drawn like real women (as are the other female characters) and interestingly, when Laura made her first appearance, I felt like I should know who she was (as I did), despite the fact she was drawn quite differently than the earlier volumes I’d read. Laura tends to have a dead-eyed look and shows almost no emotion, and the depiction of that allowed me to recognize her–which impressed me.

The drawback, as I said, is that there were storylines from other characters here, and I felt like I was missing a lot, rather than being interested in learning more.

I’m thinking, however, that integration might have been imposed from the outside, so I don’t really want to hold it against this volume too much.
Rating: 8/10

Published by Marvel

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