Although the concept is great, it’s executed very poorly. In spite of having ten extra pages to play with in this story, it comes across as rushed. A closer examination reveals why: we are presented with a long progression of short scenes. The introductory scene is five pages and the last action-pact scene establishes some coherence at the end with ten pages, but the rest of the story consists of one- and two-page scenes. By the time we see that Arthur Stacy, who has always been portrayed as a good and decent man, is willing to commit murder, it doesn’t even register because we’ve been left gasping from the rapid-fire presentation of small scenes.

Five pages would have been gained if Mackie had decided to let us just take for granted that the Sinister Six had gotten together. Instead, he apparently felt compelled to detail how the Sand-Man (remember, he’s back to being a bad-guy now) convinced Mysterio, Kraven, the Vulture, and Electro to team-up with him. We could have done without this, especially since he uses the same eloquent argument each time:

Sand-Man: Hey, let’s form the Sinister Six again.

Recruit: I’m not interested. I’m doing my own thing.

Sand-Man: We’re going after Doc Ock.

Recruit: OK!

I was worried when I found out Kraven would be part of the Six, because given this creative group’s track record of continuity glitches I half-expected to see Sergei resurrected without explanation. While some reference is made to the fact that this Kraven is indeed the son of the original, he might as well be Sergei. J.M. DeMatteis’ terrific characterization, not to mention the longer beard and the preference to using a shot gun over nets and knifes, are out the window. Really, I have an easier time believing that this guy is one of the Jackal’s clones rather than Alyosha Kravinoff.

Then there’s Mysterio. It’s good that they are addressing the fact that Mysterio apparently died in Daredevil #7, and it’s even nice to see that they’re not just using the old "it was an illusion" cop-out. But we didn’t need a five-page supplemental story that tells us that Mysterio may or may not have died, may or may not be alive now, may or may not be Quentin Beck, and may or may not have abilities beyond what he had previously. Really, we already knew about this mystery from reading the main story. The only good part of the supplemental is the somewhat funny comment about "less reputable papers" (either a stab at Daredevil or comics in general). Again, these five pages would have been better used fleshing out the Arthur Stacy/Senator Ward situation, or how screwed up the Parker marriage is at this point, or more about the stalker.

This book does have a terrific idea under it, but the execution is done very poorly, leaving this fan very disappointed.

My grade: D+.