Flight To The Finish!
The Unofficial Spider-Man Newspaper Strip is a short, unauthorized self-funded 'proof of concept' continuation of the new discontinued Amazing Spider-Man daily strip published by Kings Features. It is plotted by Zarius, with dialogue written by Maydaystan, and illustrated by various artists such as Xavier Rojo. It was launched on January 1st 2024 and ended it's short run on January 21st, 2024. The story picks up shortly after the original strip left off, with Peter and Mary Jane Parker returning from Australia.
The Unofficial Spider-Man comic strip provides examples of the following tropes:
- A Day in the Limelight: The January 20th strip one is for Mary Jane, as she returns to the stage
- Fanservice: Upon completing her heist, Felicia heads to the roof of the exhibit where she strips down to her underwear in order to change clothes
- Mary Jane stripping down to her undergarments and making love to Peter in the closing panels of the January 21st strip
- Flowers of Romance: Peter gives Mary Jane these in the January 21st strip
- Happily Married: Peter and MJ, just as they were in the original newspaper strip.
- High-Altitude Battle: Spider-Man and The Vulture for half of the story
- Hollywood Kiss: Peter and MJ in the back of a cab at the end of the January 19th strip
- Impersonating an Officer: Felicia changes into a security guard's uniform after pulling off her diamond heist, hoping to escape the building in disguise
- Loose Canon: The continuation reveals Peter knew Felicia Hardy in the strip's 'canon', despite the character never having appeared in the run of the original newspaper strip
- Mysterious Employer: The Vulture is working for another individual, who is closely monitoring events, we only see the back of him, although it's pretty clear from the character designs and other close up shots that it's meant to be Otto Octavius, aka Doctor Octopus
- The One That Got Away: After Mary Jane reads in the paper of sightings of The Black Cat, Peter reminisces of the romantic partnership he shared with Felicia as Spider-Man
- Rooftop Confrontation: The second half of the opening story plays out like this after Vulture and Spider-Man intercept Felicia at the Diamond exhibit
- What Might Have Been: The author had planned for the strip to run for an indefinite period of time, only to lose interest and decided to settle on it being just a short-lived tribute/'proof of concept' revival instead. Plans in it's early stages of development were for the Regent and the Spider-Man Unlimited costume to appear as well as a romance that would blossom between a multiverse-hopping Miles Morales and Gwenpool
- Your Worst Memory: In the January 18th strip, Felicia reveals her motivation for stealing the diamond, we learn from a flashback that it had been previously stolen by her cat burglar father and gifted to her as a young child. When her father was later arrested, the diamond was returned to the authorities by Felicia's heartbroken mother as a helpless young Felicia was forced to watch
