BLACK WIDOW: WEB OF INTRIGUE

Remember when we were reading those Frank Miller DAREDEVIL issues and Black Widow ducked out of the storyline pretty early on? And then she returned some time later with a haircut, working for SHIELD? Have you been wondering what she was up to in the meantime? No? Well, we're about to find out anyway.

In 1983, after Miller's DAREDEVIL came to an end with Black Widow in her new look, Marvel published a four-part serial in MARVEL FANFARE showcasing her in a solo adventure set prior to those Miller stories. (We'll get into how and why this might have happened in the ensuing weeks.) I believe I first encountered this story when Marvel published it in a comic book one-shot to coincide with the initial Marvel Knights BLACK WIDOW mini-series circa 1999. Written by Ralph Macchio and drawn by George Pérez, it featured the Widow cast in more of a superspy, rather than a superhero, role, and I really liked it.

More recently, Marvel collected the mini-series, along with a graphic novel from some years later by Gerry Conway and George Freeman, in a hardcover called WEB OF INTRIGUE (conveniently reprinted this past January in paperback format as well). We won't look at the graphic novel, but for the next four weeks, I'll be using my copy of WEB OF INTRIGUE to examine the Macchio/Pérez story issue by issue. I recall liking it back when I was in college; will those positive recollections hold up? Let's find out, beginning tomorrow!

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