Invasion of the Spider-Slayers


"Invasion of the Spider-Slayers" is a six-part storyline printed in Marvel's The Amazing Spider-Man title in 1992-1993, featuring Spider-Man against a series of Spider-Slayers created mainly by Alistair Smythe.

Plot

In an act of revenge against Spider-Man for the death of Spencer Smythe, Alistair created his version of Spider-Slayers. He unleashed several slayers which included a small arachnid that worked as a tracking device, a six-tentacled amoeboid, a towering humanoid slayer with multiple personality disorder, a black widow, tarantula, and a scorpion. Alistair constructed several of the slayers with the "assistance" of inmates he liberated from a private sanitarium, goading Spider-Man into several battles that inadvertently involved others such as Scorpion and Black Cat.
Spider-Man finally decided to take the fight to Alistair where he was forced to fight the final slayer—Alistair Smythe. Smythe had encased himself in a full-body bio-organic carapace, augmenting his strength, speed, agility and restoring his ability to walk, becoming what he dubbed the Ultimate Spider-Slayer. After a rough battle, Spider-Man finally defeated him. Smythe was taken into custody and the inmates returned to the sanitarium.

Reading order

Part 1 - Amazing Spider-Man, vol. 1 #368 -- "On Razored Wings"
Part 2 - Amazing Spider-Man, vol. 1 #369 -- "Electric Doom"
Part 3 - Amazing Spider-Man, vol. 1 #370 -- "Life Stings"
Part 4 - Amazing Spider-Man, vol. 1 #371 -- "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest"
Part 5 - Amazing Spider-Man, vol. 1 #372 -- "Arachnophobia Too!"
Part 6 - Amazing Spider-Man, vol. 1 #373 -- "The Bedlam Perspective"

In other media

This storyline inspired LJN's 1993 video game, for Nintendo's Game Boy. It is also loosely inspired the video game tie-in of the 2012 film The Amazing Spider-Man.

Collected editions

The storyline has been collected in a trade paperback: