This miniseries has in retrospect been called Spider-Woman: Agent of S.W.O.R.D. It’s another Brian Michael Bendis/Alex Maleev joint. When it came out, I loved it. I will admit, though, it doesn’t age as well–perhaps because soon after this phase of his career, Bendis became a kind of shorthand for disjointed stories relying heavily on flashbacks to build suspense and retcon known continuity. When he first started doing this with Jessica Jones in the Alias series it was a fresh, new way to tell stories. By this point, it was starting to feel a little rote. Just a little, though–this is still a very solid comic. It was also released online as the first Marvel Motion Comic–an experiment in trying to get nonreaders interested in reading comics, I guess. I don’t think it ever really went anywhere.
On to the tale itself: Just as she was recruited by SHIELD early in her career, in this book Jessica Drew is invited to joint SWORD–the Sentient World Observation and Response Department. Part of her incentive to join is that her life on Earth is not great–and she’s feeling sorry for herself. She was a triple agent during Secret Invasion. None of her friends like her. Etc.
She actually contemplates suicide by shooting herself in the head with her own venom blast.
So when the offer comes in from Abigail Brand to serve SWORD, Jessica jumps at the chance to kill aliens.
Her first mission takes her to Madripoor to hunt a Spider-Man skrull, but instead finds a deep state plot involving Hydra. Bendis uses Jessica’s early experiences as a double agent for Nick Fury serving undercover as a Hydra operative to parallel Jessica’s current experiences working for SHIELD in the aftermath of her having been replaced by a skrull during Secret Invasion. It’s solid character work but, as mentioned above, the heavy reliance on flashbacks is getting tiresome.
And speaking of flashbacks and continuity, this series digs into past stories that indicated that Madame Hydra is Spider-Woman’s mother. When they meet in Madripoor, Madame Hydra introduces Jessica a skrull being held in a Hydra prison–the very one who took Drew’s place during Secret Invasion! Yeah, this is THAT kind of story. Unfortunately, that part of the story doesn’t go anywhere as Jessica decides to get out of Hydra’s clutches.
After escaping Hydra, the Thunderbolts show up to recruit Spider-Woman.
This book is basically just a whole bunch of people all wanting Jessica to work for them.
Spider-Woman fights the Thunderbolts, which is fun, and then escapes. The whole Thunderbolts interlude is basically just an extended action sequence drawn by Alex Maleev and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.
After that, her old pals the New Avengers show up to help her complete her skrull-hunting mission in Madripoor–because that story still hasn’t been completed. They’re successful. Wolverine stabs the skrull and Jessica kills him with a venom blast. After that, Jessica returns to SWORD for another mission.
English (US) · 