the plot: Months ago, when Norman Osborn tried to give himself a dose of the OZ serum that gave Peter Parker his powers, a terrible explosion occured, from which there were few survivors. Osborn survived, albeit as a deformed "Goblin", his son Harry survived and so did Osborn's chief technician, Dr. Otto Octavius. Octavius, nicknamed "Dr. Octopus" for his four mechanical arms used in his experimentation, went into a coma for months and has just awoken, horrifed to discover his mechanical arms have been grafted to his body and that instead of trying to remove them, he's being studied by the United States Government as a test subject.

As you can tell, Doc Ock is slightly peeved by the whole thing.

Meanwhile, Peter and Mary Jane continue to grow closer, even more so since Pete's spilled the beans about his secret identity in Ultimate Spider-Man #13. But will their newfound courtship be treatened by a new transfer student by the name of Gwen Stacy, an offbeat girl with a philosophy all her own? And what will Peter do when his friend Kong puts two and two together and realizes that Peter Parker is Spider-Man? Well, that you won't learn until next month.

It's all-out excitment, in the Mighty Marvel tradition! Plus, two blink-and-you'll-miss-them cameos by Dr. Henry Pym and Patsy Walker, for the Marvel buff in all of us.

the review: As the series progresses it's become quite apparent that Brian Michael Bendis is moving towards a footing he wishes to pursue. Moving away from the core storylines, and using the characters towards his own. And it's great, it really is. Dr. Octopus is brought into the book in grand fashion, and even though you feel sorry for him being horribly scarred and disfigured following the Osborn accident, he's portrayed as a true menace and the forthcoming confrontation between him and Spidey should be very interesting.

Keeping with the idea of taking familiar faces into new territory, is the introduction of Gwen Stacy, who in the Ultimate series, is an edgy punk-girl, with some bright ideas in her head. Her arrival should add some tension to Peter and Mary Jane's relationship, though it perhaps would have been better to have waited a while to develop Peter and Mary Jane as a couple before bringing Gwen in.

As a Marvel fan of reasonable knowledge, it was neat to see Henry Pym as Doc Ock's technician, a twist and touch that I hope is a part of Pym's involvement with the Ultimate Avengers title, "The Ultimates", set to launch next year, of which Pym is a member. And the revelation that Kong seems to have figured out Peter Parker is Spidey? Well, I would have prefered that it be Flash who that dawned on to give him more screen time, but I like the character of Kong anyway so it's not a total loss.

In short, this is a fun book. It marches to the beat of a different drummer, but it has all the pieces of the classic Spidey titles anyway. If you're a big Spidey fan, who likes to see good stories, and well drawn presentations of everyone's favorite webhead, give this book a chance. You won't be dissapointed.

Oh, and by the way, the artwork was great, and it pleases me to no end to finally see Mark Bagley getting his due as an artist. He was overlooked on Spidey and Thunderbolts, so it's nice to see him getting some well-deserved attention for his work on this title.

This was a fun read, with enough storylines to keep you hooked into the next issue. Ultimate Spider-Man #14 gets **** out of *****.

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