A Major Spider-Man Villain Returns in Latest Issue

A family feud is brewing in the pages of Amazing Spider-Man. After an assassination attempt left Tombstone comatose, The Beetle claimed her father's criminal territory in Harlem. Hammerhead made his move and killed Madame Masque before turning the other gang bosses against each other. But Madame Masque faked her death, deposed Silvermane and her father, Count Nefaria, as the new head of the Maggia, and then took out Hammerhead to ignite a gang war that plunged New York City into chaos. With help from Mayor Luke Cage, Spider-Man assembled a team of super heroes officially outlawed by former Mayor Wilson Fisk's Anti-Vigilante Act — Miles Morales Spider-Man, She-Hulk, Spider-Woman, and Elektra/Daredevil — to wage war on the city's super-gangs.

The Beetle and her Syndicate took out Black Mariah's gang to seize Spanish Harlem, then set her sights on Diamondback's territory in Sugar Hill while he makes a play for the Financial District (over in Spider-Woman). Meanwhile, Tombstone emerged from his coma and learned that Hammerhead ordered a hit on anti-Fisk Law activist Randy Robertson and his ex-fiancée — Tombstone's daughter, Janice. With hired gun Shotgun targeting Tombstone after his failed assassination, the gangster joined Team Spidey to protect his daughter and take down the other crime bosses.

This week's Amazing Spider-Man #40 begins in the West Village, where the Rose — Richard Fisk, son of former Kingpin of Crime Wilson Fisk — plots to kill The Beetle as revenge for Tombstone refusing him a seat at the table (way back in Amazing Spider-Man Vol. 6 #1). As Spider-Man, She-Hulk, and Tombstone take down the Tracksuit Mafia bros in the Meatpacking District, The Beetle plans to make a move on Diamondback. 

Tombstone tells Spider-Man that Fisk is back in town and coming to him. And with word of their "unofficial team-up" spreading, no boss in the Tri-State area will work with him again. When the gang war is over, Tombstone won't have any territory. His days as the crime boss of Harlem are over. "I want to stop this war before my daughter gets hurt," Tombstone says. "That means dealing with Fisk."

Downtown, Madame Masque hands over a bloodied (but still alive) Hammerhead to the Maggia and has Shotgun throw Nefaria and Silvermane from the roof. She then has the cyborg Silvermane submit and make it official: "Madame Masque leads the Maggia now." Meanwhile, in Sugar Hill, The Beetle and her Syndicate — White Rabbit, Lady Octopus, Scorpia, and the Francine Frye Electro — attack Diamondback's men to seat Beetle as their new boss. But "he got here first."

Back at Tombstone's place, Team Spidey prepares to meet with Fisk. And in Sugar Hill, Beetle prepares to meet with Fisk. In a double reveal, Beetle is greeted by the Rose and his muscle, the gamma-irradiated gangster Digger. Spider-Man expects the Rose, but instead sees his father: Wilson Fisk, the Kingpin of Crime. Accompanying Fisk is his wife, the mutant Typhoid Mary, and a legion of masked knights of the Hellfire Club. 

This is a surprise: after the events of Devil's Reign, Cage replaced a defeated Fisk as mayor, and Richard Fisk replaced his father as the Kingpin. A fugitive Wilson claimed citizenship to the mutant nation Krakoa by his marriage to Mary (in X-Men Vol. 6 #20), who disappeared when the anti-mutant Orchis ordered Charles Xavier to exile mutants from the planet (in X-Men: Hellfire Gala 2023 #1).

THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #41
Written by Zeb Wells
Art by John Romita Jr.
Cover by John Romita Jr.
On Sale 1/3

GANG WAR CONTINUES! With all of New York's super underworld fighting for dominance, you didn't think Wilson Fisk, the former Kingpin of Crime, would sit it out, did you?