Welcome one and all to The Time Capsule! In this feature I’ll be highlighting an entire month of core titles for one character until his/her story is complete. The character that I’m currently focusing on is none other than Spider-Man. I’ll list any notable debuts, big moments, and favourite scenes from each issue. Hope everyone enjoys it as much as I enjoyed journeying back through time to put it together. Let me share the memories with you!
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The Cover
Amazing Spider-Man #5 (October 1963)
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The issue starts with Jonah delivering one of his Anti-Spider-Man tirades over the television. Flash Thompson thinks Spider-Man is the coolest (if he only knew) but Peter speaks up by defending Jameson (to avoid suspicion).
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Doctor Doom is buying what Jonah’s selling, believing that Spider-Man is in fact a menace to society and thusly would be the perfect partner for him to fight the Fantastic Four with.
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Doctor Doom creates a spider-wave transmitter in order to contact his potential ally.
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Spider-Man follows the signal back to its source, unaware of the sender’s identity.
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Spider-Man encounters Doctor Doom for the first time who pleads his case to Spider-Man all the while secretly intending to backstab him once the duo defeats the Fantastic Four.
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But Spider-Man rejects the alliance…
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…and wraps Doom up in some webbing. Unfortunately for Spider-Man, this Doctor Doom is merely a Doombot and the real one makes his presence known. 
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A battle ensues with Doctor Doom utilizing his miniature finger-gun.
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Spider-Man escapes the villain’s onslaught by bursting though the window and plummeting to the water below.
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Doctor Doom vows to learn Spider-Man’s true identity in order to capture him and use him as bait to lure his hated rivals, the Fantastic Four, into a trap.
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Spider-Man’s ready to re-engage Doom but the villain has already blown-up the building to cover his tracks leaving Spider-Man to only shoot some pics of the fire and…get blamed for blowing up the building in the first place. Can’t the guy catch a break?
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Peter sells the pictures to Jonah but he mentions he would have loved them better if they had shown that Spider-Man was behind the fire. Peter decides to speak up and question Jonah about what his true motivations are. Betty Brant backs Peter up and he realizes that he might just have an ally in the Daily Bugle…and a pretty one at that.
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Meanwhile, Flash decides to pull a prank on Parker to get back at him for besmirching his hero’s good name. His plan is to dress as Spider-Man and scare Parker straight.
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Elsewhere, Doctor Doom has created a device that allows him to track Spider-Man with the aim to catch him off-guard by attacking his civilian identity.
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Flash gets ready to spring his plan into action just as Doctor Doom narrows in on Spider-Man’s true identity.
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Doom mistakes Flash for Spider-Man and kidnaps the helpless bully away, unbeknownst to our hero. If Flash hadn’t been there Peter’s secret would most definitely had been found out!
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Doctor Doom hits the television airwaves to issue his demands.: for the freedom of Spider-Man he wants the Fantastic Four to disband and surrender to him. 
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Peter thinks it is all a trick by Doom until Liz phones and explains that Flash is missing…and that Flash had been wearing a Spider-Man suit. Peter puts two and two together and deduces that Doom has captured Flash. He’s confident that the Fantastic Four will never give into Doom’s demands and that he has seen the last of Flash Thompson. He’s fine with that until he ultimately comes to his senses and decides to save Flash instead.
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As Parker prepares for battle, the Fantastic Four debate what course of action they should take.
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Spider-Man develops a rock solid plan in order to find Doctor Dom’s hideout…
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…and it proves fruitful in its results. He confronts Doom and the fight begins anew.
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Spider-Man wisely disables Doctor Doom’s miniature finger-gun but that is not the only weapon Doom has in his arsenal. The villain proceeds to unleash his full wealth of deathtraps on our hero.
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After successfully dodging a few of the threats, Spider-Man is trapped on an electrified pad.
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But Spider-Man uses his brains and fires a webline to Doom in order to flow the charge back onto the villain which forces him to shut the trap off.
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Doctor Doom pulls no punches by unleashing his Doombot and another deadly machine to subdue Spider-Man.
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Spider-Man manages to take out the control panel but isn’t quick enough in his recovery and Doom grabs the upper hand.
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Just then, the Fantastic Four arrive and Doctor Doom flees to fight another day, resigning to the fact that he can not overcome the combined might of the five heroes.
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Spider-Man sees the reason Doom ran and then realizes that he must return home immediately as Aunt May must be worried that he didn’t return home from his errand yet…completely forgetting about Flash Thompson in the process.
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Flash is worried for his safety promising that he’ll never ask for trouble again if he escapes this ordeal with his life. Sure thing Flash…I’ll believe it when I see it.
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The Fantastic Four rescue Flash realizing that there is no way he could be Spider-Man but Mr. Fantastic does find signs that the real Spider-Man was indeed there.
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Jonah’s mad that Peter didn’t get any pictures but Betty tells Peter not to feel bad as she thinks he’s wonderful. Wonderful? That word rattles around in his mind as his feelings for her begin to emerge. The next day, Peter returns to school ready to seem a very humble Flash.
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The issue ends with Flash bragging that he was the reason that Doctor Doom fled and Peter can’t believe what he is hearing. Same old Flash indeed!
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Blossoming love, growing alliances, and Doom is what awaited us this with this issue. It marked the first time that Spider-Man battled a villain that was not one of his own but rather the Fantastic Four’s arch-nemesis, Doctor Doom. Though I consider this issue to be the weakest so far it’s not without its positives. One such positive was Peter showing he can be the bigger man by rescuing the boy who has tormented him throughout high school, a boy who got caught only because he was about to pull a prank on Peter, albeit a prank that was in defense of his favourite hero Spider-Man. For this fact, I admire that Peter doesn’t let his personal feelings get in the way of his heroic duties as Spider-Man. Another positive was Peter’s developing feelings for Betty Brant, someone he never really noticed until now. Peter is somewhat taken aback by this revelation and this moment starts a relationship between these two that would change and grow as the years go by. As for the villain, Doctor Doom proved Spider-Man’s superior but the sight of Doom fleeing after merely seeing the Fantastic Four’s arrival was a little strange considering the type of bad guy he one day becomes. I’d be remiss not to mention that Jonah’s propaganda was once again the catalyst for our story. Doom himself believed that Spider-Man was such a menace that he even wanted to team-up with him and it’s this negative press that led Spider-Man to believe that the Fantastic Four would never attempt a rescue in the first place. What he should take away from this issue is that not everyone believes in Jonah’s agenda as was evident by Betty backing Peter up and the Fantastic Four swooping in to aid their fellow hero despite their rocky history up to this point in time. Spider-Man’s relationships grow stronger with each passing month and his love life has just started to get complicated.
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Have any of your memories you’d like to share in relation to this issue? Any other comments? Comment Below!
The Speech Bubble 
Once again we have a Spider – Man issue full of events, with a lot of interesting interactions between Peter and the various supporting characters and also with a perfect balance between the “costume on” and the “costume off” moments.
This issue is heavily focused on the first meeting between Dr. Doom and Peter, but honestly I think this is the less interesting event of the whole story: what I liked most was the attention given to the people who know Peter and feel attracted by Spider – Man, and to all the consequences their appreciation for Spider – Man has on Peter’s life.
Of course another detail I appreciated very much is Betty’s characterization. She’s such a sweet girl! That’s the Betty Brant we want to see! : )
“What I liked most was the attention given to the people who know Peter and feel attracted by Spider – Man, and to all the consequences their appreciation for Spider – Man has on Peter’s life.”
And we’re only just beginning! So many of Parker’s supporting cast have yet to make their first appearances even. Doom as the villain was a little of a let down after original villain after original villain was created but I guess they wanted a month off from the creativity department in regards to Spidey’s rogues. Thank goodness we’re back on track next issue.
“Of course another detail I appreciated very much is Betty’s characterization. She’s such a sweet girl! That’s the Betty Brant we want to see!”
Yes! Betty’s appearances recently have been few and far between… 😦
P.S.: This series will be AMAZING: http://robot6.comicbookresources.com/2013/05/francesco-francavilla-goes-batploitation-with-batman-1972/.
Unfortunately this is merely an experiment by the artist and not an actual series being released. Maybe if the fans rise up and demand it but as of now it’s more of a what if.