Spider-Man: "Cloak And Dagger!"

The Spectacular Spider-Man #64 (1982)

By Bill Mantlo, Ed Hannigan, Jim Mooney

So, What Happens? During a night patrol, Spider-Man meets Simon Marshall, a terrified former pharmacist turned drug maker on the run from two mysterious costumed youths named Cloak and Dagger. Spidey tries to stop them, but Cloak's cape is the entrance for a dark, freezing empty space, while Dagger can create light blades with which she kills Marshall. Eventually free of Cloak's trap, Spider-Man tries to at least capture them, but they are good enough to evade him until Dagger's mentally-controlled blade hits Spidey, leaving him shaken and cold. However, the couple don't want to harm him and teleport away thanks to Cloak's cape. Just about making it home, Spidey recovers overnight and the following day goes to the Bugle looking for information about Marshall, Cloak and Dagger. He is told that Marshall was based on Ellis Island, where the mob tested his experimental new drug on unaware runaway kids, leaving a basement full of bodies. Later that evening, Spider-Man goes to Ellis Island to check for himself, finding Cloak and Dagger who have cornered a number of people responsible for their condition. They reveal that they were young runaways who were injected with Marshall's experimental drug, which, instead of killing them like the other kids, activated their powers. Despite understanding their motives, Spider-Man believes the criminals should be handled by the justice system and tries to stop Cloak and Dagger from killing them in cold blood. Spidey is now starting to figure out their powers, but when the mobsters manage to take Dagger hostage, Cloak takes matters into his own hands and uses his darkness to make them all run out of a window and plummet to their deaths. Having nothing against Spider-Man, Cloak and Dagger then teleport away, but not before warning him that their war on crime isn't over.

Something Silly This Way Comes: Did the drugs also give Cloak and Dagger their costumes? The former's especially is directly connected to his powers.

Review: If you ask a comic-book reader what's their favourite decade of stories, more often than not it will coincide with when they first encountered the medium. In what is almost like an imprinting process, that version of a given character often becomes the original one, regardless of how many decades of adventures may have already taken place. I certainly fall into this category and for me the '80s are the best decade, with Spider-Man working extremely well in noir settings such as this story. Unlike Frank Miller's run on Daredevil, which was almost oppressive in its realism, Cloak and Dagger! is a crime tale but with a definite superhero twist, as the drugs turn Tyrone and Tandy into costumed fighters. The story itself is very straight and simple, but what makes it really work is the mood, superbly epitomized in the panels where Spidey enters Ellen Island and "feels" the ghosts of all the immigrants who had ever arrived there. It's a superbly-drawn page, with insightful captiones perfectly describing the many fears of the immigrants. According to Bill Mantlo, a visit to Ellis was actually instrumental in the creation of the duo.

They came in the night, when all was silent and my mind was blank. They came completely conceived as to their powers and attributes, their origin and motivation. They embodied between them all that fear and misery, hunger and longing that had haunted me on Ellis Island

This dark, somber mood extends to the rest of the story, and it's not a coincidence that most of it takes place at night. Cloak and Dagger don't wear garish, colorful costumes, but rather simple outfits with essential colour schemes. Their voices are cold, their speech pattern is simple and straight to the point, angry and a little obsessed but never boastful or remotely quippy. Spidey himself jokes far less than usual, and when he does his one-liners are tame, almost sensing that more humour would not fit the tone of the tale.

I mentioned earlier that Spider-Man's noir period isn't quite as realistic as Daredevil's under Frank Miller, but this doesn't mean that the story doesn't feel grounded. As primary antagonists, Mantlo cleverly uses normal drug dealers instead of a supervillain, allowing him to write a chillingly sober flashback of the night Cloak and Dagger got their powers. This choice also has the added advantage of allowing the pair to succeed in killing the dealers off, proving that their cold determination isn't easily swayed and, by contrast, highlighting once again Spider-Man's much more ethical and heroic approach. If the '60s were the decade of the heroes, the '80s belong to the antiheroes, and Cloak and Dagger fall neatly in this group.

Ed Hannigan isn't a name I was familiar with, and a quick check at his Wikipedia page shows that he has only pencilled an handful of Marvel stories. Nevertheless, his style fits this tale perfectly, especially his use of lights and shadows, and the ragged, unkempt look he gives to the dealers. Faces are detailed and expressive, sweaty and covered in stubble, more than making up for some odd fighting poses here and there. Panel layouts also interesting, starting out rather ordinarily before becoming increasingly tight and oppressive in the scene where the dealers are cornered. Out of Cloak and Dagger's costumes, I've always preferred the simplicity and color scheme of the former, as Dagger's dagger-shaped cutout is more visually pleasing than practical, and her monocle is a little weird and doesn't look quite right on a teenager. 

Final Verdict: A well-written somber, effective story introducing two new important supporting characters. 5/5