School’s in session and Spidey’s the teacher...

(Panini Books)

The sales-winning title of this series is somewhat deceptive, as this book actually doesn’t focus on the web-slinger’s exploits with any of the main X-Men teams, but is instead a sequel to the Wolverine and the X-Men book, which revolved around the young mutant students of the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning.

Following Wolverine’s death, Spidey is tasked with fulfilling one of Logan’s final wishes – taking on the role of school guidance counsellor while secretly trying to uncover the identity of a mole working within the student population.

In the course of trying to instil life lessons into the ranks of Rockslide, Hellion, Shark Girl et al, the wall crawler must also deal with a bid by the alliance of Sauron and Stegron to turn the population of Staten Island into dinosaurs, the televisual terrors of Mojo, and an alien invasion by symbiote-infected Brood. While lurking behind the scenes is the evil mastermind responsible for turning one of the school’s students to the proverbial dark side…

Penned by the Daily Show’s chief writer Elliott Kalan, with art by Marco Failla, RB Silva and Diogo Saito, this is one of those series which has little impact on the wider Marvel Universe, but is no less enjoyable because of it. There’s plenty here to entertain throughout the six issues collected, and the concept of Spidey as teacher for dysfunctional mutant students never outstays its welcome.