At some point recently it was unilaterally and presumably non-verbally decided that comic plot rundowns and teases are best portrayed in vertical panels, usually three-to-five on a page. DC Comics went through a run of this on Geoff Johns’ titles, and other comics followed suit. Artist David Baldeon opens Web Warriors #9 with four vertical panels, and it works brilliantly, quickly and efficiently giving readers a quick summary of who is where.

Five different Earths host the adventure of this issue, as the Web Warriors have been scattered far and wide due to the malfunctioning Web of Life and Destiny. Karn and Octavia Otto are on Loom World (Earth-001 for those keeping score at home) trying to make reparations, while variations combinations of Spider-Folk (and –Swine) are scattered throughout the multiverse.

Writer Mike Costa uses the classic superhero team trope of smaller groupings to great effect, as it maximizes the real estate for interaction and personality. The writer wastes no time explaining who everyone is, he has already capably and collaboratively set that up with master letterer Joe Caramagna in those vertical panels on the first page of the issue. With page two, the story moves, the characters take their spots on panel and Web Warriors #9 delivers a wide range of organized chaos from Noir Earth (Earth-90214) to Cartoon Earth (Spider-Ham’s homeworld of Earth-8311).

Each of the worlds has an event demanding resolution from the Spider-Man/Woman/Girl/Ham on that planet, and Web Warriors #9 includes an appearance by the Sca-Vengers paralleling the threat of the Electros defeated in the first storyline of this series. Costa avoids darlings in the story, as the team-up trope affords most of the characters individual (albeit smaller) spotlights.

Baldeon is on the mark on each and every panel of each and every Earth. His take on the Sca-Vengers (including a redesign on Pigeon) could not be better, and I’d love to see Marvel give him a shot at a Spider-Ham and Captain Americat team-up. The other Earths are just as lush with imagery made even more vibrant by colorist Matt Yackey. With the Electros back in an adversarial role, sparks literally fly throughout Web Warriors #9, giving Baldeon’s tag-team inking collaborators Rick Magyar and Marc Deering ample shadow to balance the arcs and bolts bouncing from the electrified explosions.

Amidst the recent online flurry of whitewashing and skintone discrepancies, however, Pavitr Prabhakar seems a little paler than he has been depicted in the past. It’s not a severe error, but it is something that is important to the story when you have a myriad of characters whose diversity is a hair’s breadth from one another, as depicted by skin, hair, costume, or build. Yackey provides tremendous work otherwise, and when Spider-Man Noir and Pavitr both have their masks off, Pavitr’s skin is marginally darker, but more inline with a suntan than natural pigmentation variations. Truly, this is way more focus than it warrants, but it is an area for adjustment.

Web Warriors #9 is a wacky, wild ride through the multiverse, giving readers of all levels of Marvel Universe familiarity plenty to enjoy. Baldeon homages a previous Electros assembled panel, but their current condition marks a drastic change from his original drawing to now. The range of assembled otherworldly arachnid-inspired avenging heroes brought together throughout the issue is a masterful opportunity to showcase variety, diversity, and creativity and Web Warriors #9, like every other issue in this series packs in a whole lot of fun as well. If you’ve been needing a little extra webbed fix to fill your reading, give this one a go. It truly is comic book joy in every issue.