Marvel Team-Up, Vol. 3

#14C

Facsimile

Release:	Mar 04, 2026
Cover:	Mar 2026

Creators

Writer	Robert Kirkman
Artist	Cory Walker, Dave McCaig
Cover Artist	Cory Walker, Dave McCaig
Cover Colorist	Dave McCaig
Penciller	Cory Walker
Colorist	Bill Crabtree
Letterer	Cory Petit
Editor	Tom Brevoort, Joe Quesada

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A while back, I picked up the three-volume compendium of Invincible.

It was a nearly complete collection of the character’s stories, but there was something missing from it in the form of a crossover with a certain wall-crawling webslinger.

The show filed off the serial numbers of some of the characters and included a bit of the story, but I’d never read the full story until picking up this reprint.

(It’s called a facsimile, but it doesn’t really come across as a facsimile in the way that others do, and there is a change that’s been made from the original – more on that later – so I’m just considering it a reprint.)

In any case, the story is straightforward. While battling Angstrom Levy, a man who can open portals to other dimensions, Mark Grayson AKA Invincible is transported to the Marvel Universe where he runs – or rather, flies – into Doctor Octopus who is in the middle of a battle with his hated nemesis Spider-Man.

The story eschews the cliché of having the heroes initially fight each other, and instead they immediately team up to find Doctor Octopus, who escapes when Invincible accidentally punches Doc Ock too hard and sends him flying to parts unknown.

In the process, Mark breaks down, expressing concern for his mother who is currently in the clutches of the man who has been sending Mark to other dimensions in an effort to wear him down, and Spider-Man, who has had his own share of family drama and trauma is able to relate.

Eventually, after they have some adventures together – including meeting up with the Avengers, Aunt May, and Mary Jane – Angstrom opens a portal to bring Mark home to continue tormenting him.

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This could have been a fun story, and I’m sure most people find it so, but some of Kirkman’s annoying-to-me tics as a writer really seem to come to the forefront whenever he’s writing Marvel characters. There’s a particular brand of fanboy meta-commentary he brings to his Marvel work that really grates on me.

I especially dislike the way he kept trying to make “armpitting” happen (when a flying character carries a non-flying hero by the armpits).

Also, the bits with Mark making fun of the lack of subtlety and the general “lameness” of Marvel Universe superhero names is pretty rich coming from a guy who calls himself “Invincible” despite the fact that he’s constantly getting his ass beat.

(I did like Spidey – initially thinking that Mark was Nova in a new costume – making fun of the open top of Invincible’s mask by referring to it as being “sooo Gambit” and noting that Cyclops doesn’t even do it anymore…though I did like that look for Cyke.)

One thing that was changed in this edition is that what had been a reference to Blockbuster has been updated to Amazon Prime (naturally and possibly even contractually).

I most likely would have caught the Amazon Prime reference as something of an anachronism on my own, but it’s only because of a post on Reddit that I know that it had originally been Blockbuster.

In any case, my idiosyncratic grievances aside, it’s nice to have this gap filled, and there definitely are some fun moments, the art is great, and Invincible and Spider-Man do make a pretty likely pairing given how much the former homages the latter, so I’m glad I picked this “facsimile” up.

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