Spider-Man: The Darkest Hours

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

A Spider-Man novel written by Jim Butcher in 2006. As is Jim Butcher's style, many tropes from the Dresden Files appear here as well.

The novel chronicles the life of Peter Parker/ Spider-Man as he attempts to defeat a trio of psychotic life-eating monsters who want him dead because he killed their brother by injecting himself with radioactive material and then beating him down until the monster's assistant empties a Glock into him. The now-dead monster (named Morlun) has two brothers named Thanis and Malos, and a sister named Mortia. All three of them want to beat Spider-Man and eat his totemic life-force (the power he has from being associated with a spider). Spider-Man is joined by his old flame The Black Cat as well as Doctor Strange and The Rhino (yes, really). Our hero eventually defeats the psychotic family with magic rocks and plays basketball with a Tibetan monk.

Tropes used in Spider-Man: The Darkest Hours include:
  • Action Girl: The Black Cat and Mary Jane both fall into this catagory.
  • Crowning Moment of Awesome: MJ + tire iron + Macbeth = CMOA
  • Crowning Moment of Funny: It's Jim Butcher, so of course there are going to be some CMOF.
    • "Boot to the head!"
      • "Got it. No getting eaten."
        • "Their weakness is ham on wheat?"
          • "I am the Rhino. My favorite movie is Rocky 4 and my turn-ons include exotic haberdashery and rubble."
  • Darkest Hour: It's the title of the book, plus Spidey has three, near-invincible psychopaths trying to eat his power and kill his family. Darkest hour indeed.
  • Dynamic Entry: "Boot to the head!"
    • Mary Jane drives a Gremlin through a chain-link fence and beats up an ancient monster with a tire iron, all while quoting Macbeth.
Retrieved from "https://allthetropes.org/wiki/Spider-Man:_The_Darkest_Hours?oldid=1681374"