Obamamania Infiltrates Marvel

Barack Obama will make a special appearance in Spider-Man #583, to be released January 14th. The President-Elect will be teamed with Spider-Man for, presumably, crime fighting and, as illustrated, even some fist-bumping. From USA Today:

“It was a natural after we learned the new president is a Spider-Man fan,” says Marvel editor in chief Joe Quesada about reports that Obama once collected Spider-Man comics. “We thought, ‘Fantastic! We have a comic-book geek in the White House.’”

It seems possible, though, that calling Obama a “comic-book geek” might be an overstatement:

The White House transition team did not respond to a question about the extent of Obama’s comic-book geekiness, but Obama did mention Spider-Man during the campaign, primarily at children-oriented events. And during an Entertainment Weekly pop culture survey, Obama said Batman and Spider-Man were his top superheroes because of their “inner turmoil.” (John McCain picked Batman.)

The USA Today piece is here.