Note: This post contains spoilers for Amazing Spider-Man #591.

By this point, Marvel Comics has the recipe down pat for sparking mainstream-media interest: Take a comic-book icon like Spider-Man or Captain America, and add a dose of real-world politics.

It worked for Civil War, and "The Death of Captain America," and Spider-Man's encounter with Barack Obama (it really worked with that last one).

The latest mash-up, revealed this morning by A.M. New York several hours before comic shops even opened, occurs in this week's Amazing Spider-Man #591. (A big spoiler is right there on the tabloid's cover.)

It seems that Michael Bloomberg is mysteriously absent from the Marvel Universe, and that a figure very familiar to comics fans has just been elected as mayor of New York City.

“What happened to Mayor Bloomberg in the Marvel Universe?” Executive Editor Tom Brevoort rhetorically asks A.M. New York. “I don’t know, crushed by a rock, killed during the Skrull invasion? Could’ve been anything.”

So who'll be moving into Gracie Mansion? Who can make Spider-Man declare "This is not happening"?

Continue reading to find out.

Again, be warned: There are spoilers below.



Apparently it's not a dream! Not a hoax! Daily Bugle Publisher J. Jonah Jameson has been elected mayor of New York City.

Mark Waid tells A.M. New York said that the initial idea was to make Jameson the most hated mayor in the city's history. But when the economy began to tank, plans were altered.

“We kind of changed courses on Jonah and decided that being a man who could pinch a nickel until it bleeds is actually maybe not the worst thing for New York right now,” Waid says.