PETER PARKER, THE SPECTACULAR SPIDER-MAN #87

Cover shows strong gloss and vibrant color with sharp corners and no visible creasing or spine stress lines. The spine appears tight with no color break visible at this resolution. Minor edge wear cannot be ruled out due to the protective sleeve and slight glare, and the back cover and interior pages were not assessed.

Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man #87 arrived in February 1984 as part of the ongoing Bill Mantlo run, with Al Milgrom supplying pencils and cover and Jim Mooney inking. The issue continues Marvel's slow-burn Hobgoblin mystery, a subplot thread that ran across the Spider-Man titles in the early-to-mid 1980s and kept readers guessing at the villain's true identity for years before later reveals. The supporting cast is a snapshot of the era's Spider-Man corner, including Mary Jane, Gwen Stacy, Betty Brant, Flash Thompson, and Black Cat, but the issue does not introduce any of these characters nor mark a first appearance, death, or other landmark story beat.

Market data for the issue reflects its status as a well-collected but ordinary chapter in a long-running series. Certified copies show a gentle price curve through the mid grades, with values holding in a narrow band before rising more sharply at 9.6 and 9.8, a pattern typical of Copper Age Marvel comics where high-grade survivors are scarcer than raw supply would suggest. Demand is driven almost entirely by Spider-Man completists and Hobgoblin storyline collectors rather than by any single iconic moment tied to this specific issue.

This is a book bought to fill a run rather than sought as a standalone target. Lower and mid-grade raw copies trade for token sums and are readily available through back-issue bins and online marketplaces, while high-grade CGC 9.8 slabs command a real premium reflecting genuine scarcity at the top of the census. Collectors assembling a complete Spectacular Spider-Man collection, or tracking the full Hobgoblin arc across multiple titles, represent the primary audience, with pricing across grades following predictable, incremental appreciation rather than speculative spikes.