In this review of Ultimate Spider-Man: Incursion #5, Miles and the Ultimates take on Emmanuel Da Costa, but will their strength be enough against his power?
Ultimate Spider-Man: Incursion #5
Writer: Deniz Camp & Cody Ziglar
Artist: Jonas Scharf
Main Cover: Sara Pichelli
Variant Covers: Marc Aspinall, Pete Woods, Leinil Francis Yu
Page Count: 19 pages
Release Date: October 22, 2025
This review contains spoilers
As Ultimate Spider-Man: Incursion #5 begins, Miles finds Emmanuel Da Costa by following Magik through one of her portals. Da Costa reveals that he has collected super-hero catalysts from the Maker’s collection and has imbued himself with all of their abilities. Though they take him on, he shows Magik and Miles their greatest fears, and Miles is only able to snap out of it after hearing Billie call for him.
He uses his Bio-electricity to knock a powered-up Da Costa down, and the Ultimates arrive before he can recover. Miles gets knocked away from the fight and discovers a spider that reveals the entirety of his past life to him. He is found by Captain America and Iron Man, and Iron Man reveals that the catalysts are stored in Da Costa’s own version of the origin boxes, and they need to get rid of them.
Spider-Man offers to take them to his dimension and give them to the Avengers. Back in the fight, Da Costa escapes Giant-Man’s hold and teleports away. Miles and Billie are finally reunited and are taken to the Triskellion, where Doom reverse-engineered the Maker’s technology to get them home. Before they are transported back to their universe, Miles reveals the Maker’s origins and tells Doom that he is Reed Richards.
Analysis
As far as the story goes, Ultimate Spider-Man: Incursion #5 has its ups and downs. For starters, like many issues in this short series, it felt as though everything moved really fast. The majority of the fight happens outside of Miles’s view, many things aren’t explored about his time in a universe that used to be his own, and the story doesn’t end with any steady conclusion. This makes it feel as though this series exists mainly to justify Miles regaining his memories and to bring the origin boxes to the 616 universe.
Hidden in the chaos of Ultimate Spider-Man: Incursion #5 are several good moments. Miles finally remembers his past after touching the spider. He remembers everything he endured and lost in his original, now-destroyed, universe. The series had been building to this point, mentioning his fragmented memories throughout earlier issues. Now that we’re here, there will hopefully be moments of him talking about his old universe in the mainline Miles Morales: Spider-Man series.
Miles remembering his past also led to one of the best moments in the issue, when he reveals to the Doom of the Ultimates universe that the Maker was once Reed Richards. Doom doesn’t get a chance to respond, but you can see the shock in his expression, even though the only thing you can see are his eyes. It’s a single panel, a true picture worth a thousand words.
Miles and Billie’s reunion was also worth waiting for. You can feel the relief on both of their faces after being so close to each other again and again. The soft colors of the background and the relaxed expressions of the Ultimates add to the relieved atmosphere, and it feels like the finale that has been building since Miles and Billie entered the Ultimates universe.
Final Thoughts
Ultimate Spider-Man: Incursion #5 wraps things up with emotional moments that are enhanced by the art and set up for the future of Miles’ story, but the rushed pacing and lack of a substantial conclusion hold it back from being a standout issue in terms of storytelling.
