Confirmed : Essential Spider-Man Vol.8

It's now official, Essential Spider-Man Vol.8 is coming up in May. Surprise surprise, it's going to be out just in time for the brand new Spider-Man 3 movie. Here's the solicitation straight from Marvel :

ESSENTIAL SPIDER-MAN VOL. 8 TPB
Written by LEN WEIN, BILL MANTLO, MARV WOLFMAN, ARCHIE GOODWIN & STAN LEE
Penciled by ROSS ANDRU, MIKE ESPOSITO, DAVE HUNT,
FRANK GIACOIA, JIM MOONEY, TONY DEZUNIGA, SAL BUSCEMA, ROSS ANDRU, DON PERLIN & LARRY LIEBER
Cover by ROSS ANDRU
Spider-Man is as amazing as ever against adversarial alumni like the Lizard and the Kingpin, as well as up-and-coming enemies such as Stegron and Jigsaw – with the lesser-known larcenies of the Big Wheel and the Spider-Squad to fill his spare time! Featuring the first appearances of Rocket Racer and Will O 'the Wisp! Forgotten chapters from the Green Goblin legacy and the Clone Saga! Spider-Man's origin and Peter Parker's college graduation! And J. Jonah Jameson at his best and worst! Guest-starring the Punisher, Nova the Human Rocket, the Human Torch and the X-Men! Collecting AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #161-185 and ANNUAL #11, GIANT-SIZE SPIDER-MAN #6, and NOVA #12.
512 PGS./All Ages …$16.99
ISBN: 0-7851-2500-0

As you can see, Amazing has a lot of ground to cover before closing in on Spectacular Spider-Man regarding their Essential collections. Amazing Vol.8 goes up to #185 of October 1978 whereas Spectacular Vol.3 ends with #53 of April 1981. That's a three year gap my friends. Still, according to Marvel's VP of sales David Gabriel, we can expect Amazing AND Marvel Team-Up to catch up with Spectacular pretty soon(1).


(1) According to a Q&A with Mr. Gabriel on the Marvel Masterworks MassageBoards
Sources ; www.marvel.com