The long delays that often dog Kevin Smith's comic-book scripts can sometimes have devastating results. In the case of The Evil That Men Do, a tale pairing Spider-Man with ex-flame Felicia Hardy, a.k.a. the Black Cat, the long gap between issues caused fan interest to wane -- and created a Jekyll and Hyde dichotomy between the first half of the miniseries and the last.

Set in a period when Peter Parker was separated from his wife, Mary Jane, the reintroduction of the Black Cat was boiling with possibilities. While Mary Jane has proven time and again to be Peter's soulmate, there's no denying the chemistry when Spider-Man romps over the rooftops with Felicia. (Their relationship back in the day was more sexual than romantic, after all, and Felicia fled the scene when Peter wanted to get more serious.)

Now regretting her hasty flight, Felicia returns to New York City in search of a missing friend. She of course runs into Peter, and their flirty interactions just bubble with potential. "No one's ever tried to French me through the mask before," he tells her, after a life-saving clench. The first half of the six-issue mini just trills with the stuff, and fans were left wondering if Mary Jane was going to return after all, or if this daring beauty was poised to take her place.

Then Smith took his long, unscheduled hiatus from the book, and when he came back, he was in a much darker frame of mind. (No wonder, he spent the time off finishing Jersey Girl, and that would ruin anyone's good mood.) Playtime was over for those crazy kids on the rooftops; now, Smith wanted to deal with issues such as rape and incest.

Credit where due, he deals with difficult topics well, with sensitivity and tact. The story is, no denying it, powerful.

But damn, Kevin, where was your turn signal? The sudden shift in tone is jarring, to say the least. It feels less like a delay, more like a different writer stepped in to finish the script. (Of course, by the time Smith submitted his final pages, Peter's separation from his wife was over, and his flirty fling with Felicia was no longer appropriate.)

The book is gorgeously illustrated by Terry Dodson, who draws with a focus on Felicia that leaves you no doubts he was bottle-fed as a child. Still, for all her eye-popping glory, the pages jump with color and action -- although the book takes on a suitably darker cast as the story shifts into its less light-hearted mode.

It's a really good package, and I'm glad Smith finally finished it. But I far prefer the first half of the book, which if nothing else shows how to torture information from criminals through the cruel use of Broadway show tunes.