This comic really made an impact on me as a kid.  I once read a quote from Qi Lu saying something along the lines that luck was like a bus.  It came more than once, but you had to have enough for the fare. When you look at Peter in this comic throwing everything including the kitchen sink at Jugs, it's hard to see an outcome other than Spidey's demise. I agree with Qi on this front.  If you keep trying, and you've got a mixture of tenacity, passion and creativity, an opportunity or solution will eventually present itself. Even if it's "luck" that luck wouldn't have been there for most people, because most people would have quit. True, sometimes the cookie crumbles and we die instead of succeed.  But, as Spiderman and many other successful folks would preach, the success is in the journey of doing what you believe in, not in the outcome.