By Tim Stevens

Dear Peter Parker, c/o Horizon Labs,

Despite your repeated contacts, I must again state the all clients’ full records are protected by confidentiality laws. Even if a requester promises to continue to write us “every day until I get what I want.”Technically, we cannot even tell you whether or not a particular person has become one of our clients. However, we recognize the concerns each of these people represents, especially as a team, so we have consulted our attorneys and determined it is legal to release our summaries to you. Please note that these summaries are based on aggregate sources, including newspaper and magazine articles, other psychologists’ reports, and any personal records that could be located. It is not indicative of us having worked with any of the Sinister Six. We hope this helps you in your endeavors.

Doctor Octopus: Doctor Otto Octavius is an unquestionable genius who has shown aptitude in a multitude of scientific fields, especially robotics and physics. He has demonstrated time and again that he is very aware of this fact, often presenting as arrogant and assured of his own superiority.

It appears this arrogance may mask significant insecurities. Octavius grew up in a difficult household and went on to a career where most of his co-workers treated him with either indifference or casual mockery. This continued on into his second career as a super villain as Spider-Man would consistently degrade and embarrass the subject.

Currently, Octavius reports that he is succumbing to a fatal illness. He has attempted to cure himself and also reached out to Anthony Stark for help, with neither being able to succeed in the endeavor. With the knowledge of his imminent demise, Octavius has claimed to dedicate himself to saving the planet. However, his method of, in essence, taking it hostage first is problematic. That he has also aligned himself with other villains while making these claims further diminishes his credibility. It is impossible to trust that he is authentic in his stated goals.

Sandman: William Baker, now known as Flint Marko, is a challenge to understand. His personality has proven rather unstable over the years. At times he has acted as hero, at others as a villain. He is typically of around average intelligence, but has also been childlike or nearly mindless on occasion.

Currently, he is dedicated to a little girl named Keemia who he refers to as his daughter. In an earlier collaboration with Octavius, Marko actually derailed the plan when he realized it might hurt her. Normally a selfish person purely out for himself he, once again, is revealing another aspect to us.

Overall, his instability makes him both the weak link in the Six and potentially its most dangerous member. He can be easy to manipulate, but he can also be quite volatile if such an attempt goes awry.

Rhino: Aleksei Sytsevich is a tragic individual. While, arguably, he was always bound for a life of crime, an experiment that went amiss placed him in this very specific subset where he has never quite fit in fully. He is, to speak frankly, a thug, a low level criminal who would’ve been good at following orders and providing muscle. Instead, he finds himself often trapped in his “costume” and trapped into life as a super villain.

Sytsevich did recently attempt to give up his ways, meeting and marrying a woman, and settling down. Unfortunately his old life came looking for him in the guise of a new Rhino. While Sytsevich, with Spider-Man’s help, was able to defeat the new Rhino, he was unable to save his wife. His new “straight” life destroyed, he re-embraced his Rhino persona.

He is still a man grieving for certain. It just remains unclear if this makes him more or less dangerous.

Chameleon: While the Chameleon was born Dmitri Smerdyakov, his ability to take on the appearances of others paired with his own weak self esteem and lack of self knowledge, has long since erased who Smerdyakov might have turned out to be.

His unstable self image aside, however, the subject is a crafty, dangerous person. While presenting as arrogant much of the time, he has shown a lack of ego in terms of what he is willing to endure to achieve his goals and protect himself. This has included feigning insanity on multiple occasions. Or so he claims. This may be a case of retroactive justification for true psychotic episodes.

Electro: In a field known for severely insecure people, Maxwell Dillon has developed quite a reputation for being one of the most self-doubting. This drove him to retire for a time, following his biggest attempt at committing a crime being thwarted by, as usual, Spider-Man.

Obviously, he eventually returned to crime, thanks, in part, to power upgrades. However, these upgrades left him scarred and unable to control his powers. How this disfigurement and physical isolation will affect him is unclear in the long term.

Mysterio: Quentin Beck was once a master of special effects. However, not satisfied with merely having a well paying job he was respected for, he attempted to parlay his skills into crime. He felt he deserved more.

This grandiose thinking has driven him repeatedly to stage more and more elaborate attempts at beating Spider-Man and has consistently gained him nothing but defeat. In the end, it is unclear who falls more for his illusions, his intended victims or himself.

For further insight into the Sinister Six, please refer to file AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #685, as prepared by Doctors Dan Slott and Stefano Caselli. It will be available for review on May 2.

Psy D. Candidate Tim Stevens is a Dialectical Behavior Therapy Consultant and Practicum Trainee at a community mental health center.