Reilly2040's Blog

So, a follow up to my Spider Island post.  I must admit, this has really surprised me, but this year will see not only the return of the Scarlet Spider, but he’s getting his own monthly.  And even more than that, he’s a clone of Peter Parker once again.  Wow.

Now, the Scarlet Spider ID has been used previously since the clone saga, turning up in Avengers: The Initiative where an elite unit of 3 Scarlet Spiders were discovered to be a secret part of the Initiative (and appropriately enough, clones of another character), as well as in the MC2 universe.  However this is the first time the identity is making a big return to the main Spider-Man franchise itself since the Clone Saga wrapped up (to the best of my knowledge).

This time, in a bizarre twist of fate, its Kaine that’s under the mask.  Having been cured of his degeneration (and subsequent mutations) during the events of Spider Island, he’s relocating and finding himself with his first honest chance at a normal life since he was first created.   However, while he may not possess Peter’s memories, the spirit of Peter Parker looms large in his life, and its not long before he finds himself donning a costume of his own.

I must admit, despite the fact that I’d really love to see Ben Reilly back (it’ll never happen), I really like the idea of Kaine taking over the role.   And the setup actually harks back to the old “Lost Years” era of Ben Reilly, which was such a big hit at the time.   Like Ben at that time, Kaine finds himself on the road, and struggling with who he is.  Both are clones, and both live in the shadow of Peter Parker.   But while Ben was on the road purely to escape Peter and avoid Peter’s life, Kaine is genuinely on the run since he was previously arrested for various murders he committed both before and during the Clone Saga.

Its a setup that seems to be borrowing heavily from what made Ben successful as a character, so I’ve got high hopes for the series.  The fact that it seems to be specifically targetting that “Lost Years” vibe really appeals to me, as does the idea of Kaine trying to figure out who he is.  He’s definitely been played as a more sympathetic character since his origins as a clone were revealed, despite his murderous tendancies during the years he tormented Ben, so it’ll be interesting to see how they address that side of the character.  With the degeneration gone though, its a real fresh start for the character.

The only thing I have to say against the series so far, is that I’m not a big fan of the new costume.  I do really like the black mask with red eyes, but I’m on keen on the fingers being a different colour to the rest of the gloves, and I do kind’ve miss the hoodie Ben wore (a nice nod to it in the Point One book though, pity they didn’t keep that look).  However its not nearly enough to kill my excitement for the book.

Roll on issue 1.  Can’t wait

I’m quite excited about this upcoming Spider-Man game.  I’ve got fond memories of the Spider-Man games on the PS1 which excellently captured the character, and were filled with loads of fun unlockables.  I played those games a lot.  Then on the PS2 I bought the first two movie games, with the second having that great free roaming aspect as you swung your way around Manhatten (the best bit of the game in truth, the missions just distracted from it).

So I really hope this game brings a similar great feeling of having captured what it would be like to be Spider-Man, to the next generation consoles.   And its got different costumes in it which catches my attention straight away.  Especially the unexpected appearance of Spider-Man 2099.   I’ve seen that the Scarlet Spider can be unlocked too.

Can’t wait for the first reviews and demos to appear.  The game’s got a lot to live up to, especially with the recent Wolverine and Batman games being great fun.

When I first got back into comics in a big way, it wasn’t Green Lantern that did it.  It wasn’t even DC.

Nope, it was Spider-Man.  Specifically, the Clone Saga.  A time of huge controversy in the Spider-titles as what started as an interesting idea, got thrown wildly out of control by marketing excess.   By the time the dust settled, the various elements introduced were brushed away with a seemingly unspoken promise at Marvel to never speak of it again.

A great shame though, as for all the problems with the Clone Saga it had its highlights as well.  Aunt May’s death was a beautifully written issue that moved the character of Peter Parker forward, Kaine was a compelling new villain, and Ben Reilly a brilliant new character that added something new to the franchise by giving Peter a brother.   I’ve always maintained that the whole thing went wrong only when phrases involving the words “one, true” came into the mix.  Until that point it had been great fun having the two brothers running around.  Something that was briefly recaptured towards the end of the story albeit with Ben now in the Spider-Man role rather than as the Scarlet Spider.

Despite the unravelling of the Clone Saga I actually stuck with the Spider-titles for a while afterwards, only eventually dropping them in protest over Aunt May’s resurrection.  It was a horrible story and a worse retcon.  And subsequent storylines such as Mary Jane’s “death”, Spider-totems, Sins Past and One More Day only served to underline my decision to walk away.

Until now.  Now they’ve managed to do the one thing guaranteed to bring me back to the fold.  The Clone Saga is back, and not just in the form of the new mini-series that started this month.  Nope, its turned up in Amazing Spider-Man as well, with flashbacks to Ben Reilly, and Kaine himself appearing (and due to be the focus of a story in this week’s Web of Spider-Man).  For me, this is really exciting, and makes so much more sense than the previous “pretend it never happened” ethos.  Obviously, partly this will be due to the amount of time that’s passed, so now readers and fans of the clone saga will be the writing professionals, so why shouldn’t Marvel embrace those pieces of the storyline (which occupied a fair chunk of the 90s) that actually worked?

Of course, sadly this is all unlikely to result in Ben Reilly actually coming back (a pity as I’d love new stories with Ben back as the Scarlet Spider), but the return of Kaine should be very interesting, as he was always a powerful opponent and his very personal links to Peter should be interesting to see what he’s actually up to.

And of course, I have to mention the first issue of the Clone Saga mini-series, which is re-presenting the series, altered to present something more along the ideas of the original writers.  It was definitely fun to see the story being revisited, although I personally found the first issue a little rushed.  Its hard to criticise it for that though, given it was trying to set the scene, and had to incorporate about a years worth of events in the Spider-titles in order to get the reader to the point where the main story of the Clone Saga can be told.   It was definitely fun to see the new spin on Peter and Ben’s meeting and it was so nice to see the characters working together again.   I’ll be very interested to see what the rest of the series brings, especially now the necessary evil of catching the reader up is out of the way.

So, an update on the Ben Reilly rumours doing the rounds.  It looks like its definitely happening, at least in one form.

Bleedingcool.com has the solicit (via SuperPouvoir) for Spider-Man: The Clone Saga.  A 6 issue mini series which will tell the Clone Saga in the way it was originally intended.

Now this should make for interesting reading.  For anyone who’s a fan of the Clone Saga, (or is just interested in what actually happened to cause it to go wildly wrong), I can’t recommend the Life of Reilly column enough.   Its a long read, but breaks the whole saga down and gives detailed accounts from the various people involved at the time as to what actually happened.

Going from what was said in Life of Reilly, I’m presuming this series will show the original “out” (which wasn’t too different to what actually happened) in that it would’ve been revealed that Seward Trainer had faked the test results that proved Ben was the real Peter Parker (although I forget who he was working for.  Must re-read Life of Reilly myself).   It’ll be very interesting to see this bit of Spider-Man history addressed and its a great idea to give the original creators a chance to revisit the story and tell their version of it.

As an amusing aside, given the Bleeding Cool article references both One More Day and the 101 Ways to End the Clone Saga one-shot, its worth pointing out that one of the original ideas touted to resolve the Clone Saga was to reveal that Mephisto had been behind it.   Amusingly this idea was rejected as the writers felt it wasn’t appropriate for Spider-Man, and that it should be a more grounded explanation, rather than a mystical one.

I’m looking forward to this a lot.

At least, that’s the way the rumour mill is heading at the moment…

From my point of view, its something I would be very excited about.   It’ll be no surprise that this character is where half of my domain name comes from.   For me, the big mistake in the clone saga was introducing the whole “one, true Spider-Man” guff.  While I understand that the writers desperately wanted to give the series a clean slate (in a similar way to One More Day), they eventually ended up in such a mess that killing Ben was obviously seen as the only way to put the Clone Saga behind them.

The thing is, Ben was popular.  Very popular.  Ok, not so much as Spider-Man, but as a character in his own right.  As the clone of Peter Parker who’d wandered the US trying to figure out his own identity, and then later, as Peter’s brother.   It put a great new spin on the series, with Aunt May’s death, it still gave Peter that other family member, but with a very different spin.  Someone who knew him possibly better than he knew himself.

So if Ben is coming back, then I’ll be a very happy reader.  I just hope it all doesn’t end up some cheap trick, and if its done, its done well.   I can’t really see them keeping two Spider-Men around as they were doing at the time of the Clone Saga though, so if Ben is brought back as the Scarlet Spider, he’d end up heading off into the sunset to have adventures of his own somewhere, but its something I’d like to see.  And as someone who has generally avoided the Spider-titles ever since the terrible Gathering of Five (honestly, never mind the Clone Saga, half the stuff that happened afterwards was worse), Ben Reilly is probably the one character they could bring back that would get me to buy Amazing Spider-Man again.

Heck, it could be very interesting, given that Norman Osborn was the one who killed Ben all those years ago, to see exactly how Ben would react to Dark Reign.