Credits: Written by Tom DeFalco, breakdowns by Sal Buscema, finished By Bill Sienkiewicz and edited by Eric Fein.
Cast: Peter ‘Spider-Man’ Parker, Ben ‘Scarlet Spider’ Reilly, Dr Miles ‘The Jackal’ Warren, Kaine, Spidercide, Mary Jane Watson-Parker, a clone of Gwen Stacy and the New Warriors (Turbo, Justice, Speedball, Alex Power and Firestar)
Plot: Ben and Kaine battle a seemingly endless amount of clones. At home, MJ is trying to combine Peter’s spider-tracers to get his attention. It works and Peter swings over to his home with FauxGwen in tow. Back at the lab, the mob of Spider-clones are beginning to dissolve. Back to MJ and Peter’s home and Peter swings in with FauxGwen who is thrilled to see one of her best friends again after so many years.
Elsewhere the New Warriors are researching the Scarlet Spider as they learn that the Springville survivor was kidnapped and are now intent on finding him. At the lab, Spidercide sends some of the Jackal’s information to Scrier and when the Jackal tries to kill him using a self destruct command, it fails and Spidercide attacks his creator. To everyone’s surprise, Kaine defends the Jackal, just as his visions make clear once and for all who is fated to kill Mary Jane. This vision splits his focus and Spidercide uses that to kill Kaine by stabbing him through the heart with a spear made from random machinery. Ben rushes in and sees him off as Jackal laments over the pointless sacrifice of Kaine and whilst the Springville survivor escapes Jackal activates more remote programming and the decomposing clones form one amorphous glob that swamps over the exhausted Scarlet Spider.
Notes: Very much a game of two halves here and so I’ll start with the good. Splitting the action between the Jackal’s lab and elsewhere in the city, we get a sense of the plot moving forward at breakneck speed. The New Warriors get involved, MJ worries about the state of her marriage as she sees the clone of her old friend and the first great love of her husband’s life. In the lab we get the deaths of several clones, causing mental and physical upset to Ben as he vomits over the clone mob’s fate. Then we have Kaine’s death and the betrayal of Spidercide and that’s a hell of a lot in a short amount of time. That was the good.
I’m not going to be adding anything new to the bad, so let’s just get to the verdict
Verdict: Writing: 3 out of 5 Solid story telling and a competent script paper over some one if the pacing in this issue, but ultimately this has set up a highly anticipated finale.
Art: 1 out of 5: We have less Buscema than ever before and even then it isn’t a good fit, the finishing artist is incredibly talented, but this isn’t his genre and it clashes so badly against the other titles.
Overall: 4 out of 10: Nothing else left to say, a good story let down by its art in a visual medium.
Next: Maximum Cloneage Omega
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