The first phase of the clone saga went from Web of Spider-Man 117 to Spectacular Spider-Man 229 from 2 August 1994 to 21 September 1995. It covered dozens of issues and went across all the ongoing Spider-Man titles, with the exception of the Untold Tales title which started in 1995.
I can in a way see the need for this shake up, Spider-Man was a coming of age tale about a relatable character who lived a life that people understood. That was true at first, the whole high school experience and his tentative days in college and his money troubles and relationship woes were a key to the strip’s success. You picked up the title for Spider-Man, you stayed with it for Peter Parker.
By the 90’s this had changed somewhat. Despite a gig style career in the most expensive city in the western world, Peter always seemed to be doing well and after many years of him being in this relationship minefield, he was married to a supermodel and had a book with his more famous photos published. He was older, more settled and married and he looked less and less like the loveable loser that had made the title what it had been.
It became the opinion that it was harder to relate to a married Peter, they brought back the clone from the Jackal stories in the 70’s to reintroduce a single and less established Peter. But did this work?
To an extent it did, it brought new readers back to the strip and played with the idea that under all the stuff that had happened over the last several years, he was still the man he was, based on how similar he was to Ben, who was the same person up to a point. From there we get some really nice stories as Peter tried to get back to himself and reconcile with his wife, while Ben tried to establish himself as his own person, despite using someone else’s memories, face and shtick. Then we get the more merged stories, Kaine and the return of the Jackal and we started to meander. The trial was a nice story and then we get to Maximum Cloneage which is all kind of silliness and then the big status quo shift, Ben is revealed to be the real Peter, Peter is the clone and as a result can be happily shuffled off with his pregnant wife and have something of a happy ever after.
If this is where this went, I’d have been okay with that, we would’ve had a new Spider-Man, yet the real one at the same time, Peter with all his adult responsibilities would have walked away and a brave new world would have been there as a semi-experienced Spider-Man had to navigate the world he remembers, but doesn’t really know him. I don’t know if it would have been a success, but it would have been new.
But ultimately, between an intractable fanbase and a marketing department that saw dollar signs ahead, we got a second phase of stretched out clone calamities. I think that will also be an interesting read and feel that after a week or two break, I may want to dive into the second one.
The Clone Saga was an attempt to solve a problem, using a solution no one wanted, that worked too quickly to make as much money as was wanted and that new status quo was not going to be the new status quo.
Next Time: What do you do after the world doesn’t end?
My Marvel Life 