Credits: Written by Glenn Herdling, pencilled by Tod Smith, inked by John Nyberg and edited by Eric Fein.
Plot? Ok, lets say plot: The authorities (including the World Health Organisation) have found one of the Jackal’s labs, identifying it as the source of the Carrion virus that killed the population of Springville. Also there is Jacob Raven, the man who pursued Kaine and had Peter arrested for Kaine’s crimes. In his Scarlet Spider outfit, Ben follows Raven, who ends up finding some kind of hi-tech container that holds Kaine’s body. When he examines the container/coffin he is attacked by several half animal creatures and when Ben follows him, he finds him webbed to a wall and is attacked by several ‘Animen’ called Komoo, Spinneret, Flying Fox, Buzzard and The Crustacean.
The misunderstanding fight is interrupted by the holographic appearance of the High Evolutionary. (based on the animen and his overall history, I can’t tell if he’s the evolutionary above all others, or the evolutionary whose taken the most drugs, this story doesn’t help with that question) The HE calls on his creations to return to Wundagore as they have destroyed all the details of the Jackal’s research and then they are teleported back, since Ben was webbing The Crustacean at the time, he gets pulled along too, leave Jacob Raven alone.
Ben’s arrival calls a near riot with the locals and he ha to run, finding refuge in a church, This church is being operated by Anubia, high priestess of the Cult of the Jackal. Anbia points out that in the past, the High Evolutionary had proved that the clones of Peter and Gwen back from Amazing #150 were not clones, but the oldered bodies of Anthony Serba and Joyce Delaney. We then get some retconning exposition. Miles Warren was once a lab assistant to The High Evolutionary. When the High Evolutionary left Earth, Warren kept in touch with the animen left behind after promising to alter the animen and make them more human in appearance. This led to the first instance of the Carrion virus. Years later Warren returned as The Jackal, pointing out that he had successfully cloned two people. Anubia helped set up her Cult in reverence to Warren, who then left for New York and was apparently killed.
The High Evolutionary returned to Earth and retook control of the animen, forcing the cult underground. This is when he ‘proved’ that the clones were Serba and Delaney, altered by the Carrion virus. Ben is taken aback by this, meaning that Peter (who had been Spider-Man since Amazing #150) was actually Anthony Serba, who had his life taken away from him. Emboldened by Ben’s arrival Anubia heads off to The High Evolutionary’s lab to confirm the truth, were the clones altered people, or created copies? Anubia, Ben and a couple of other animen get to the lab and face the animen from New York, now styled as the Knights of Wundagore.
Again, the fight is stopped, this time by the actual presence of The High Evolutionary (I’m just going to call him Herbert now) who explains to Ben that he had created the Jackal. Years earlier, he recruited Warren, who behind his back altered a Jackal who escaped and killed Miles Warren’s family. The rebellion of the animen was called by Warren who blamed Herbert for all this. This ‘explains’ why when Warren killed Serba, he created the identity of the Jackal. Herbert created the ‘proof’ that Serba and Delaney were Peter and the Gwen clone to discredit the idea of cloning, which he sees as a stagnation of genetics, an anathema to his own goal of genetic advancement. Herbert then ends the battle between the Cult and his Knights and Ben points out that cloning was possible, rather than Anubia’s assertion that that’s not what the Jackal did. He also points out the massacre at Springville, this deflates the Cult’s reverence of the Jackal. Herbert is happy with how this all shakes out and happily sends Ben back to the lab where Jacob was left and they both discover that the body of Kaine is gone.
Notes: This is by a large measure the worst comic I’ve covered for the Page of Apocalypse series of posts. This is an unnecessary retcon, wrapped in a bad story. I don’t know what else to say here. This is just not what you do.
Verdict: Writing 1 out of 5: Clunky dialogue, stretched out exposition and a retcon to undo a retcon, this felt like an extended waste.
Art: 1 out of 5 – It was fill in art and not great fill in art at that and was very at home in this story.
Overall: 2 out of 10 – I’m not a great fan of the Unlimited concept, I’d rather annuals or mini-series to tell an additional story with a solid creative team and this was neither. If you want to make a good comic, then leave it and come back with another idea. There’s no reason to make such a bad comic, you can make comics that aren’t to everyone’s taste, but this was just bad.
Next Time: Back to the song as we hit another X-Factor chapter.
My Marvel Life 