Last Week In Comics:
A fresh take on 5 day-old comics.

Amazing Spider-Man #608

In the 90′s I stopped reading Spider-Man comics because of the Clone Saga. The Clone Saga was confusing and not constant enough to sell the plot to me nor did it hold my interest. In the Clone Saga the reader is reintroduced to Spider-Man’s clone who was thought to be dead after a scuffle with the real Peter Parker. The clone comes into Peter’s life again when Aunt May almost passed away (don’t ask me which time, there have been too many to count) using the name of Ben Reilly. Ben and Peter fight and then team up with Pete being Spider-Man and Ben becoming the Scarlett Spider. After a while we find out that Ben was the real Peter and Peter was really the clone. It was the classic “briefcase switch” used in movies. As a reader I was ticked off… I felt cheated and wanted my money back for all of the comics that I thought featured Peter Parker instead of a clone. I guess many fans felt the way that I did and Marvel ended up recanting their previous decision and Peter really was Peter not the clone… yeah… and people wonder why I jumped ship. Anyway, when Peter’s past was wiped away by the events of “One More Day” began to read Spider-Man again on a regular basis thinking that the nonsense like the Clone Saga was erased… until I read Spider-Man Annual #36 this summer.

In the Spider-Man Annual a villain is looking to kill Ben Reilly for murdering his family and mistakes Peter for the clone. So this meant that the Clone Saga was still in continuity and Ben Reilly wasn’t dead but still wandering the Marvel Universe. LWIC:

• Through flashbacks Ben Reilly is shown working as a lab assistant to Dr. Ryder.
• Ben and the good Dr. are working on finding the “missing link” of evolution – being that dinosaurs evolved into humans not birds.
• The character of Ben is still Peter at heart – a science geek. +1
• In the present Dr. Ryder, who experimented on himself giving him crazy Raptor like powers, attacks Peter again thinking that Peter Parker is a new alias for Ben Reilly.
• Ryder knowing that Peter/Ben has super-spider powers decides not to attack the hero directly instead he wants revenge by hurting Pete’s friends and family.

Now that the Clone Saga is in the past I don’t mind it being brought back up, and I’m looking forward to this story line. I am ready for the Clone Saga: The Sequel.

Batman and Robin #5

There is a new dynamic duo in Gotham. I’m not talking about Dick Grayson and Damian Wayne as Batman and Robin, I’m referring to the Red Hood and Scarlett. Dick Grayson wasn’t the only Robin trying to fill the shoes of his mentor; Jason Todd takes the role up a notch from “fighting” crime to “killing” criminals.

As the Red Hood Jason still has the ideals that Batman taught him firmly rooted into his mind, it’s the dislike for what Jason would call Batman’s “soft side” that twisted Jason into a murderer. Upon his return from the dead, Jason became the Red Hood and worked behind the scenes to convince gangs and mobs to kill each other, now with Bruce Wayne dead he has a new Red Hood costume and has jumped to the front lines to fight crime. Like Dick, Jason doesn’t fight crime alone he has a teenage sidekick named Scarlett. Scarlett is the daughter of one of Pyg’s Dollotron victims. Scarlett was about to become a Dollotron too, but Robin saved her before chasing Pyg. LWIC:

• Batman and Robin save the Penguin from being offed by the Red Hood and Scarlett.
• Scarlett is ticked at Robin for leaving her immediate after her rescue.
• Oberon Sexton, a mysterious new character, proclaims that with the type of justice the Red Hood .delivers will bring in a newer violent element of crime into Gotham.
• There is a nice reference to a “phone poll” similar to the one used by DC to determine Jason Todd’s fate.
• References to the Pre-Crisis characteristics of Jason Todd is made when he is shown to have red hair and dyed it black when Robin.
• The Red Hood and Scarlett fight and capture Batman and Robin and while they are bringing the heroes back to their lair…
• Jason is shot in the head by a new criminal, a criminal who is called the “king of the killers,” a criminal who eats the faces of his victims – Edwardo Flamingo.

I really liked seeing the repercussions of Jason killing to clean up the city instead of Batman swinging in and saving the day. One of my favorite aspects of the Batman mythos is that he and his rouges gallery are all related in a cause and effect manner. Batman’s theatrics and antics to fight crime created the antics and theatrics of his enemies, just like Jason’s violence and disrespect for human life created the need for a villain like the Flamingo.