For those of you who have been reading my Substack from the beginning, you’ll likely remember when I devoted eight posts to Ben Reilly and the “Clone Saga” right out of the gate including a discussion with legendary comic book writer J.M. DeMatteis. The inspiration for those posts was the announcement that DeMatteis would be writing a brand new series centered around Ben Reilly and taking place at the time of his original stint as Spider-Man in the ‘90s appropriately titled Ben Reilly: Spider-Man. As the writer of the two best Ben Reilly limited series ever published (in my humble opinion), I was understandably pretty hyped by this news. Along with DeMatteis were artist David Baldeon, colorist Israel Silva, letterer Joe Caramagna, and editor Danny Khazem. The fifth and final issue of the limited series was released this past Wednesday. So how was it? Did it meet the lofty expectations it set?
Yes. Yes, it most certainly did.
This series was the perfect balance of nostalgia and modern comic book sensibilities. I want to start off taking an overall look at the artwork and writing of the series before examining the plot itself.
Baldeon’s artwork with Silva’s colors perfectly complimented the storytelling with a kinetic energy that I don’t think I’ve ever seen before. The panel layouts are brilliant, and they do an incredible job conveying both the action and emotion. Baldeon utilizes these unconventional panel layouts combined with very streaky effects on the backgrounds to give a sense of movement that is truly unique and incredibly effective.
The colors from Silva also pop off the page. He uses some darker shades than you would typically see in a ‘90s Spider-Man comic, and they help give this series a more modern feel without cultivating an anachronistic feeling.
In short, this is a visually stunning book. This art team feels like it was put on this planet to make Spider-Man comics. That is as strong a compliment as I can give as someone who has been reading Spider-Man comics for almost thirty years.
It should come as no surprise that the writing on this book is also top notch. DeMatteis expertly captures the pathos that Ben Reilly is known for. One thing that jumped out at me from the very first page was how rare it is to see significant inner monologue panels in modern comics. It’s something I didn’t realize I missed until I saw it return in this series. Caramagna is one of the top letterers in the industry, so it’s no surprise that he knows exactly how to work the dialogue onto the page.
One thing DeMatteis gets to do in this series is revisit plenty of characters who were prominent in the ‘90s that have since faded into obscurity. It was great to see villains like Carrion (Malcolm McBride), Lady Octopus, Edward Whelan, and others grace the pages of a comic in 2022.
With general observations out of the way, let’s take a look at the plot itself. What story needs telling that never got told in the pages of the original comics in the ‘90s?
Ben Reilly: Spider-Man is a bit of a mystery at its core. Ben is still new to being Spider-Man, and he’s dealing with a lot of self doubt and impostor syndrome while doing his best to deal with the various supervillains plaguing New York City. The aforementioned Carrion is the first villain he deals with, but there’s something else on the fringes of the story that might be a more serious problem. It seems that there is a serial killer on the prowl murdering women on first dates.
Ben isn’t able to focus on this serial killer though because he is being constantly harassed by supervillains who seem to know his secret identity, but he has no idea how they could have obtained this knowledge. First he has to deal with Scorpion, then it’s Lady Octopus, and finally it’s seemingly an undead Kraven.
Ben understandably suspects a shapeshifter is behind these attacks. He looks into Chameleon as a potential suspect first, but he’s locked up in the Ravencroft Institute. After that, he pursues Mysterio as a potential culprit. He’s also in Ravencroft, but Spider-Man thinks he might be sneaking in and out through the use of his illusions. This is also a dead end.
🚨🚨🚨SPOILER ALERT FOR THE FINAL TWO ISSUES OF THE SERIES🚨🚨🚨
Ultimately the culprit is revealed to be Spidercide. For those unfamiliar with the character, he was a genetically modified clone of Peter Parker who had the ability to make his body malleable to the point of being a gel or liquid. He was thought to have died during the “Maximum Clonage” arc from the ‘90s. Ben speaks for pretty much every person reading the comic when he says Spidercide is “the last person I expected.” He is also revealed as the serial killer that had been lurking on the periphery of the story. It seems that Spidercide has been desperately trying to learn what it means to be human and not doing a terribly good job of it. It also seems that his abilities now also include being able to create duplicates of himself that exist as part of a hive mind. By giving him new motivations and a more diverse power set, DeMatteis has elevated Spidercide from a forgotten relic to a legitimately frightening villain and a strong foil for Ben.
Ultimately Spidercide ends up releasing the inmates at Ravencroft to cause chaos and torment Ben. We get an eclectic mix of villains including Mysterio, Scorpion, Mr. Hyde, Chameleon, Shriek, Typhoid Mary, and even Swarm. We even get to see Edward Whelan briefly transform back into the animalistic villain known as Vermin. It’s a lot of fun to see so many villains running amok, but ultimately Spidercide has a change of heart and ends up rescuing Ben from certain doom by generating multiple duplicates to subdue the various released inmates and reviving Ben Reilly as he laid on death’s door from the punishment he had taken during the fight. Spidercide seemingly dies in the process, but we see that Dr. Ashley Kafka has the body and believes she can revive him as Ben swings away as Spider-Man.
It’s a bombastic conclusion that still maintains the intimately personal character story for both Ben and his fellow clone.
One particularly interesting bit of back matter is the redesign of Spidercide’s costume in the final issue. He opts for a red and gray color scheme with webbing detail on the red portions. Spidercide says it is to mock Spider-Man, but the real world reasons for the change are much more interesting.
It seems that editor Danny Khazem had been made aware of some old concept sketches from Dan Jurgens that he had done in the ‘90s while trying to come up with Ben Reilly’s new Spider-Man costume. Khazem had apparently suggested this unused design be used for Spidercide’s new look, and Baldeon and Silva executed it to perfection.
Ultimately this series exceeded my lofty expectations, and any Spider-Man fan should do themselves a favor and give it a read. Here’s hoping that we get more offerings like this in the future.