So this doesn’t seem to fit anywhere in the timeline. It began publication during the previous block and ended 3 months ago, where we are now. It all clearly takes place after Aunt May died, but Peter isn’t in jail, or an emo sycophant for The Jackal. Who knows? I just put it here, I give up. This comic, and the 5-part story it kicks off, are all new to me. I’d heard of these Super Specials, but didn’t get them. This was to be David Michelinie returning to explain where symbiotes come from (100 issues on ASM and he just never found the time, I guess), so it was on my radar, at least. I haven’t read it, but I have read the 2010s Guardians of the Galaxy story that flatly refutes it. Let’s see what was retconned.
Michelinie is joined by Dave Hoover, Ralph Cabrera & Tom Smith, and they being their story with Spider-Man being shot at by “neo-ludites who want to eliminate technology,” but as he points out, they’re trying to accomplish their goals with stolen laser rifles. They were trying to destroy some fancy science machine. In the fight, Spidey kicks it through the whole roof of the warehouse they’re in. And wouldn’t you know it, Venom is brooding just a few blocks away and sees it. Specifically, Eddie was brooding about whether Venom’s homicidal tendencies are a group decision or just the alien’s.
Hoover is really hewing to Bagley’s Spider-Man here. As the fighting continues, Venom webs a guy up and does the tired old threats to eat his brain, but then…
Somehow, everyone but Spidey and that guy have fled the building by the very next panel (???), so he webs up the goon and leaves. He thinks about seeing Venom hesitate, and as he goes, Venom watches him, and he thinks about it, too, worrying his ability to protect the innocent is being compromised. After a visit with MJ, Spidey goes to 4 Freedoms Plaza to research the symbiote on Reed Richards’ computer (Reed is currently “dead,” so Ben lets him in). Which just entails him reading his own personal history with it just in case you don’t know it, it’s very silly. But then he sees a “Sperzel” in the computer, and finds out it’s Anton Sperzel, a “cybernetics genius” he’d previously heard of in physics class. And guess what, he’s going to be demonstrating a new device today. What luck!
Time for some exposition.
Spidey & Thing arrive and get into it, but of course of the technology-hating villains easily figures out how ot use the cybernetic helmet and control the big machine. Spidey keeps fighting the goons while Ben takes on the big robot. Even still, one guy almost kills Sperzel, but Venom shows up and saves him.
Ben destroys the robot as Spidey beats the last goon, but Venom flees in the chaos.
We’re a long way from ASM 317, when they were physically incapable of separating. The angry and rejected symbiote slithers away and then lets out a “psychic wail” into space. That’s probably bad news. It sends people all over the area into a depression somehow, and makes the currently comatose Cletus Kasady (Alliteration!) smile.
Seems like trouble! You know, I guess the “Super Specials” replaced annuals this year. There are no 1995 annuals, and Marvel’s approach to annuals in 1996 is different. Maybe they were just trying something new. There follows a story of The Steel Spider. Have we seen him yet? It’s Ollie Osnick, the former “Spider-Kid,” having grown up, lost weight, and become a very 90s character. This story picks up threads of the as-yet-unread Spider-Man Unlimited 5, and features a villain from another not-yet-posted story, and has no Spider-Man in it, so I’m not gonna talk about it, but he looks like this:
Mm hm. But these Super Specials are also flipbooks, and here’s the cover to the other side:
Kinda funny to see a sad rip off of McFarlane’s Spider-Man #1 cover on this blog before the real thing. The Scarlet Spider is brought to us by Terry Kavanagh, Mike Lackey, Phil Goser, Greg Adams, Tom Christopher & Chia Chi Wang. A lot of personnel on this. Ben has gone to visit Aunt May’s grave, spending 4 pages recapping his whole deal as he swings to his apartment.
Meanwhile, a team of 7 generic super-mercenary-types called “Shadowforce Alpha” (hilarious), show off their various weapons and powers and I am so bored with them already after 2 pages. Surely Ben won’t fight these lames for all 5 specials. Ben gets cleaned up and goes to see neighbor and potential love interest Gabrielle Greer.
At Empire State Hospital, a very ill foreign leader in the US as a refugee named “Col. Broga” is not responding to treatment, and then his doctor goes to interview Ben for a job. But his Spider Sense goes crazy as a waiting room explodes. The Feds make sure Broga is ok, but little do they know they have an ally.
More of the Shadowlames get to Broga and inject something into his IV. Ben just webs the bald lady up so she can’t flip her switch. Still more Shadowlames smash through the window to Broga’s room, setting his main guard on fire and shooting him out a window (The 90s!).
The Shadowwhatevers flee as their 2 heavies shoot a missile into the room from across the street, killing Ben Reilly forever, probably. And what of the big guy who got set on fire? You’d think he was dead, but…
W.. what? How could The Lizard possibly be related to whatever was happening there? I am honestly not sure when these take place. It’s clearly after ASM 400, but… I’m not sure when or how. The Spider-Man story could be before ASM 400, but the Scarlet Spider one is clearly after. Continuity is so bad right now. An ad in this book for these books says they will be illustrated by “top talent.” No truth in advertising…