{"id":13767,"date":"2022-07-13T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-07-13T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/?p=13767"},"modified":"2021-04-24T20:38:14","modified_gmt":"2021-04-25T00:38:14","slug":"spider-man-2099-meets-spider-man","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/2022\/07\/13\/spider-man-2099-meets-spider-man\/","title":{"rendered":"Spider-Man 2099 Meets Spider-Man"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

First thing we do before Ben becomes Spider-Man is this. Back in the 90s, Marvel hit upon the idea of a line of future versions of their characters. In the far off, unimaginable world of 2099, the heroic age began again, and Spider-Man was the first new hero (As a Spidey nerd, I\u2019ve always taken a weird sense of pride in how Spider-Man begins all these alternate comics lines. First 2099 book? Spider-Man. First MC2 book? Spider-Girl, Daughter of Spider-Man. First Ultimate book? Spider-Man. He\u2019s the cornerstone). Super scientist Miguel O\u2019Hara works for Alchemax, the megacorporation that owns & operates New York City. When his evil boss addicts him to a designer drug made by Alchemax to keep him from quitting, Miguel uses an experimental procedure to rewrite his genetic code in attempt to remove the addiction. Shenanigans, though, and naturally he gets a program based on spider DNA and becomes a spider-man, man. Putting on a pretty cool suit he just happened to have in his closet (sssshhhhhh), he became Spider-Man 2099! And a couple years later, in this comic, he finally meets the original recipe version. A little. This is brought to you by the original creative team of the Spider-Man 2099 series: Writer Peter David, penciler Rick Leonardi, inker Al Williamson & colorist Steven Bucellato. Real Spidey all-stars. Rick left the series with #25, ostensibly to do this, but then he never went back. It opens with a deeply confused Spider-Man 1995 on the run from the law in 2099. The future is run by corporations, and so the Alechmax enforcers are after him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Spidey keeps eluding the cops, who note he\u2019s a lot more chatty than usual, until\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Our man\u2019s having a rough time. But if you think that\u2019s bad\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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(\u201cShock\u201d is a curse word in the future, ya see) So, things are pretty weird for both our heroes right now. And someone\u2019s watching both of them on some kinda holographic projector, saying it\u2019s all happening as it was supposed to. Spider-Man 1995 finds his way \u201cDowntown,\u201d to the old New York that the 2099 version was literally built on top of, which is now like every dangerous back alley in 1995, only a whole city of it. Back in 1995, Spider-Man 2099 is surveying the world, disgusted by the lack of technology and how he\u2019s already seen 5 traffic accidents, but thrilled by the lack of invasive surveillance. He sees an ad for The Daily Bugle, remembers that news used to be distributed on paper, until the discovered printer\u2019s ink causes cancer, which is just a terrible Peter David joke. And like many terrible Peter David jokes, it doesn\u2019t stop there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Meanwhile, some exposition with Spider-Man 2099\u2019s boss\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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So this technology hasn\u2019t been used in a century, huh? That works out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Ugh. So lame. Both Spider-Man\u2019s attitude and\u2026 The Vulture 2099. I was very into Spider-Man 2099 as a kid for a bit. I bought the first several issues, and I liked the character, the suit, and the world. But it seemed like once they set it all up, they didn\u2019t know what to do with it. As an adult, I found most of the run at McKay\u2019s, often less than $1 an issue, and I read to #50. The villains are all terrible and the plot struggles to find a place to go. You got generic new villains like \u201cThe Specialist\u201d and somehow even more generic 2099 versions of classic villains like this lame Vulture. Miguel O\u2019Hara\u2019s problems and supporting cast never really got interesting. The whole thing just failed to launch. By the time this crossover came out, I\u2019d long-since dropped the book and I\u2019m not sure I even knew they did this until much, much later. Going back and getting the Rick Leonardi\/Al Williamson issues was at least worth it for the art, tho. Anyway, in a rather odd move for this story, Spider-Man 1995 whups Vulture 2099 in less than 2 pages, making note of how lame and unthreatening he is. Peter David created this character, to see him jobbing him out so hard is weird. A crowd gathers to see the aftermath.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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That is, of course, Miguel\u2019s brother. Once Spider-Man 1995 is able to convince him he\u2019s not his brother, he says he could desperately use his help. Meanwhile, Spider-Man 2099 is realizing today is the day of a serious historical event where he comes from, but then JJJ is after him, threatening legal action over his rough treatment earlier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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That\u2019s a good moment. Outside, Spider-Man 2099 is swinging over Mary Jane, who\u2019s arriving at The Bugle assuming her missing husband will turn up. The mysterious figure who\u2019s been watching knows he has to run into MJ again, and is pleased that he notices her below and scoops her up to talk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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That\u2019s our MJ. In the future, Miguel\u2019s brother has lent Spider-Man 1995 some clothes to hide his costume and is taking him to Miguel\u2019s home. Spidey is freaked out by Lyla, the holographic AI that runs Miguel\u2019s home and computers and looks like Marylin Monroe, but Gabriel, the brother, wants her to scan Spider-Man to prove he is who he says he is, because she\u2019s far more advanced than his own system (Miguel is rich, Gabriel is not).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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This sadsack Peter makes it feel like maybe this takes place awhile ago, maybe the previous block from this era, but whatever, too late, I\u2019m already running it before it even came out just trying to fit it somewhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In the future, Spider-Man 1995 sees this big thing happening, too, and the mystery man watching it all is suddenly attacked by what certainly seems to be a Goblin. And back in the past\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Bad timing, V. Venom is doing his thing, calling Spider-Man 2099 an imposter and threatening to kill him and such, and SM2099 rakes him with his claws. He sticks to walls and stuff with little claws on his fingertips and toes, ya see, somewhat more like a real spider. In the present, we learn this device powering up is supposed to solve the energy crisis by using \u201ctemporal energy from the theoretical 5th dimension\u201d even as it begins to malfunction. And in 2099, the new version of the same device Alchemax built is starting to malfunction, too. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Spidey uses the hole the Public Eye cops blew in the building to get inside, and when he looks into the energy being generated by the machine, he sees a vision of MJ in it. In 1995, Spider-Man 2099 has made it to the machine, still in combat with Venom, but V flees when, like, all the Marvel heroes charge in to meet the danger of the machine, not knowing they run to their death, according to the history Miguel knows. And then someone grabs him, and in a big 2-page spread I couldn\u2019t possibly photograph, he meets the real Spider-Man. Actually, a version with no text is on the back cover, it looks like this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The reproduction made Spidey\u2019s webbing look a lot worse on this version, but trust me, the full-size one looks really cool. Spider-Man 1995 seems to know what\u2019s going on now, and reassures Spider-Man 2099 that he\u2019s been doing this longer and he can help. They travel through the timestream, but no one bothers to explain to us what they\u2019re trying to do. They wind up in a grim wasteland, not sure if they\u2019re in 1995, 2099, or elsewhere, but it turns out\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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So\u2026 what just happened? I mean, that was terrible. Confusing, nonsensical, and unsatisfying. Not unlike the Spider-Man 2099 monthly series. But the day is saved, because the 2 characters you bought this to see meeting who only met for like 4 pages did nothing at all, and that somehow made all the difference. Weeeeeak. Spider-Man 1995 reappears in his own time and embraces his wife, and Spider-Man 2099 reappears in his apartment, and immediately starts checking to see if history has changed. Specifically\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Inessential End. Peter David would later put the Spidey and Hobgoblin of 2211 in the comic Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man in the 2000s. I\u2019ve not read it, but I hope it makes more sense than this did. The disappointing nature of this book is really in line with the 2099 book: Great setup, goes nowhere, ends with a splat. But at least Rick Leonardi & Al Williamson pull out all the stops on their farewell to the character. This comic cost $5.95 in 1995! That\u2019s steep right now! Insane. Next post, we got another weird comic that was hard to place in the chronology…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

First thing we do before Ben becomes Spider-Man is this. Back in the 90s, Marvel hit upon the idea of a line of future versions of their characters. In the far off,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13768,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[410],"tags":[481,13,26,333,123,2,1226,994,409,1227],"class_list":["post-13767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-1990s","tag-al-williamson","tag-j-jonah-jameson","tag-joe-robertson","tag-peter-david","tag-rick-leonardi","tag-spider-man","tag-spider-man-2099","tag-steve-bucellato","tag-venom","tag-vulture-2099"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13767"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13767\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13792,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13767\/revisions\/13792"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/comicsfromspace.com\/spiderman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}