How To Deploy The 616 Spider-Army

Spider-Man is having something of a comeback as Marvel’s flagship superhero. Movies, video games, a…preschool kids show, and a whole lot of other people with spider-powers lately. Wait, doesn’t that last one diminish Peter as Spider-Man? If everyone has the same but greater powers than Peter Parker, what does that make him? As Julia Carpenter, the current Madame Web, once stated: “…my champion has learned the first lesson of Spider-Island: Even though he shoulders great responsibility, while he’s here all of his great powers are absolutely meaningless.” At that point practically everybody had spider-powers in New York as part of a plot to ruin Spider-Man. To also paraphrase Syndrome from The Incredibles, when everyone’s spider, nobody is. Okay, that sounded better in my head. The point is you delude what makes Peter special by spreading his powers around. Superman’s powers are a dime a dozen in both the DC and Marvel universes as well as superhero fiction in general. If anything, Superman is basically the basis for most superpowered heroes throughout fiction. It’s how he uses those powers and his personality that separates him but there’s also a lot of characters tied to him. I could do one of these articles on him. Hmmmm.

Right now, and I will totally admit I’m taking a lot from the Marvel Database (despite Fandom wikis being a total pain in the webspinner to use these days–WHAT THE @$#@%#% IS PLAYING AUDIO WHEN THE POP UP VIDEOS ARE MUTED!!!!!!! and why is it all whispering like the site is possessed!) since I can’t follow them all, there are six active spider heroes in 616 alone. That’s still less than the Batman Family’s current roster but at least they all have unique skills and identities. While the Flash has three people sharing the name (hmmmm) we have two Spider-Men, one Spider-Woman, a former Spider-Girl, a clone, and a spider-partridge in a pear tree. We won’t even get into the multiverse because they don’t count…although one of those current Spider-Men are from another universe. It’s confusing, annoying, and unnecessary. However, if I can find a use for every active member of the Bat Family (and one whose dead and shouldn’t be) finding a use for the active Spiders shouldn’t be too hard.

Admittedly these are a bit more on the fly (I’m sure there’s an unintended pun in there somewhere) than the Bat Family but I think this could work. I’ll go over Peter Parker last. We have five others to get through and a lot of what I’m going to suggest may actually be already in effect or close enough that my ideas won’t be that earth-shattering. That’s fine. I’m not here to join the EPIC storytelling obsession. I just want to take what we have and make some good use out of it that won’t dilute Peter Parker as Spider-Man…provided we’re done with 616 spider heroes. The only ones I’m not bothering with is whatever Ben is going by this month, whoever is Venom this week, and the “Uncanny Spider-Man”. Let Kurt go back to being Nightcrawler without having to go back to the X-Men if he’s really that sick of them. Otherwise, he’s just helping turn the Spider-Man brand into a team name like the X-Men and our boy Pete deserves better. As for Ben Reilly, I can’t tell if he’s alive or dead, good or evil from one storyline to the next so I’m not even going to try to work him in. They really ruined a great character and I so could have used him as a wandering hero. As for the rest…

“Also this mask is surprisingly sweaty.”

Miles Morales

In a bit of cosmic coincidence, TwitterX was having yet another debate yesterday as to whether or not Miles Morales is Spider-Man. While of course the race card was played the debate isn’t whether or not he goes by Spider-Man, because he does, but whether or not comic fans and the general public think of him as Spider-Man. This was brought on by Insomniac Games announcing that starting the next game Miles would be THE Spider-Man as Peter Parker retires. There are fans who believe this is actually Marvel’s goal, to go with the black latino Spider-Man for diversity points and kick out the white dude. While there is sadly some merit to that, which is a discussion on its own, the gist is that the pro-Peter side seems to agree that as far as everyone who actually follows the characters know, Peter is Spider-Man, end of story.

The opinion isn’t “we don’t want black Spidey cuz wez iz razict”, especially when some of the people complaining ARE black and latino, but “why should the black latino guy just have a white guy’s castoffs”? Give him his own name and let him be his own hero instead of being stuck in Peter Parker’s shadow because the brand name is more important than the character. Spider-Man is the popular name and this or that group, be it politically minded or otherwise, wants that name to make their character special. Like Bruce Wayne told Terry McGinnis, the name doesn’t make the hero, but the other way around. Get to 2:40 to go right to the moment.

The difference between Miles and Terry is that Terry is in the future, where Bruce has retired because his health was so bad he was forced to grab a gun to protect himself in the first episode. Miguel O’Hara is the Spider-Man of 2099, who took on the identity of a hero who died decades ago with every other Marvel hero, inspired by the superheroes of the past. So the first thing we need to do is give Miles his own superhero identity to step out of the shadow of a cultural icon and form his own legacy instead of piggybacking off of an existing one he’ll never be able to replace after all these decades. The Disney Junior show Spidey & His Amazing Friends gave him the nickname Spin to make it less confusing for the kids, explained in a short that the Webquarters computer got confused with two kids identifying as Spider-Man. (They’re all de-aged in the show except oddly for Iron Man.) Spin isn’t really a strong enough hero name, but due to his camouflage power and black and red costume I want to call him Shadow Spinner, though I’m back and forth on it.

Whatever we call him, Comic Drake had a great idea about what to do with him: make HIM the teenage Spider-Man. Let Peter finally grow up and let Miles do all the high school stuff some writers want to fall back to, as evidenced by so many non-comic media, and even some alternate comic continuities, pushing him back to high school despite most of his supporting cast not appearing until college. Heck, we have two other teens so you could have Miles graduate and go to college, covering both time periods. Miles also lives in a different part of New York and while Comicstorian has noted they should interact more often, it does allow them to have their own adventures. So what if Miles Morales was Shadow Spinner, protector of the streets of New York while Peter handled the bigger threats as the more experienced hero? Then see what happens when Miles has to face a larger threat with or without Peter’s help on a rare occasion. Give Miles his own supporting cast (they have) and rogues gallery (not sure if they have), and you can have him part of the Spiderverse while not being called Miles Morales because they want people to know which Spider-Man is here. It’s more racist not to pull him out of Peter’s shadow (oooh, my name works on that level as well) and let him become his own hero.

I wonder if Cindy Moon and Cassandra Cain swap fashion tips?

Silk

Speaking of heroes who are tied to Peter Parker, the spider that bit Peter’s hand also bit Cindy Moon’s ankle, making her a target for Morlun, some interdimensional dude who eats spider-people across the multiverse because comics. For some reason co-creator Dan Slott decided that this meant their shared Spider-Sense would cause them to do the spider tango on the side of a building whenever they were near each other. It’s still kind of messed up, and I reviewed a story where Skeletor wanted to raise a clone baby Teela as his daughter and marry her to gain access to Castle Grayskull.

Once that nonsense was written out, Cindy Moon became a reporter for J. Jonah Jameson’s various not-newspaper attempts like The Fact Channel and Threats And Menaces. I didn’t bother looking into that last one because the name is a stupid nod to the Daily Bugle‘s famous headline. The Fact Channel sounds much better and that’s what I would do with her. She’s also worked for a couple government institutions on a case or two but I’ve got that covered. Silk is totally going newsie. I’m thinking something like the old Spider-Woman cartoon or Lois Lane type girl reporter adventures where she comes across various shenanigans, some of which involve superpowers, that Cindy/Silk has to deal with while keeping her identity a secret from her workmates. With Peter bouncing to jobs based more on his scientific prowess someone has to cover the newspaper angle, and Cindy could refreshen that from a new perspective just as Miles would with the teenage angle. It’s the two ideas Peter can no longer handle in the next wave of spider heroes and Silk would be a good fit.

Now here’s where things get interesting.

“I lose more hats this way.”

Spider-Woman

The easiest one on this list. Jessica’s been a SHIELD agent and why mess with a working idea? Jessica Drew is not tied to Peter beyond the name and Stan Lee wanting to make sure nobody tried to make a girl knockoff of Spider-Man except for Marvel Comics, to protect the brand. Her origins are tied to the High Evolutionary and Wundagore…or Hydra, or whatever retcon you prefer to follow. It’s not quite the same mess as Donna Troi or Hawkman and Hawkgirl because they actually stopped trying to tell Jessica’s origin at some point and just let her be. DC could learn a lesson there. She has been a member of the Order Of The Web (more on them in a moment) but otherwise her ties to the other spider heroes is minimum. So keep her as a SHIELD agent, who can offer her services and connection to SHIELD to the others on this list when needed. I can move on.

Not that Kaine. He doesn’t know kung-fu or look like David Carradine.

Kaine Parker/Scarlet Spider

Here’s proof a bad idea can have some good results. Kaine comes from the infamous Clone Saga, aka “oh dear God make it stop please just kill this story already the marketing people are utter morons and this needs to @#$%#$% stop for the sake of the franchise!”. You may have heard of it, but Kaine himself is such a non-entity you may not even know he came from there unless you’ve seen reviews or suffered the nightmare itself. Linkara recently did a review of the “Mark Of Kaine” storyline and it has issues. I don’t mean comic issues, I mean writing issues.

So what has Spider-Clone #4 been up to since that event from hell? Well, he went travelling around, fought in the whole Spiderverse thing the Sony movies were inspired by, protected a teenage girl from sex trafficers and another from a disease. He’s also been possessed by interdimensional demons but I only know what the Database has on that one. Basically the dude’s been through a different kind of hell and came out a better person. So what to do with him now? Take over Ben’s spot as the wandering hero along with his identity, given to him by The Tarantula after one of their clashes? Partially, yes, but I need to introduce the last two characters together and you’ll see why quickly.

The kids are alright. Though kind of derivative at this point.

Araña and Spider-Boy

The former Spider-Girl has had more experience than Spider-Boy…I think. Dan Slott’s other invention had memory of his existence removed from history like the Sentry but through other circumstances, and claims to have been Spider-Man’s sidekick for three years if my brain is translating his bio correctly. The problem is Spider-Man having a sidekick goes against the reason for his creation. Peter Parker was made a teenager in response to characters like Robin, Bucky, and the other teen sidekicks of the past. Stan Lee thought younger readers would rather see the teenager be the main hero instead of the apprentice. I’m fine either way, really, but I do reject the idea that no kid simply wanted to hang out with the hero instead of being the hero. I speak from experience here. Nobody was trying to kill Wendy and Marvin for hanging out with the Superfriends and Teen Titans…until a few years ago.

Frankly the Marvel Database tells us almost nothing about Bailey Briggs because he’s still a new character to us whether he’s been around prior to being erased by the Spider-Totem dagger thing nonsense or not. He’s the result of genetic experimentation that made him a human-spider hybrid, while Aña Corazön finally broke out of the Spider-Girl shadow (for the audience as Mayday Parker was in MC2), with her own ties to the Spider-Totem. Her powers come from magic thanks to a group called the Spider Society and I’m guessing the Database entry on her isn’t doing the story justice. My point is these two would make a great team, not with a shared origin but shared elements of their history. Being sidekicks for Spider-Man and Spider-Woman doesn’t seem right. You could have Miles go to college now that Peter’s graduated and let them do the high school teen thing, but I have another idea in mind.

You know who could be a mentor for them? Kaine.

He’s had a history with superpowered kids in recent years from what I’ve read. So what do you do with the trio? The Order Of The Web was a group formed by Madame Web, this time the second Spider-Woman, Julia Carpenter. She replaced a previous Madame Web who died or retired or something. This is how you pass on a mantle while Spider-Girl of 616 got her own name, if the wiki is to be believed as written. Spider-Boy technically owes his name to the Amalgam comics fusion of clone Spider-Man and clone Superboy but nobody else is using it so why not? You know, despite his necessity being in question unless you control Dan Slott’s wallet. Anyway, she formed the Order to protect Peter…very long story, but what if there could be a repurpose for the group now that Pete’s fine?

In the aforementioned Amalgam comics there’s another merged character called Doctor Strangefate, a fusion of Doctor Strange, Doctor Fate, and for some reason Professor X. He was the main villain of the first Access miniseries after DC Vs Marvel/Marvel Vs DC but in his own Amalgam story he sent others to track down an anomaly he considered a threat to the Amalgam universe, namely Access. Imagine Madame Web 2 doing something similar. Only she sends Kaine, Aña, and Bailey, three spider people who have in the past been hit with both superscience and the supernatural. They investigate for her, with adventures in line with The Sarah Jane Adventures.

Kaine serves as a mentor to help hone their abilities and fighting skills and they help him accept his humanity and become his own Parker. You could see a brother/sister bond forming between Aña and Bailey because they’re young teens and shippers can bite me, while Kaine is a surrogate uncle. Bailey could use a parental figure if he’s an orphan or just orphaned by the Totem dagger wiping him from the web of life or whatever it’s called (Fandom finally ticked me off enough that I shut the windows down), Aña might learn more about the Spider Society and the whole spider/wasp thing, and Kaine may have his own demons to deal with. I don’t know if this would work as a full series but a back-up, a miniseries (Marvel loves doing those), or a series of standalone graphic novels (remember those, Marvel?) might work out nicely. A niché audience maybe but in theory it could work.

“At least I’m still unique.”

Peter Parker (the original one)

It’s hard to pin down what Ben Reilly and Venom are doing right now. Who is the Venom symbiote even bonded to at the moment? Ben is just ruined as a character. So let’s move on to Peter Parker. What’s his role in all this?

Remember back in the Bat Family version of this article where Batman was the jack-of-all-trades type and the others were specialists? Well, since the spiders are not that kind of team–or any kind of actual team–this is more the narrative version of this. Peter has been around the longest, depending on Jessica Drew’s backstory. Out of canon, Spider-Man is the longest running Marvel superhero who wasn’t around for the Timely or Atlas periods of the company depending on how you view the Fantastic Four. Every spider hero ties into Peter Parker. Miles, Kaine, Ben, all the other Peter clones, and Cindy do so directly and Gwen Stacey/Spider-Gwen/Ghost-Spider, who isn’t on the list because she’s in an alternate universe, does so indirectly. In the comics her and Peter switch places while in cartoons not made for 5 year olds she had a friend who died so she can interact with Peter despite not being the more famous Gwen. Spider Woman has a more tangential tie to Peter as she was created to protect the brand while Spider-Boy exists to make Slott more money as co-creator along with Cindy, and Araña has the loosest tie to Peter Parker out of any of them.

Miles can never replace Peter as the center of the Spiderverse because Miles is himself an offshoot of Peter, sharing an origin with the Ultimate universe version of Peter and having two new powers to his name. However, NONE of these characters would exist without Peter Parker and Amazing Fantasy #15, Stan Lee’s gambit to get his hero out there and prove a teen could be more than a sidekick to an adult hero. He can be a street hero like Miles and Cindy, get involved with spies like Jessica, or deal with the paranormal like Araña and Bailey. He’s not all-purpose in the way Batman is, but on a narrative level he can still be the veristle character able to be used in multiple types of stories.

What he should be is a mentor to the others, except maybe Spider-Woman or Madame Web. He already serves that role to Miles and either did or didn’t for Bailey at one point before he pulled a Sentry so it’s not that hard to see. Otherwise, Peter calls in the others when he needs help, but unlike the Bat Family the Spiders don’t really get together and protect New York on a regular basis. Spider-Woman doesn’t even live there as she’s a Cali girl and Kaine travels. They do their own thing more often than not, with Peter and Miles being the closest for various reasons in their story. He’s a narrative jack-of-all-trades, master of none. Where the Batcave dwellers are masters of one of Bruce’s individual skills, the other spiders serve a narrative purpose Peter either grew out of or was never able to do for more than a story or two.

Need a teen angle? We have three now. Need a secret agent adventure? We have Jessica. Something for a news person? Cindy’s been a reporter twice. Need something more paranormal? Kaine and possibly Aña and Bailey. Peter can now be allowed to mature, grow, undo the devil deal, have a family, and tell new kinds of stories while the stories he used to tell are handled by others. Peter finds new ways to play with the “with great power must also come great responsibility” theme and let others pick up the themes he missed out on or can no longer logically continue. This will allow these new spiders a chance to grow as characters as well.

So am I talking out of my spinnerets here? Is there some merit to my proposal of how to use all the spider family? Can we stop creating more spider heroes and keep some of Peter’s specialness as well as the others? We have three character with sting blasts now. It’s time to stop before being a spider person is akin to being a mutant, being so far everywhere that they have to do a huge depower to get the numbers to a decent level narratively. We have all the spider folk we need. Try something new now and allow these characters to earn their own place in the larger Marvel universe. They’ll always be tied to Peter but they can also be themselves and build on the universe.