Jackal (Prof. Miles Warren) Appreciation (2019)

[MajorHoy]

from Amazing Spider-Man Annual #15 (1981)

First appearance of "Professor Warren": waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay back in Amazing Spider-Man #31 (December 1965)


First appearance of The Jackal:
Amazing Spider-Man #129 (February 1974)

And, oh yeah, there was some other guy introduced in that issue, too.

[Mistah K88]

Jackal is one of the rogues who needs a redesign the most... granted they have tried with the more human looking version in the 90’s I believe, but it still didn’t stick.

Do you guys prefer a mutation or a suit for this character?

[Celgress]

...Do you guys prefer a mutation or a suit for this character?

If a reboot definitely a suited character as such a design lends itself to an initial mystery storyline a la the Hobgoblin.

[HypnoHustler]

Jackal is one of the rogues who needs a redesign the most... granted they have tried with the more human looking version in the 90’s I believe, but it still didn’t stick.

Do you guys prefer a mutation or a suit for this character?

The only good thing about Clone Conspiracy was Ben Reilly's Anubis inspired Jackal costume.

[Huntsman Spider]

The only good thing about Clone Conspiracy was Ben Reilly's Anubis inspired Jackal costume.

Yeah, Ben Reilly masquerading as Anubis, the jackal-headed Egyptian god of the underworld was badass. Oh, and killing the original Jackal in ASM Worldwide 24. A karmic death if there ever was one, even if Ben's derangement by the end of The Clone Conspiracy really ruined his character for a while.

That said, some people have brought up that Miles Warren being a seemingly regular Empire State University professor who somehow becomes (or is revealed as) a proficient cloner, proficient enough to create near-perfect genetic duplicates of Gwen Stacy and Peter Parker, stretches the willing suspension of disbelief past the breaking point. Even Norman Osborn turning out to be his secret benefactor doesn't really make it add up any better, so I was thinking that, if Warren was to make better sense, it would be as a pawn of a known (within the context of the Marvel Universe) manipulator of the human (and superhuman) genome. Someone like Mister Sinister, or maybe Weapon X (or its umbrella organization Weapon Plus) or one of its offshoots, using Warren and his obsession to get at Spider-Man's DNA and mine it for whatever potential they think it possesses, Sinister because he wants to create a being superior to even mutants and Weapon X/Plus or its offshoots because they want to weaponize spider-powers against mutants. Could even throw in and expand upon that bit of retcon where Warren was either a student or partner to the High Evolutionary who later became his rival, with the High Evolutionary secretly sabotaging Warren being at least half the reason Warren could never get his clones entirely right (right enough to have a normal human lifespan, instead of suffering and dying from clone degeneration), the other half being Warren just wasn't as good at cloning as he thought he was.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

That said, some people have brought up that Miles Warren being a seemingly regular Empire State University professor who somehow becomes (or is revealed as) a proficient cloner, proficient enough to create near-perfect genetic duplicates of Gwen Stacy and Peter Parker, stretches the willing suspension of disbelief past the breaking point. Even Norman Osborn turning out to be his secret benefactor doesn't really make it add up any better, so I was thinking that, if Warren was to make better sense, it would be as a pawn of a known (within the context of the Marvel Universe) manipulator of the human (and superhuman) genome. Someone like Mister Sinister, or maybe Weapon X (or its umbrella organization Weapon Plus) or one of its offshoots, using Warren and his obsession to get at Spider-Man's DNA and mine it for whatever potential they think it possesses, Sinister because he wants to create a being superior to even mutants and Weapon X/Plus or its offshoots because they want to weaponize spider-powers against mutants. Could even throw in and expand upon that bit of retcon where Warren was either a student or partner to the High Evolutionary who later became his rival, with the High Evolutionary secretly sabotaging Warren being at least half the reason Warren could never get his clones entirely right (right enough to have a normal human lifespan, instead of suffering and dying from clone degeneration), the other half being Warren just wasn't as good at cloning as he thought he was.

That was done in Spectacular Annual 8 written by Jackal's creator Gerry Conway himself.

Conway saw Miles Warren and the Jackal as a joke villain. Miles Warren was conceived by Conway as the personification of the Gwen Stacy fandom who largely fixated on her because she died and her death made the hero look bad or made them feel bad...so the first clone saga, has Miles Warren hate and blame Spider-Man for Gwen's death, who keeps cloning and recreating Gwen at the moment of her death, and the entire point of Warren and the first clone saga is that he represents a very toxic form of nostalgia and necrophilia.

But that point got lost thanks to the worthless second Clone Saga. Now Jackal is a legit cloning dude. And he sucks as a long-time recurring Spidey rogue. It's not a role and function he was created for.

[Huntsman Spider]

That was done in Spectacular Annual 8 written by Jackal's creator Gerry Conway himself.

Conway saw Miles Warren and the Jackal as a joke villain. Miles Warren was conceived by Conway as the personification of the Gwen Stacy fandom who largely fixated on her because she died and her death made the hero look bad or made them feel bad...so the first clone saga, has Miles Warren hate and blame Spider-Man for Gwen's death, who keeps cloning and recreating Gwen at the moment of her death, and the entire point of Warren and the first clone saga is that he represents a very toxic form of nostalgia and necrophilia.

But that point got lost thanks to the worthless second Clone Saga. Now Jackal is a legit cloning dude. And he sucks as a long-time recurring Spidey rogue. It's not a role and function he was created for.

That's a pretty good read on the original Clone Saga. I do agree that the Jackal sucks as a recurring rogue for Spider-Man, because after how much he messed up Spider-Man's life, even with Norman Osborn revealed to have been behind everything all along, he can't just pop up with a new wacky scheme and be treated like it's just another day in the life for Spidey. (Yes, the same could be said of Norman Osborn himself.)

[t-spider]

Yeah, Ben Reilly masquerading as Anubis, the jackal-headed Egyptian god of the underworld was badass. Oh, and killing the original Jackal in ASM Worldwide 24. A karmic death if there ever was one, even if Ben's derangement by the end of The Clone Conspiracy really ruined his character for a while.

We sure Warrens dead? I mean, we didn't see a body and all...