Ben Reilly: Spider-Man/Scarlet Spider Appreciation 2022

[Webhead]

Another CBR hit piece

Ben Reilly's New Identity Chasm Is Doomed to Fail

https://www.cbr.com/ben-reilly-chasm...er-man-marvel/

You know stuff gets bad when the people who mostly profit from a good relationship with publishers are bringing it down.

[Reilly]

Ben Reilly's New Identity Chasm Is Doomed to Fail

Goooooooooooood.

[Huntsman Spider]

You know stuff gets bad when the people who mostly profit from a good relationship with publishers are bringing it down.

Ben Reilly's New Identity Chasm Is Doomed to Fail

Goooooooooooood.

Yes. Yes, indeed.

[Shadowcat]

Reading/buying the Clone saga, and while I’m not quite there yet, why did Dan Jurgens only staye on Sensational for only 7 issues?

[Matt Rat]

Reading/buying the Clone saga, and while I’m not quite there yet, why did Dan Jurgens only staye on Sensational for only 7 issues?

He didn't want to work on Ben Reilly and wanted things changed.

[Shadowcat]

He didn't want to work on Ben Reilly and wanted things changed.

Really? Like, he didn’t know that going in?

[Sr. Bungle]

Really? Like, he didn’t know that going in?

Ben's stint was suposed to be shorter, but Harras wanted to wait until Halloween

[Webhead]

Really? Like, he didn’t know that going in?

Memory's a bit fuzzy but Life of Reilly details he was working under the impression that editorial was running with the "Ben was always a temporary Spider-Man" endgame, and that he would eventually get to write Peter. Then they shifted to "Ben's the real Peter" and back again, and the padding and general workplace toxicity around Spider-books at the time burned him out.

[HypnoHustler]

It’s ironic since Jurgens wrote one of the best characterizations of Ben. Anyway, he’s doing covers for the BR mini now, so it seems like he’s come around on Ben since then.

[IamnotJudasTraveller]

Really? Like, he didn’t know that going in?

He knew that going in, but according to Life of Reilly like someone else mentioned, he could tell the powers that be were getting cold feet about making the change long-lasting and he also did his part in trying to sway the Spider editor at the time to change things. The resulting mess of no one managing to settle on a status quo and how to get there as well as Bob Harras demanding the storyline last 6 more months or so burned him out, so he left.

Also, just from the things I've pointed out about Spencer's run - anytime you see your PR arm publish stories saying one of your current things "isn't going to last", well... they're more or less just setting the stage.

[HypnoHustler]

He knew that going in, but according to Life of Reilly like someone else mentioned, he could tell the powers that be were getting cold feet about making the change long-lasting and he also did his part in trying to sway the Spider editor at the time to change things. The resulting mess of no one managing to settle on a status quo and how to get there as well as Bob Harras demanding the storyline last 6 more months or so burned him out, so he left.

Weirdly enough, I think things worked out for the best. I recall the two plans were either Ben literally replaces Peter and adopts his ID, or Ben is killed off. If they tried to make Ben adopt the "Peter Parker" identity like nothing happened, that would have been out of character and a huge mistake imo. If they killed off Ben back in March or April of '96 as some were pushing for when it was clear that sales were beginning to tank, then it would have robbed us of an extra 6 months of Spider-Ben stories... and some of those were his strongest adventures since most weren't connected to the overall clone saga mythology.

[IamnotJudasTraveller]

Weirdly enough, I think things worked out for the best. I recall the two plans were either Ben literally replaces Peter and adopts his ID, or Ben is killed off. If they tried to make Ben adopt the "Peter Parker" identity like nothing happened, that would have been out of character and a huge mistake imo. If they killed off Ben back in March or April of '96 as some were pushing for when it was clear that sales were beginning to tank, then it would have robbed us of an extra 6 months of Spider-Ben stories... and some of those were his strongest adventures since most weren't connected to the overall clone saga mythology.

Yeah, that was by design. The creative teams agreed that if Ben was going to die at the end, they should spend the most time making him as endearing as possible so the readers would feel the loss.

[Huntsman Spider]

Yeah, that was by design. The creative teams agreed that if Ben was going to die at the end, they should spend the most time making him as endearing as possible so the readers would feel the loss.

Which makes a lot more sense than what happened 25 years later with Beyond. Basically, if Ben's story was going to end in tragedy, then the writer(s) should have worked harder to make us feel that tragedy, feel that loss.

[Sr. Bungle]

Which makes a lot more sense than what happened 25 years later with Beyond. Basically, if Ben's story was going to end in tragedy, then the writer(s) should have worked harder to make us feel that tragedy, feel that loss.

Beyond was like seeing someone falling from a buildong in slow motion

[boots]

Which makes a lot more sense than what happened 25 years later with Beyond. Basically, if Ben's story was going to end in tragedy, then the writer(s) should have worked harder to make us feel that tragedy, feel that loss.

good point, the contrast is stark.