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| BEN REILLY: SCARLET SPIDER No. 1, June 2017 |
Despite being touted by Associate Editor and
self-confessed “Ben Reilly maniac” Devin Lewis as the most “deserving character
in the Spider-Family” for “a shot at reinvention”, Peter David’s opening narrative
for this “all-new ongoing series” must surely have come as something of a major
disappointment to the original Scarlet Spider’s fans due to the veteran
spider-scribe’s inability to determine whether Peter Parker’s clone is actually
going to be a good or bad guy. Indeed, at one point, having played the hero and
rescued a distraught woman from a mugger in a Las Vegas alleyway, the costumed
crime-fighter then disconcertingly threatens the victim, Mandy, if she doesn’t
make good on her promise to find a job and pay him “a hundred bucks” in order
to “call it square.” A scene which hardly promotes the “darn charming”
personality “mighty Marveldom” apparently promised the titular character would
portray in the comic’s pre-publication publicity.
Worse, the Maryland-born novelist’s incarnation of Professor
Miles Warren’s creation has clearly been driven so utterly mad by the “dozens
of torturous experiments” imposed upon him by the Jackal that he now regularly
suffers with hallucinations of his former selves; “Dude, you need a plan. I’m
imaginary. So I can do whatever I want.” This seemingly never ending
self-banter and monotonous dialogue really starts to quickly grate upon the
nerves, especially when the comic finally starts to ‘up its game’ courtesy of a
heavily armed casino robbery, and the facially scarred duplicate immediately
dispels any illusion of suspense or jeopardy by entering into a short,
supposedly humorous, conversation with himselves..?
Such a poorly thought-out, substandard ‘Deadpool duplicate’
is not helped either by the breakdowns of Mark Bagley, whose inconsistent and
lack-lustre pencils genuinely seem to imbue the vast majority of this
periodical’s twenty-pages with a palpable sense of disinterest and haste. In
fact, it is difficult to imagine anyone calling the American comic book artist “a
legend in comics” if his inability within this book to draw a consistent
Cassandra Mercury or Ben Reilly is an example of his best “big, bombastic super
hero action.” It’s certainly hard to reconcile the man “on pencilling duties
for this puppy” with someone who, at least according to the comic’s editorial, “can
stage and draw an action scene” like few others “in the biz.”
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| Writer: Peter David, Penciler: Mark Bagley, and Inker: John Dell |
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