Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows #20 Review: Something Sinister
By Alex Widen
Image by Marvel Comics
Can Peter Afford to Replace Broken Diner Cups?
Yet Peter’s hardly a novice hero, and knows that the superhero life isn’t so cut-and-dry. While the idea of his daughter going bad is a genuine concern, he knows from all of his adventures as Spider-Man that strange villains have strange schemes. Logan sticks around to help Peter brainstorm things. Yet all he really does is get Peter to realize the obvious. It isn’t really Annie May, nor it is mind control or an alternate reality version. It may very well be the return of the Clone Saga.
Image by Marvel Comics
Nearly any Spider-Man fan should know about the Clone Saga. The original tale in 1973 in Amazing Spider-Man #121 saw the Jackal (Miles Warren) cloning Gwen Stacy and then Spidey himself. It was actually the only story featured in CBS’ Amazing Spider-Man TV show (circa 1977-1979) which was even remotely adapted from a comic (“Night of the Clones”). Yet it really reared its head in 1994-1996 when it ran across all of Spider-Man’s comics and introduced Ben Reilly.
Image by Marvel Comics
The irony is that while the Clone Saga of the 1990s was many things, at its core it was the first desperate attempt by Marvel Comics to end Peter’s marriage. The angle was to reveal that “our” Peter was a clone since 1973 and shuffle him and “the wife” off to retirement while “the real” Spider-Man came back, with a fresh new hairstyle and love triangle antics again. It backfired big time, and in many ways 2007’s One More Day was a second, more desperate, and (sadly) scorched earth attempt at the same goal.