MC2 Avengers Cameos

Another brief post, this time about the recent cameo appearance of MC2 characters in the pages of the current volume of Amazing Spider-Man.

So, I recently sat down to catch up on the past few months’ worth of Amazing Spider-Man and was pleasantly surprised to finally read the scene I’d been told about in Amazing Spider-Man (vol.  5) #35. For context, Spider-Man has an experimental device that calculates the probability of event transpiring. This device wasn’t very practical until it received a super-charge from an energy burst set off by Miguel O’Hara aka the Spider-Man of 2099. As a result of this burst, Spidey is able to use the device (dubbed ‘The Clairvoyant’ and now loaded with Miguel’s holographic assistant Lyla) to view various scenarios to determine how likely they are to play out favourably.

Written by current Amazing Spider-Man scribe Nick Spencer with guest art by Oscar Bazaldua, it’s here that we get our rather lovely glimpse of several MC2 Avengers: American Dream, Sabreclaw, J2 and, of course, Spider-Girl. Long-time MC2 fans will instantly recognize the shot of the various heroes as being a direct swipe from the cover of Avengers Next #1 by Mike Wieringo.

This isn’t the first time this particular image has been referenced in an MC2 cameo, as we saw when a variety of different worlds were glimpsed in the climax of 2013’s Age of Ultron #10 following the breaking of the space-time continuum via repeated abuse of time travel by the Avengers.

Going back a little further to 2010’s Avengers (vol. 4) #2 we got a similar line up of the MC2’s Avengers roster when the Main Marvel Universe Avengers glimpse realities, which you may have notice seems to be a running theme. Here we see Bluestreak, Sabreclaw, Freebooter, Mainframe, Spider-Girl, J2 and American Dream representing the MC2 version of the Avengers.

I think that’ll about do it for now. Let me know if there is anything you would like to see discussed relating to the MC2!




Until I break the space-time continuum in an unrelated story and therefore potentially give an explanation for why future developments involving the death of a beloved MC2 character can be disregarded in the event the MC2 returns to print someday, I remain




frogoat

Luke Cage in the MC2

With more recent years, Luke Cage has gained a great deal of exposure and recognition, with both his own self-titled Netflix series and the crossover mini-series The Defenders being notable examples. Much of the recent surge in popularity can likely be attributed to the Brian Michael Bendis run on the Avengers, during which Luke first joined the team in 2005 with New Avengers (vol. 1) #3.
Despite his long-time crime-fighting partner and friend Danny Rand aka the Iron Fist appearing on a few occasions, Luke Cage has only had one brief appearance in the MC2 and it's not even really him...let me explain.

In Avengers Next #1 (January 2007) the MC2's current roster of Avengers are unable to stop the theft of various Avengers blood and tissue samples by the teleporter known as Warp. These samples are delivered to Sylene, a sorceress and the daughter of Loki, who uses the samples to create 'magical clones' to attack the Avengers as a diversion.  

Logically, if these were samples from past and present Avengers members and Luke Cage's 'magical clone' appears amongst the shambling monstrosities, Cage was at some point a member of the team in the MC2. This is likely a nod to Cage's longstanding membership over in the Main Marvel Universe. We get the only mention of the real Luke Cage shortly after, when American Dream points out that the monstrosities can't be actual corpses, 'Not with duplicates of Haweye, Cage and the rest of us who are alive.'

And that's about all we know of the Hero for Hire. He's still alive in the MC2 and he was a member of the Avengers prior to the current team founded in A-Next #1. It also seems Luke is known simply as 'Cage', in the same way he was referred to in the 90's. To stray into the world of wild speculation, the most likely placement for Luke's time on the team would be at some point between the (admittedly vague) divergence point between the Main Marvel Universe and the MC2 before the original team was almost entirely wiped out on their last mission. Alternatively, Cage may have served as a member of the interim team that existed for some 18 months afterwards alongside members such as Speedball, Nova, Jolt, Jubilee and the Steel Spider.

Possibly completely irrelevant, but I felt I should point out that Cage's copy is wearing a version of his original costume, complete with tiara. Whether this indicates when the sample was collected from the hero or that he returned to his original costume at some point is unclear. Considering other 'magical clones' aren't wearing their heroic counterparts current costumes, this is probably nothing more than an artistic choice.

If anyone has any insight on this, admittedly very minor point of continuity, please let me know! Until I stop picking apart the very fabric of the MC2-niverse, I remain

frogoat