The Leader in the MC2

 

Marvel Studio’s newest film, Captain America: Brave New World is days away from release and I personally cannot wait to see it. Once again, I’m going to tie today’s MC2-related post into an aspect of Brave New World, with a look at the so-far unseen mastermind behind the film’s plot. This is a brief look at The Leader in the MC2.

 

First appearing in Tales to Astonish #62 by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko, Samuel Sterns aka The Leader is one of the Incredible Hulk’s greatest villains thanks to his gamma-gifted superhuman intelligence. The following issue presents our first full look at the mega-cranial megalomaniac with Tales to Astonish #63 detailing the Leader’s origin as a lowly labourer who was bombarded by gamma rays in an accident which transformed him, turning his skin green and causing his head to enlarge to accommodate his vastly increased brain and intellect.

 

In the MC2, the Leader only made one appearance, in Amazing Spider-Man Family #3 when Alexsei Sytsevich aka The Rhino and Peter Parker aka Spider-Man discuss the expenses of paying for medical treatment and they bond over their common lack of money, both working job to job. Aleksei mentions some of the ‘bad bosses’ he’s worked for including the Beetle, Doctor Octopus and the Leader, the latter of which refers to the events of Incredible Hulk #124 and Incredible Hulk #157-#159.

 

In the Incredible Hulk #124, The Leader revives the unconscious Rhino and subjects him to further gamma treatments to enhance his strength, providing him with a new Rhino suit and sending him to attack Bruce Banner during his wedding to Betty Ross.  During the encounter, the Leader accidentally hits the Rhino with his gamma ray device, causing the Rhino to charge him, resulting in an explosion which seemingly kills them both.

 

The Leader would later control the comatose body of the Rhino in another plot against the Hulk that leaves Jim Wilson (relative of Sam Wilson aka the Falcon) injured and ultimately led to both the Hulk and Rhino on a rocket headed for the High Evolutionary’s Counter-Earth. As a result of the rocket’s shuttle explosion upon their return to Earth, the Rhino would become permanently bonded to his Rhino suit (Incredible Hulk #157-#159). This event, apparently occurred during the Incredible Hulk #159 and was implied in Thing #24 and confirmed in the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe Deluxe Edition #10, would become Alexsei’s driving motivation in several stories that followed. No wonder Rhino considers The Leader a bad boss!

That’s it for the Leader in the MC2, but it’s nice to see the connections to Marvel’s past woven throughout the MC2. I’m very soon heading to an early screening of Captain America: Brave New World, so let’s see how that bulbous brain looks on the big screen!

 

Until I leave a huge Russian guy stuck in a Rhino suit after leaving him in a coma because I wanted to ruin my arch-enemy’s wedding, I remain

 

frogoat

Clones in the MC2 (Part 1)

 

Warning! The following post contains spoilers for comics from fifty to as recently as 15 years ago! It is not often a comic book storyline comes along that is so universally beloved for its consistency, quality, and brevity, but the ‘Clone Saga’…is not one of those storylines either. Though it is often unfairly maligned for bad writing and its excessive, unnaturally protracted length, the Clone Saga also delivered some spectacular stories with top tier writing with memorable, iconic, and beloved characters. Some of these characters heavily influenced the MC2. Which brings me to the subjects of today’s post: Clones in the MC2.

 

But before we start talking about clones, we need to detail where they came from, who created them. Which means we need to talk about Professor Miles Warren, who first appeared teaching biochemistry at Empire State University during Peter Parker’s first day of class in Amazing Spider-Man #31 and should not be confused with Peter Parker’s Midtown High School teacher, Mr Warren who first appeared way back in Amazing Fantasy #15 before being (sur)named in Amazing Spider-Man #8. Many years later, Untold Tales of Spider-Man #25 would establish the two men of science as brothers.

 

Shortly after the death of Gwen Stacy, we are introduced to new villain The Jackal in Amazing Spider-Man #129, who manipulates the vigilante known as The Punisher into targeting Spider-Man. The Jackal’s identity remains a mystery until Amazing Spider-Man #148 where he unmasks himself as Professor Miles Warren. Having orchestrated the apparent ‘return from the dead’ of Gwen Stacy (Amazing Spider-Man #142), Warren reveals that he coveted Gwen and blames Spider-Man for her death. Using cell samples obtained during one of his classes, Professor Warren tricked his lab assistant Anthony Serba into cloning Gwen and Peter. Initially led to believe the cloned cells were taken from a rat, upon realizing the truth Serba was murdered by Miles. Professor Warren disposed of Anthony Serba’s body, convincing himself ‘The Jackal’ had committed the crime. Afterwards, Warren fully developed his Jackal persona, and used hypnosis to ‘re-educate’ and control the newly awakened clone of Gwen. Having been drugged by The Jackal, Spider-Man awakens to find himself facing his ‘Spider-Clone,’ with neither Parker knowing which of them was the original thanks to both sharing the same memories up to that point. Breaking free of her mental conditioning, the clone of Gwen lashes out at Miles for his actions. Warren regained his senses just long enough to apparently die in his own timed explosion, along with the clone of Peter (Amazing Spider-Man #147-#149).

 

The clone of Gwen Stacy would bid Peter farewell and depart, while during a battle with Spencer Smythe’s Spider-Slayer, Peter would have the revelation he genuinely loved Mary Jane Watson. Despite having Dr. Curt Connors run a test to find out if he or his doppelgänger was the original, Peter chose to throw away the results without reading them, certain only the one, true Peter Parker could have felt that way. Worried a corpse bearing his face would be found, Peter disposed of the ‘Spider-Clone’ down a smokestack, believing he would be shortly thereafter incinerated (Amazing Spider-Man #149-#151).

For a while that was the end, until Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #25 introduced a ghoulish new villain named Carrion who knew Peter was Spider-Man. Later in Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #30 it was revealed that this mysterious figure was a clone of Miles Warren, though writer Bill Mantlo originally intended Carrion to be the ‘Spider-Clone’, badly decayed and clad in the remnants of the Green Goblin’s discarded costume.  It’s revealed that prior to his final confrontation with Spider-Man, Miles had injected a cell sample from himself into a ‘clone casket’ to incubate but the process had gone wrong, leaving the clone’s body within to wither and change but kept alive. Eventually set free, the Miles Warren clone sought revenge on the wall-crawler before finally perishing by the tendrils of his own ‘Spider-Amoeba’ experiment (Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #31).

Relentlessly pursued by the High Evolutionary’s Gatherers from her quiet life as a teacher in Lansing, Michigan, the clone of Gwen Stacy makes her way to New York to seek Peter Parker’s help (Spectacular Spider-Man #142-#143). After reaching Peter and realising he is Spider-Man, the Gatherers capture clone Gwen and take her and Spider-Man to the High Evolutionary who runs tests on her. After a clash with Spider-Man and the Young Gods, the High Evolutionary claims that Professor Miles Warren had not, in fact, cloned anyone and proposes that Warren had instead kidnapped a woman of similar age and appearance and via infection with a genetic virus, transformed her on a molecular level to resemble Gwen. The Young God known as Daydreamer used her abilities to apparently revert ‘Gwen’ to her former appearance (Spectacular Spider-Man Annual #8). 

According to Professor Warren’s journal recovered from his old laboratory, the woman Warren apparently abducted was a student named Joyce Delaney. Miles’ former assistant Anthony Serba had also been transformed in the ‘Spider-Clone’ by the Professor’s genetic virus, and a version of this would also later turn Malcolm McBride into a second Carrion, with the implication being that another host body had been altered to become the original Carrion seen in earlier stories (Spectacular Spider-Man #149). These issues served to retcon the Original Clone Saga so that there had never been clones at all, a status quo that would not last for long…

 

That’s where we’ll pause for now before the 90’s Clone Saga kicks off. Special thanks to arias-98105, the Marvel Chronology Project, the now-defunct www.samruby.com (via the Wayback Machine) and the Appendix to the Handbook of the Marvel Universe and the Marvel wiki as well as the Clone Saga Chronicles Podcast which I re-listened to while working on this project.

Until I uncover a genetic virus to rewrite my DNA, I remain

 

frogoat