New Ultimate Spider-Man is Ben Reilly?

30 Comments

1. I’m just going to say that the new Ultimate Spider-Man won’t be Ben Reilly. Its going to be either someone else who has been “Spider-Man” in the regular universe and hasn’t appeared in this universe yet or its going to be a completely new character. The idea of it being Ben Reilly, who hasn’t appeared in the Ultimate Universe for some time, is pretty dumb. It wouldn’t make sense based on his character from what we’ve read. Could he help create the new Spidey? Possibly, I won’t leave that idea out but I’m not holding my breath.

2. @ 29: “If Ultimate Ben Reilly was to inject himself with Peter’s blood….he could possilby take on some of Peter’s features (therein, he would resemble Peter, at least partialy).”

   That’s not how blood works, at all. Even in the crazy comic book science of all the Ultimate Universe their science isn’t that bad.

   @30: Don’t know if serious.

3. All this crazy speculation!! Oy!! I have been reading dozens and dozens of these pages looking for one, just one person, who gets it. It is sooo obvious who it is going to be people. Not Ben Reilly. Not Human Torch. Etc Etc. Listen upp!! It. Is. Going. To. Be. MARY JANE!!!! Hello?!?! Peter’s got a bloody mouth and he kisses her!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The last page is of the goblin (and as a flat out wink to those smart enough to see it) the goblin’s MOUTH. BLEEDING!!!! SMILING (Bendis smiling at us hint hint hint) DUH!!! JUst Look. It’s all there!!!!!! JEEZ!!!!!

4. If Ultimate Ben Reilly was to inject himself with Peter’s blood….he could possilby take on some of Peter’s features (therein, he would resemble Peter, at least partialy). Or maybe Ultimate Ben Reilly makes a clone of Peter and names the clone after himself (before dying in an explosion, and thus, we have a clone of Peter).

5. @25 But the hypothetical story is “the new Spider-Man is a black guy who is not a clone of Peter”, the resemblance to the original Ben is largely superficial. The name is nothing more than an easter egg to the fans, that character could be called literally anything. So the actual story wouldn’t be a rehash. And to claim it is entirely old hat based on the name of the character, rather than any of the actual story details, kinda misses the point doesn’t it? It would be an entirely new guy taking over from Peter Parker as Spider-Man after he’s died, who isn’t Pete or a clone of him, and that really hasn’t been done before, not in an ongoing continuity anyway.

   And of course, he could be someone else entirely anyway.

6. I’m in if it’s Ben : )

7. I am too old school and will wait for the issues to come out…and be genuinely surprised for a change. I know crazy huh?

8. Not a bad idea because it wouldn’t come completely out of no where and it’s the ULTIMATE (pun not intended….really) nod to the clone saga Since the original purpose was replacing Peter.
   But I still wish that Ben had some character development before they threw him into the costume.

   Not everything in the ultimate world should be the same….That’s the fun part. 🙂
   I’m still hoping Peter will be brought back though. Kinda sucks that they killed him off as a teen.

9. @Nathaniel, your hypothesis was the first thing I thought of when I saw this article… well played

10. If they for some reason go with this… I called the whole “New Ultimate Spider-Man being African American” on the Ultimate Spider-Man #160 recording. Heheh.

    I don’t really believe it could be him but yet I could see Ultimate Ben being some how tied into making the new Ultimate Spider-Man. He was last seen in a flashback in the Clone Saga arc explaining to Jessica that she was a female clone of Peter Parker. This Ben Reilly does have the knowledge of knowing how to “create” some form of spider powers (ie. clones, Ultimate Carnage). It wouldn’t be too stretched out to explain that Fury took Ben into S.H.I.E.L.D. to work for him on potential “spider soldiers”.

11. Maybe its just a shield soldier, a la Venom-Flash? Fury would get the body of peter and manage to extract the Oz-Spider serum in his blood and since Peter’s death was indirectly his fault, try to create a new Spider-man to cope with it. A spider-man HE can control of course… Beside, their is this asian spidey in ultimates VS avengers, so duplicating the spider power don’t seem to be such a big deal…

12. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I’ll bet money it’s Kong. Kong is not only Bendis’ pet character but has been absent for a long enough to get in shape. Imagine it: He is miserable shipped away from all of his friends and than sees his buddy die on television. Plus he was the one who killed the Spider back when Peter got bitten, so he could maybe have some dormant Spider powers. It was forshadowed back towards the end of the last USM series has a panel where Kong says: “I need to get myself some super powers” since he was of no help during Ultimatum.

13. @Gifford

    If that’s true, then I could kinda see this as an attempt at redemption on his part. That is, if this is true.

    Deltas, you know what this could possibly wind up being, right? It’s Mayday/Arana II. Replacing an popular, established character with one who’s less than popular. Difference being that we don’t really have any reason to really dislike Ultimate Ben. And if we’re completely against this, they could label us the biggest hypocrites.

    My overall opinion is meh, I didn’t really read the Ultimate books. And sadly, if this is true, if this is true… I have to commend them for the effort of trying to put a Ben Reilly back in a Spider-Man costume. Something a lot of fans have requested. And yet again, I have to say…

    … WRONG BEN REILLY, D*****!!!

14. Dear Marvel:

    WRONG BEN REILLY!!!!

    Props for throwing Donald Glover a potential bone… but WRONG BEN REILLY!!!

15. NNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

16. I don’t think Ben’s the new Spider-Man. The image we have for New Spidey has the same build as Ult Spidey, basically a scrawny teenager, and Ben looks a bit too big to be him. Though different artists have changed the looks of characters before so that’s not much of a reason why he can’t be the New Spidey.

    Maybe the New Spidey is Gwen since she is Carnage and the New Spidey is supposed to be someone Peter inspired like Uncle Ben did to him. It’s not any worse than the Ben Reilly theory in terms of “silly, crazy, and never going to happen” ideas. 😉

    My money’s still on Peter’s not really dead but in SHIELD witness protection because well, they already did this story at the end of Ultimatum and it was a cop-out then and nothing I’ve seen has convinced me this won’t end the same way.

    @ thrawn: Ult Ben is pretty much a new character that happens to be called Ben Reilly. There’s absolutely nothing to connect him with the 616 character save the name. In real life many people share the same name so why not comic characters? I think I read somewhere that Ult Ben was just Bendis’ response to people wanting him to do the Clone Saga, making him Black was the biggest way he could say “yeah I’m not doing it”, but since he did eventually do the Clone Saga I don’t know how accurate that is.

    @ dr warren: It’s because we can’t have nice things. 😉 Seriously though I think it’s because Bendis doesn’t know what to do with the character. It also might have something to do with all the gender and sexuality issues you’d have to do in order to explore her character. Given that her appearances are just as Spider-Woman (as in just a hero that saves people) and having Johnny Storm hit on her (a joke he decided to do twice BTW) I’m inclined to believe that. She’s supposed to be in the new Ultimates book as an agent of SHIELD, since making her more like 616 Spider-Woman was clearly the way to go. (rolls eyes)

17. I like the idea of a Black (non-Peter Parker) Spider-Man. I really hated the Ultimate book (read it for 70 issues), because I disliked the modernised characters (especially Peter) so much. It’s the same reason I am not too excited about the new movie.

    Would have rather they kept the young Peter alive for those that want young Peter and let my 616 Spidey grow up (and stay married) instead of trying to keep him young forever. Seriously how can anyone who read the classic comics read the current Aunt May (who seems 20 years younger that when the comic started) without being annoyed?!

    But this might be interesting, I might start picking it up again if they are able to do something cool with it. Hope he uses a new costume though. Would be dumb to see him in the classic outfit.

    That being said though, I predict the death of this comic in 30 issues (or another revamp).

18. I’m down with this, but it would be such a tease for those of us waiting for a Ben Reilly 616 revival.

19. Who cares? It’s a Spider-man book without Spider-man. just sounds like if I were still reading I’d just have a new jumping-off point.

    I’d want Ben Reilly back in 616- but even still I don’t want him in replace of Parker. Even more so in this situation. It’s a totally different comic book now. This Ben Reilly doesn’t have anyhting to do with Parkers storylines. Maybe some- but not enough. There’s no need to see interaction between him and MJ or Gwen or Kitty Pryde. I’m sure they’ll be some forced scenes just to keep people happy but really what’s the point.

20. why can’t jessica have her own series? her underuse in USM is downright criminal

21. Ben Reilly helped create Carnage and in the Clone arc he was mentioned (I don’t remember if he appeared or not) as one of the lead scientists creating the clones on top of the fact that he provided the DNA for the cloning process. I feel like he isn’t the hero type in the Ultimate Universe, quite on the contrary, he seems more on the bad side than anything.

    Also, I, in my opinion, disagree with Thrawn. He’s a white, blond clone in the mainstream universe, but the Ultimate Universe was created to be independent from the mainstream comics, a whole different universe, allowing some characters to be redesigned to be different, even possibly changing them completely; with new backgrounds, ethnicity and even moral beliefs sometimes (good vs bad) as can be exemplified by Ben Reilly.

22. But Ultimate Ben Reilly is an established character, for several years now in this universe, so it would be completely in continuity. And it’s the ultimate universe, where the whole point is that things like origins and appearances of characters have changed. Hence why we have a Venom who is a cancer-curing bodysuit, a Green Goblin who turns into a huge green monster and a Hobgoblin who is Harry Osborn. It’s hardly unprecedented.

    And we last saw Ben during the clone saga in flashback didn’t we? He was working with Doc Ock to create the clones. So as I said, with that and Carnage, he definitely has things to atone for. In terms of why he has the name “Ben Reilly”, is it even established in the Ultimate Universe that May Parker’s maiden name was Reilly?

    I’m interested, anyway. And it’s the closest we’re likely to get to a proper Ben Reilly comeback anytime soon.

23. I’ve been thinking about who could it be. . .and it could be him.

    That is, I don’t want it do be him because we haven’t learned enough about him yet. Heck, we haven’t even seen him for almost 100 issues!

    But as long as it’s done well, I won’t care.

24. Interesting… I’ll need to reread the Carnage arc I guess cause I don’t remember him making that big of an impression on me.

    What is the explanation for this character having the name Ben Reilly? I liked how the clone took that name because of its meaning to Uncle Ben and Aunt May… so is it just a coincidence that this random non-related character has this name?

    I’ll go along with it, but I gotta agree with Thrawn, why change the background of a popular character that much?

25. Kind of moot since I don’t think it will be Ben. I think it’s Kong.

26. That would be awful. Ben Reilly is a clone of Peter Parker with blond hair. I don’t care if the replacement Spider-Man is a black, white, Asian, or Hispanic person, but Ben Reilly is white because he’s a clone of Peter Parker. End of story. I hate it when writers change the ethnicity of established characters. Just create new ones.

27. Interesting…and hey, a black Spider-Man’s a first

28. Since he was partially responsible for creating Carnage, I suppose it’d be easy enough to give him a guilt/responsibility motivation, and his background in genetics should make it possible to give him the powers without too many plot somersaults. So yeah, I’ve heard worse ideas.
    And it’s not as if there were many more obvious candidates, so in terms of him being a “nobody”… well, who could Bendis have used who wasn’t a nobody? The only more obvious candidate is Ultimate Spider-Woman, and if anything that seems a bit too obvious. Plus she already has her own identity so has no actual motivation to start pretending to be male.

29. I can’t wait for Zach’s two cents. So Kev do you want a nobody taking the mantle?

30. Didn’t he die?