Spider-Man's New Clone Saga Fails to Learn from Controversial Original
Warning: Contains spoilers for The Amazing Spider-Man #93
The Amazing Spider-Man "Beyond" storyline reintroduced Ben Reilly, Peter Parker's clone, in a prominent role for the first time after the infamous Clone Saga concluded in 1996. Spider-Man Beyond's finale, however, proves that Marvel has learned nothing from the Clone Saga's negative feedback, and keeps making the same mistakes.
The Clone Saga was on of the most ambitious storylines in Spider-Man's long history. The story introduced Ben Reilly, Peter's clone who was supposedly killed in Amazing Spider-Man #149. Ben was revealed to actually be the original one, while "Peter" was the clone. The story also killed Aunt May and made Mary Jane pregnant. However, all these big plot twists were reversed or retconned for fear of making everlasting changes to the franchise - which was supposed to be the whole point of it all. Ben took over as Spider-Man for a while, but he later died saving Peter from the Green Goblin, who turned out to be the true mastermind behind the clone identity crisis (not the Jackal, the one who actually created all the clones in the first place).
Many see the Clone Saga as Marvel's attempt to answer DC's The Death of Superman, which was breaking sales records, by delivering what many fans had been asking for a while: letting Peter Parker grow up from a struggling adolescent into an adult (an issue that Marvel still has not solved today). However, Marvel did not want to lose Spider-Man's core audience, so they came up with the idea of the clone who would take on the Spider-Man mantle (turning him into a legacy character), while Peter would move on from superhero antics and create a real family with MJ. Halfway through, Marvel lacked the courage to change forever one of its most recognizable characters and took the easy way out of the Clone Saga. Despite all the criticism received by the story, Marvel tried to give Ben Reilly another shot with the Beyond saga, but things did not work out as intended, as proved in The Amazing Spider-Man #93 by Zeb Wells, Sara Pichelli, Mark Bagley, Patrick Gleason, and Bryan Valenza.
Ben returns to New York after a long time spent in Los Angeles and became the target of the Beyond Corporation, a mysterious evil conglomerate that has acquired the rights to the Spider-Man name and image and wants Ben to become its own trademark superhero. With Peter incapacitated after a fight with the U-Foes, Ben gets his blessing to be Spider-Man, creating a very similar situation to the original Clone Saga. This time, Ben has the support and resources of a mega-corporation, and he can effectively be a better Spider-Man. Before the storyline can develop these interesting premises, however, Marvel pulled the trigger on it: Peter recovers, Ben loses his mind due to Beyond's manipulation, and the two Spider-Man fight, ending with the clone presumed dead once again. It is unclear why Marvel rushed things this way, but it could not be just a coincidence that this happened at the same time as Spider-Man: No Way Home's incredible success, which might have spurred the company to put Peter back in his costume as soon as possible.
If Beyond was an attempt to re-evaluate the Clone Saga and give Ben another chance, it failed miserably. The poor clone was once again discarded, and Marvel's attempt at rebranding him into a new character called Chasm seems like a late apology. Peter still has to "grow up" especially after this whole saga made him look incompetent and weak. The teased reunion with Mary Jane has already been ruined by Marvel's previews of their upcoming breakup. Once again, Marvel is afraid to make lasting, meaningful changes to one of its most famous characters, and this new version of Spider-Man's Clone Saga failed to learn from the mistakes of the past.