And Then There Were…

A caped superhuman has just beaten up Doctor Octopus and dragged him back to their hideout. Mocking Otto as they bind him to a wall, Doctor Octopus demands to know who they are. This super doesn’t reveal his true identity but tells Octavius that he is called Captain Power. Otto tells Power that they will pay for this indignity, but Captain Power says they will have to see. Back at New York City Hospital, Peter Parker assess the damage caused by the attack by Doctor Octopus and is surprised that this all happened in the same building without his knowledge. He wonders what the Doc’s connection is to Jonathan Rickman other than the explosion that turned him into Doctor Octopus and gave Peter Parker his spider-powers.[1] He wants to talk to Rickman some more, but unfortunately, the doctors won’t let Peter anywhere near him after the evening’s excitement and he decides to check in on his personal life. After Peter leaves, on the clean-up crew finds one of Doctor Octopus’ mechanical arms which were ripped off in the battle. As he picks up the mechanical appendage it comes to life and knocks him out then snakes away from the scene.

Later, at the TriCorp Research Foundation, Peter Parker meets with his boss Ted Twaki who is disappointed with Peter’s spotty attendance and lack of attention to the job. Twaki refuses to listen to Peter’s excuses and tells Peter to sort out whatever problems he has and not let him down. While half a world away, Mary Jane is trying to book a flight back to te United States because she believes her husband is in danger from the man who has been stalking her.[1] Back in New York, the Stalker waits patiently at his laptop computer when it suddenly gets a ping. It pulls up Mary Jane’s flight details back to New York, much to his delight since she will be coming to him.[3] By this time, Peter has returned home to find Aunt May trying to calm Jill Stacy. She tells Peter that she is worried about her father, Arthur, who is scared of something so bad that he wants to try to get her and her brother Paul out of the city. As Peter adds this to his list of worries he suddenly thinks of a lead on the Doctor Octopus case when he remembers that General Techtronics used to have a facility on Long Island. As Aunt May goes to answer the doorbell, Jill tells Peter that her father is scared of Senator Stuart Ward but doesn’t know why.[4] That’s when Paul Stacy enters the room and orders Peter to stay away from his family, reminding Peter that bad luck seems to follow his family whenever they get involved with Peter and his business partner, Spider-Man.[5] Meanwhile, Mary Jane is at the airport waiting for her flight and tries to call Peter one more time. She gets the voice mail and leaves a message trying to explain her abrupt return home unaware that the very stalker she is afraid of had intercepted and is recording the call instead.

Soon, outside the old General Techtronics Lab, Spider-Man arrives and pauses to think about the explosion that happened here. He’s surprised that the lab is still here considering the company went out of business not long after the accident. He thinks about all those who were hurt in the blast when his spider-sense begins going off telling him that there is someone inside. Inside, Captain Power is preparing machine and continuing to mock Doctor Octopus. Paying close attention to his captor’s turn of phase, Otto calls them Chris. Having his identity deduced angers Captain Power who demands to know how he figured it out. Octavius explains his deductions and their connection to the explosion years earlier. Not only that, Doctor Octopus has figured out what Power is trying to accomplish and agrees to tell them everything he knows. Outside, Spider-Man approaches the laboratory when suddenly, Captain Power goes flying away. Going inside, Doctor Octopus gloats that he narrowed down Captain Power’s kill list. When the wall-crawler demands to know who Power is after, Octavius refuses to answer and soon his severed mechanical arm ambushes the wall-crawler. With Spider-Man subdued, Doc Ock free himself and decides to explain everything to Spider-Man.

He recounts back to the day of the explosion and how General Techtronics made him the scapegoat, taking all patents to his inventions and disbanding the company. This left Otto as the sole person who could be sued for the accident. Only one person attempted a lawsuit, Doctor Christina Carr who was crippled. Unable to succeed in suing Octavius, she then began targeting those who she saw as being unfairly spared in the blast. He then told her that GTL had since become TriCorp and that his former manager, Doctor Ted Twaki now runs that company. He goes on to explain that Carr had discovered that she was dying due to the mutagenic effect the explosion had on her body, but it also endowed her with great powers such as the ability to change shape, among other abilities. By this time, Captain Power as arrived at TriCorp and has started smashing their way through the facility to get to Dr. Twaki. Having been let go by Doctor Octopus, Spider-Man arrives just as Captain Power confronts Doctor Twaki. When Power refuses to listen to reason, Spider-Man connects lines to a device that jolts Captain Power with an energy transversion to short out their powers. This causes Captain Power to revert back to her female form, all be it one that is hideously deformed. Although she can no longer shapeshift or access other powers the mutation is still killing her and she vows to somehow get revenge against Spider-Man someday.

Later, Peter Parker goes to pay a visit to Jonathan Rickman to tell him what happened but learns that he died due to his injuries. Going up to the roof to change into Spider-Man, Peter thinks about how everyone who was caught in the explosion had their lives irrevocably changed and is glad he made it out alive and sane. Still, he can’t help but wonder how much more lucky he would be if he never became Spider-Man. Meanwhile, on her flight back home, Mary Jane plans on telling Peter everything about her stalker. Looking at a Daily Bugle newspaper she suddenly takes note of the photos of Spider-Man that her husband took and recognizes them for the style he used when he used to take of himself as Spider-Man and begins to wonder if Peter has become the wall-crawler again.[6] At that moment, in New York, a cab pulls up to pick up the man who has been stalking Mary Jane. He asks the cab driver to help him get a large storage trunk into the cab. When the cabbie isn’t looking, the stalker beats him over the with a baseball bat and seals the driver in the drink before driving off in the taxi cab.

Recurring Characters

Spider-Man, Mary Jane Watson, Aunt May, Jill Stacy, Paul Stacy, Captain Power, Doctor Octopus, Jonathan Rickman, Ted Twaki, Stalker

Continuity Notes

1. The origin story recounted here is the one presented in Spider-Man: Chapter One series. It was intended to be a retcon of Spider-Man’s origins. Ultimately, Marvel decided to rescind this retcon and the events of Spider-Man Chapter One have been delegated to an alternate reality of Earth-98121. Since the plot to issues #9 and 10 draw on plot elements from Spider-Man: Chapter One, Marvel has not provided an official explanation for any of this.

2. Peter and Mary Jane are referred to as husband and wife in this story. However, years later, their marriage was erased from existence by Mephisto in Amazing Spider-Man #545. As such they should be considered a common-law couple here. The Stalker Mary Jane is afraid of has been harassing her since Peter Parker: Spider-Man #5

3. The airline Mary Jane is flying on is identified as Trans World Airlines (aka TWA). This should be considered a topical reference per the Sliding Timescale of Earth-616 due to the fact that TWA went out of business in 2001.

4. Arthur Stacy and Stuart Ward’s past is detailed in Amazing Spider-Man (Vol. 2) #23-24

5. Paul mentions the deaths of his Uncle George and his cousin Gwen. George was killed by falling debris during a battle between Spider-Man and Doctor Octopus in Amazing Spider-Man #90 while the Gwen was murdered by the Green Goblin in Amazing Spider-Man #121.

6. Peter promised Mary Jane that he would retire as Spider-Man following the events of the Final Chapter story arc. He has been secretly going out as Spider-Man since Amazing Spider-Man (Vol. 2) #2.

Making Sense of Nonsense

As stated above, this story draws elements from Spider-Man: Chapter One, John Byrne’s attempt to retcon Spider-Man’s origins. In that story, he combined the origins of Spider-Man and Doctor Octopus. That the explosion that fused Otto’s mechanical arms to his body also irradiated the spider that bit, Peter Parker. Christina Carr, aka Captain Power, the villain of this two-issue arc was a victim of the blast (hence how she gained her powers).

So how to make sense of this all? My way of interpreting this is to ignore the origin story retcon. Instead, Peter finds the name of US Atomic Research, the company that Doctor Octopus worked at in Amazing Spider-Man #3 instead. As opposed to recalling his own origins, Peter recalls Doctor Octopus’ origins instead. One could then presume that Christina was injured in that explosion.

So how do you explain Peter Parker’s name being on the list of people Carr wants to get revenge on? Well if we’re going to infer Christina Carr into the original origin of Doctor Octopus, then perhaps instead of seeing his own name, Peter sees the name of Otto Octavius and is curious to know why his longest foe is on a list. It’s less of a mental exercise to work with than trying to figure out why Parker’s name would be on that list.

Lastly, the connection between Techtronics and TriCorp, this becomes stickier, particularly since previously in Spider-Man: The Final Chapter it was established that Techtronics became Galannan Alternative Research for Immunization Development (or GAIRD). This also interferes with what was established in Amazing Spider-Man (Vol. 2) #1 which states that TriCorp has existed for over 100 years. One could assume that TriCorp funded the experiments at US Atomic Research. since US Atomic at this point hadn’t been seen in any story. The only time US Atomic is seen after the fact is in Superior Spider-Man #29 when the Green Goblin blows up the original US Atomics facility. So that wouldn’t interfere with any established continuity.