Peter Parker: Spider-Man #57
Reborn Part 2
Near Jones Beach, a man is out walking his dog when it suddenly runs into an alley. There he runs into a deformed version of the Sandman who is creating a trio of vicious dogs out of his sand. While on the beech, Spider-Man is with three other versions of the Sandman: A massive but friendly male, a young boy, and now a woman. Examining the situation, Spider-Man deduces that each Sandman is a fragment of William Baker’s personality, the boy is his inner child, while the woman is a representative as his feminine side.[1] When questioning the female Sandman, she explains that she/they are trying to find themselves. She then calls the child to her and gives him much-needed comfort, telling the wall-crawler that as a boy, the Sandman was deeply neglected. The touching scene makes the older Sandman want to cry, but he tells Spider-Man that men aren’t supposed to cry. As there is another aspect of the Sandman’s personality on the loose, Spider-Man asks the female version if she knows where he is. She doesn’t but has an intuition that this other Sandman is probably a reflection of all the Sandman’s repressed hurt and pain.
By this point, the evil Sandman has unleashed his vicious dogs on the man who found him, killing him. Meanwhile, Spider-Man and the other aspects of the Sandman’s personality have gotten into a taxi and are out looking for the evil Sandman. Along the way, the female Sandman spots an ugly homeless woman and instantly feels sorry for her and wonders how she will get by. When Spider-Man tries to comfort her, the male Sandman begins to feel uncomfortable and then angry. The female aspect apologizes for her male counterpart, saying that he has felt insecure ever since his merger with Hydro-Man.[2] As the pair argue, the baby Sandman spots the dogs that their evil counterpart created. The dogs attack the taxicab causing it to crash. Everyone is okay, and while the good Sandman fights his evil counterpart, the others deal with the dogs. Two are destroyed, but the third merges with the baby Sandman turning him into a temperamental and gangly teenager with large blocks of sand for hands.
Realizing that they are all parts that make up the whole, the female version of Sandman insists that they all reunite. Although the evil Sandman resists at first, he soon allows the female and the teenager/boy to merge with him again. The evil Sandman becomes more cohesive and Spider-Man realizes that the remaining Sandman is the personification of his innocence and tells it to merge with the rest, saying that it was the one thing that will make the Sandman good again. However, the Sandman’s innocence refuses to join the others, fearing it will make him impure. Not wanting to wait around for his good-side the evil Sandman decides to retreat. When Spider-Man tries to convince the good Sandman to go after his evil self he discovers that the good one has become inert and shatters to dust when the wall-crawler touches it.
Later, Peter Parker is visiting his friend Flash Thompson who is still in a coma at the hospital.[3] He talks about his foes he has fought over the years and how none of them could ever admit they were wrong and how they sweep every defeat under a carpet of pure evil. Peter admits that he is not perfect and that people have died under his watch, but at the very least he owns his failures and figures that he can be so strong because he can admit when he is weak.
Recurring Characters
Spider-Man, Sandman, Flash Thompson
Continuity Notes
The Sandman has been going through a lot of changes recently. First, he had trouble keeping his form together after Venom ate a chunk of his body in Peter Parker: Spider-Man #16. He eventually gave up trying to keep himself together and was washed away in Peter Parker: Spider-Man #22. The Sandman resurfaced recently in Peter Parker: Spider-Man #42-43 where he attempted to reform himself by absorbing a number of vapid musicians into his body, this failed.
Sandman and Hydro-Man were accidentally merged in Amazing Spider-Man #217-218. The pair were separated in Marvel Two-In-One #86. The experience deeply disturbed the Sandman who then went straight until he was exposed to the Wizard’s ID Machine to make him evil again in Peter Parker: Spider-Man #12.
Flash has been in a coma since the Green Goblin forced him into having a car accident in Peter Parker: Spider-Man #45. He will remain in a vegetative state until Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man #4.
