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Today, learn how Spider-Man was supposedly created by two powerful cosmic entities.
In every installment of “If I Pass This Way Again,” we look at comic book plot points that were rarely (sometimes NEVER!) mentioned again after they were first introduced.
As you all know, one of the strongest impulses in comic book history is the ol’ “Everything you thought you knew is wrong!” In the case of Spider-Man, perhaps the most famous example of that occurred in Amazing Spider-Man Vol.2 #30 (by J. Michael Straczynski, John Romita Jr. and Scott Hanna), where Spider-Man met a mysterious man known as Ezekiel who basically threw Spider-Man’s life upside down when he asked Spider-Man exactly how much Spidey knew about the spider that bit him. When Peter admitted that he didn’t really know THAT much about it, Ezekiel asked the big question – did the spider give Peter powers because it was radioactive or did the spider have powers BEFORE the radiation killed it? In other words, are Spider-Man’s powers actually magic in nature?
At first, Straczynski played it a bit close to the vest as to whether it was true or not, but over time, it became harder and harder to explain events other than if Spider-Man’s powers were magic in nature (and that he was the servant of the Spider Totem). In Amazing Spider-Man #508 (by Straczynski, Romita Jr. and Hanna), Ezekiel tries to get Spider-Man to take his place as a sacrifice to the Spider Totem, but eventually changes his mind out of guilt and sacrifices himself instead…
That story ended with a bit of a, “Well, who knows? Science/magic, does it really matter?” but then later stories leaned even heavier into the whole Spider Totem stuff. That, though, occurred because J. Michael Stracznyski had a long run on Amazing Spider-Man where he could make sure that the concept was followed up on, which is not always the case. One example that we’re looking at today involves a suprrise revelation by Master Order and Lord Chaos.
WHO ARE MASTER ORDER AND LORD CHAOS?
Relatively early on in Jim Starlin’s iconic run on Warlock, Adam Warlock discovered that his enemy, the evil Magus, was actually, well, HIM! Here is the revelation in Warlock #9 (by Jim Starlin and Steve Leialoha)…
We then discovered that Warlock was driven into becoming the Magus by the In-Betweener, who is the servant of order and chaos working together to make sure things are equal in the universe, and with the introduction of Warlock, the cosmic beings felt that they needed to introduce his evil opposite…
Okay, things continued for a while before it all ended fairly abruptly when Starlin left the series. He then returned to wrap things up a few years later, starting in Avengers Annual #7, where Warlock’s friends Gamora and Pip the Troll are both killed by Thanos. Warlock then comes to the Avengers for help in stopping Thanos, who now controls five soul gems (later Infinity Gems and even later on, as my friend Chris loves to call them, Infinity Stones) that he has merged to power a synthetic soul gem that gives Thanos a whole lot of power.
The heroes head off to Thanos’ spaceship and we got some amazing artwork from the artists on the issue, Starlin and Joe Rubinstein…
Things take a turn for the worse, though, when Thanos seemingly kills Warlock with the soul gems..
The issue ends as the Avengers are basically surrounded, but they also have to take a moment to acknowledge that while things look terrible for them, at least Warlock seemed as though he was finally at peace in his life…
But yeah, since Thanos planned to, like, kill billions, it was a downer ending. Luckily, there was a second part, one that saw the full debut of Master Order and Lord Chaos and a shocking reveal involving everyone’s favorite wallcrawler!
HOW DID MASTER ORDER AND LORD CHAOS CREATE SPIDER-MAN AND WHY WOULD THEY DO THAT?
First, in Marvel Two-in-One Annual #2 (by Starlin and Rubinsein), Moondrago contacts Spider-Man telepathically and explains how Thanos captured all of the other heroes and gets across to Spider-Man that they need his help…
We then meet Master Order and Lord Chaos and discover that they want Thanos defeated for the sake of universal balance, so they are bringing in “reserves” like Spider-Man into the deal…
Thing and Spider-Man use a Fantastic Four spaceship to travel to Thanos’ ship where they are taken out of commission temporarily, but we learn that they’re really only there to free Adam Warlock from the soul gem…
Spider-man starts to lose his cool in the overwhelming cosmic situation, choosing to try to escape from the fight, but of course, his vaunted sense of responsibility sends him back to do what he can and that’s when Master Order and Lord Chaos claim that they were the ones who caused Peter Parker to become Spider-Man…
Spidey then frees Adam Warlock from the soul gem and Warlock temporarily emerges from the gem as a sort of fiery cosmic entity and he then kills Thanos, turning him into granite and then he retreats back into the soul gem to enjoy his new existence there with his friends as Starlin says goodbye to Marvel cosmic (of course, his farewell was not a final one by any stretch of the imagination)…
So yeah, according to Master Order and Lord Chaos, they had Peter Parker become Spider-Man so the years later he could help defeat Thanos and save billions of lives (trillions?). No one has ever brought this up again, of course, and heck, maybe they were not even telling the truth. It’s still a fascinating little revelation hidden in the middle of a classic story arc.
If anyone else has a suggestion for a future If I Pass This Way Again, drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com
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