Will AMAZING SPIDER-MAN Film Franchise Be Covering The Clone Saga?

I’d imagine that many real world newspapers would like to have the online views and influence that the fictional Daily Bugle has. Well, if they started dropping hints about the Amazing Spider-Man franchise they’d be able to make up the ground easily.

The Daily Bugle Tumblr has been up and operating since July of last year, and presents itself as the Internet arm of the newspaper that gives both the comic and film versions of Spider-Man a fair dose of trouble. Since it is a fake newspaper covering the New York City that Spider-Man lives in, the tumblr has been publishing a number of “articles” that might give some indication as to where the film franchise might be heading.

One that is getting a lot of play on the Internet in the comic book press is a tumblr post from last week titled “Cloning Class at ESU?” :

It’s either a sign of the times or a sign of the apocalypse…

Manhattan’s Empire State University announced a new class for the 2014 fall semester in advanced biogenetics that will actually require the successful cloning of a living creature. Introduction to Live Cloning, taught by noted geneticist Professor Miles Warren, is the first class of its kind anywhere in the world.

When asked about the ethical aspects of teaching a class on how to clone living cells, Warren said, “Our responsibility is to educate our students and prepare them for life. For those who study genetics or biology, cloning will be a fact of life.”

The ethical aspects of cloning are irrelevant to Warren, who added, “We are cloning single-celled amoeba. Maybe one day we’ll work our way up to mice. There is no ethical dilemma. Save your red flag for when I start cloning co-eds…”

Naturally, this post will catch the eye of the comic book fan, because it references one of the most controversial Spider-Man stories from the comics–the Clone Saga.

In the comics, Miles Warren was a professor to both Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy, whom he had an unprofessional attraction for. When Gwen died in the comics, Warren went over the edge and made a clone of her (hence the “cloning co-eds” in-joke). He also became the villain known as the Jackal and set out to kill Spider-Man, who blamed for Gwen’s death. He found out Spidey’s identity by cloning Peter and noticing that he had the proportional powers of a spider. He set  the clone after the original and they fought, with the original coming out on top.

Or so they thought. The clone came back years later and convinced Peter that he was the original and that Peter was the clone. This didn’t set well with fans when they found out they were reading a fake Spider-man for all these years.

Now, before we all get up in arms over the possibility of two Andrew Garfield’s running around in the franchise, we must take into consider that while this is a viral marketing site for the films, it doesn’t mean everything it presents will make it on screen. Over the past  six months, the Daily Bugle’s focus has been on telling us what happened since the last film (Dr. Connors has been sentences to life in prison) and setting the stage for the next film (Spider-Man is a urban folk hero), and, in the process, a lot of comic book characters and storylines have been hinted at in the Tumblr, including:

• Various Daily Bugle employees: Including Ned Leeds, Joy Mercado and, yes, even J. Jonah Jameson.
  
• Hydro-Man: The Spider-Man villain who can turn his body into water might have been hinted with an article on a new hydroelectric power plant.
• Shocker: The Z-list villain was hinted at in not one, but two articles on the page.
• Spencer and Alistair Smythe: The father and son robotists who designed the Spider-Slayer robots in the comics apparently work for the film’s Oscorp.
• Doctor Octopus: The scientist also works with Oscorp.
• Venom, Silvermane, The Big Man, and The Enforcers: All are referenced in this entry (Venom in the by-line). The Big Man is referenced again here, and the Enforcers, or at least one of them, name dropped here.
• Puma: Thomas Fireheart, the alter ego of Spidey’s comic book frenemy, is mentioned here.

And that just scratches the surface of the mentions so far on the site. That’s a lot of new elements to the film, even before we get to the Clone Saga. Odds are that not all of these will be main focal points. Some might just be background elements. And that includes the Clone stuff too.

That being said, there are a lot of script elements that lend proof that the clone storyline might be introduced in a big way. Norman Osborn has been shown in the franchise as being in death door. Obviously, cloning a fresh, young, new and healthy body for himself would be something he’d look into. And a prevailing rumor states that Gwen might be killed of in a future installment. That would give a lovelorn Warren a reason for extracurricular cloning. So we do have elements that would create the right atmosphere for a version of the clone saga to hit the big screen.

However, if this is where the franchise is going, don’t expect it to start until Amazing Spider-Man 3 at the earliest. Peter and Gwen will be graduating from high school in the next film, so their first opportunity to meet Professor Warren will be after that.

Although, wouldn’t it be funny if Sony’s plan of creating an expanded universe of Spider-Man films involved Spider-man clones? Just a thought.