I heard Bendis say at a convention once that his idea for Dark Reign was to create a universe in which ever super hero felt like they were Spider-Man. At the time I didn’t have a clear idea of what he meant. I guessed that he meant to be persecuted for what you believed, even if you know you are right and the rest of the world thinks otherwise.

The tumult of Dark Reign tie-ins have failed to deliver on this concept for me, in fact I had forgotten Bendis’s statement completely. Until I read this, what will be the end of the Ultimate Spider-Man series. At least as we know it.

The issue is a kind of eulogy written by JJJ in which he describes the very concept of what it is to be Spider-Man. To quote:

“Never asking for payment, never asking for reward, and when the winds of society blew against him, wehen we in the media tore into him like wild animals, he did not waver”

Seeing the resolution of this complicated dynamic between the hero and his public is like knowing the mind of Bendis regarding the very idea of bravery and persecution. And if the Dark Reign event is a mirror of the travails that Spider-Man faced in this series, then we can expect to see a similar resolution to the question of how Marvel’s heroes will resolve the current conflict with Norman Osborn. Just as Sipdey succeeds even in ‘supposed’ death, by winning the heart of JJJ, so too will the heroes in Dark Reign succeed: “Whether we liked him (them) or not, whether we appreciated him (them) or not, he (they) stood up and were counted.”