Marvel’s Spider-Man: Reign 2 Teases New Versions of Miles Morales and Black Cat

“The most notorious Spider-Man story ever told” reigns again. Marvel Comics has unveiled the cover for Spider-Man: Reign II #1, the sequel to Kaare Andrews’ 2006 limited series about an aged Peter Parker who comes out of superhero retirement to battle the brutal forces of the Reign. The new five-issue limited series, hitting stands in July, returns to the bleak future of Earth-70237 to “reveal more experiences this older, grizzled Peter Parker has had to endure from epic tragedies to inspiring triumphs,” and will introduce all-new versions of Black Cat and an older Miles Morales.

See Andrews’ just-revealed Spider-Man: Reign 2 cover below, along with a variant paying homage to 2006’s Spider-Man: Reign #1 — but instead of Peter Parker clutching the grave of his deceased wife Mary Jane, it’s Miles Morales at Spider-Man’s grave.

“I never imagined that I would ever be creating a sequel to a comicseries from so long ago, my first major work in comics,” Andrews said in a statement.”Nor did I anticipate that a four-issue miniseries would continue tovibrate in the public consciousness today. But without fail, Spider-Man: Reign is mentioned in articles, lists, and social media posts.”

“Many call it the most infamous Spider-Man story ever told. But forme, what’s kept it relevant is the love behind creating that book,” hecontinued. “This is the character I grew up with, the one that taught mehow to be a man, how to live with failure and keep standing back up,the unrelenting force of trying to make things better. Reign was full of tragic and dark absurdity that only a youngcreator could come up with. A way to challenge the idea of personalpower and responsibility. But as I’ve grown older, and after sittingwith this story for so long, I started to ask myself this question,’What if there was a way to go back and change what happened? What if Icould fix everything?’”

The original Reign re-imagined an elderly Peter Parker as a florist living in a cold and hostile Manhattan patrolled by the Reign, the authoritarian force of Mayor Waters. Following a decade free from super-powered crime, the Waters regime launched a secret technology system, the Webb: a laser-powered protective barrieraround the city to protect it from a super-terrorist attack and keep New York safe for the next century. The series pit a black-suited Spider-Man against the “Sinner Six” — Sandman, Mysterio, Electro, Scorpion, Hydro-Man, and Mysterio — and then Venom and a symbiote army. Reign ended with old man Parker, having returned to his red and blue costume, at his wife’s grave. “I’ll see you one day, MJ,” Peter said. “Until then… I have responsibilities.”

Spider-Man: Reign II #1 is on sale July 3 from Marvel Comics.