Welcome to the five hundred and seventy-fifth in a series of examinations of comic book legends and whether they are true or false. Click here for an archive of the first five hundred (I actually haven't been able to update it in a while). This week, did Spider-Verse really have every Spider-Man in it? Who was the Red Hood during Dan Slott and Ty Templeton's Batman Adventures? And did SHIELD and Hydra end up fighting against each other in a comic that originally didn't feature either?

Let's begin!

NOTE: The column is on three pages, a page for each legend. There's a little "next" button on the top of the page and the bottom of the page to take you to the next page (and you can navigate between each page by just clicking on the little 1, 2 and 3 on the top and the bottom, as well).

COMIC LEGEND: Spider-Verse had every Spider-Man ever in it.

STATUS: False

In 2014-15, Marvel had a fun crossover spearheaded by Amazing Spider-Man writer Dan Slott called Spider-Verse, which pit the Spider-themed heroes from throughout the Marvel Multiverse against the evil Morlun and his family, the Inheritors. It was a blast of a storyline...



And it served to introduce some brand-new Spider-themed characters from alternate realities, like the surprise smash success, Spider-Gwen...



I dug Spider-Verse a lot, so I'm certainly not trying to knock it at all. However, when the event was first promoted, it was said "Every Spider-Man Ever."



Even in an interview with CBR's own Albert Ching, Slott described the story thusly:

"This is every Spider-Man ever teaming up, or fighting each other," Slott said, adding later that readers will definitely see some "spider-fights." "Some won't get along. It's a Spider-Man story on a scale we have never seen before. Epic in its scope."

"Olivier Coipel is chained to a table drawing as we speak," Lowe said. "You can tell we're serious about it, because he's already working on it. It is incredible. It's huge and mind-boggling."

"The thing is, every Spider-Man ever wasn't enough," Slott added. "We're bringing in even more. New ones that you've never seen before."

And Slott really, really did his best to make that true. We even got Hostess Spider-Man by Slott and Ty Templeton (more from these guys later)!



But due to legal restrictions, Dan Slott eventually noted that there were at least eight Spider-Men who could not appear in the crossover, including Nicholas Hammond's Spider-Man from the 1970s TV series...



The CGI Spider-Man from the MTV series...



Plus both movie Spider-Men at the time, Tobey Maguire...



and Andrew Garfield...



However, in Spiderverse #2, a tie-in to the storyline, they at least fit in a reference to Maguire and Garfield...



Clever stuff.

But yeah, not every Spider-Man ever! Still a very cool story, though! Thanks to CBR's own Rob Levin for suggesting that I feature this one!

What other Spider-Men did you see missing in the story?

Check out some entertainment and sports legends from Legends Revealed:

Which Original Cast Member of Grey’s Anatomy Was Added to the Show’s Pilot Through CGI?

Did Mattel Really Make a Barbie Friend Named “Wheelchair Becky”?

Were Leicester City Chances of Winning the Premier League This Year Really 5,000 to 1?

Was Famed Satanist Anton LaVey the Technical Adviser on Rosemary’s Baby?

On the next page, more Dan Slott/Ty Templeton goodness! Who was the Red Hood during their Batman Adventures run?

COMIC LEGEND: Dan Slott eventually revealed the identity of the Red Hood from his Batman Adventures run.

STATUS: True

Dan Slott and Ty Templeton worked together on an excellent Batman Adventures series that tied in with the Batman animated universe. It debuted in 2003 but sadly ended in 2004 after just 17 issues. Slott and Templeton would each write roughly half of the stories, with typically Rick Burchett and Terry Beatty drawing the stories.

One of the storylines driven by Slott involved a mysterious villain controlling some of the Gotham mob, as seen here in Batman Adventures #7, as the villain directs both Black Mask and Phantasm...





The following issue, the mystery villain gets irked at Black Mask's failures...







And at the end of the story, the villain reveals him/herself to Phantasm as the Red Hood...





The problem is that the book was canceled before Slott and Templeton could reveal who the Red Hood WAS.

Not only that, but even after it ended, Slott wasn't particularly interested in revealing the Hood's identity.

In 2005, Ty Templeton explained on the ToonZone forums that he couldn't reveal it, since it was Slott's idea, but he DID throw in some clues:

I know who the Red Hood was, naturally, since I was working on the issues that featured him. HOWEVER, the decision as to who was under there was Dan's not mine. We often shotgunned ideas, and sometimes just called each other up with ideas, but the basic Red Hood storyline was 90% Dan's (just as the Penguin as Mayor bit, or the reformed Riddler bits were mine), and it's not for me to reveal the identity if Dan hasn't done so in public. He's often said he plans to use the storyline in a JLAnimated comic someday, which he still might (although his exclusive contract with Marvel, and my contracts with Bongo and Mr. Comics seem to have us working elsewhere than DC at the moment.)

I will give you some hints though....

It's a character that belongs exclusively to the DC animated world...who wouldn't work in any other version of the continuity, and it's absolutely NOT Jason Todd or Alfred.

Sorry, but you'll have to pester Dan about the final identity, since it wasn't my bit.

That same year, ToonZone also interviewed Slott and cut right to it:

TZN: Will you ever reveal who the Red Hood was?

DS: You’re referring to the Red Hood we brought into the BATMAN ADVENTURES book back in ’03, right? Ah, I remember those days… BATMAN ADVENTURES #5 through #9 (also reprinted as BATMAN ADVENTURES DIGEST VOL.2, “SHADOWS & MASKS”). A new crime boss, the Black Mask, was trying to take over Gotham’s underworld… but he was secretly working for a mysterious new Red Hood.

We were going to keep building up the mystery of WHO was behind that darn Red Hood… and then, in a startling reveal, you’d discover that it was actually….

And then the book got canceled. And, man, it still hurts. So, nope. Not gonna tell. Maybe someday. Just not today. The wound’s still too fresh.

Fortunately, the mainstream BATMAN books have a story going on with Black Mask and a sinister new Red Hood. So I’m sure you’ll get to see a Red Hood unmasked soon. And I’m sure theirs will be somebody really cool.

However, in recent years, at comic book conventions, Slott has been more open with the information. So we now know the answer.

Just skip to the next legend if you don't want to know the answer! I'll also give you some spoiler space!

S

P

O

I

L

E

R

W

A

R

N

I

N

G

Okay, ready? The great DC animated fan website, The World's Finest, got the answer, as one of the site administrators, James Harvey, asked Slott about it at FanExpo 2013.

Here is the answer.

LAST CHANCE TO SKIP THIS LEGEND!

Had Batman Adventures continued, Dan Slott said, The Red Hood would have been revealed as Andrea Beaumont's mother, Victoria Beaumont, who also happened to be the real head of the Valestra mob. Years ago, she faked her death in an attempt to get her family away from the Valestra mob, and was disappointed to see her family eventually fall into their clutches. However, when she saw what happened to her husband, and what eventually became of her daughter, she felt it was time to not only get revenge on the Valestra mob, but take Gotham for herself. Inevitably, this would have led to a devastating confrontation between her, Batman, and Andrea Beaumont.

Very clever idea. Slott's a clever dude.

Thanks to James Harvey and Dan Slott for the information! Thanks to reader Kyle for suggesting that I feature this one!

Check out my latest TV Legends Revealed at Spinoff Online: What was the original plan for Inara's mysterious syringe on Joss Whedon's Firefly? The answer is super dark! Be forewarned!

On the next page, see how Marvel edited an old comic book into becoming a SHIELD vs. Hydra story!

COMIC LEGEND: Marvel edited an old science fiction comic to make it a SHIELD vs. Hydra story.

STATUS: True

A couple of weeks ago, when discussing whether Marvel edited the "snap" out of their reprints of the death of Gwen Stacy, I mentioned how Marvel would sometimes reprint Pre-Marvel stories (from their Atlas days) and then edit in references to Marvel characters in them. I've done two legends on them in the past. In one, Hank Pym retroactively appears and in the other, Hydra makes a retroactive appearance.

Reader Cullen, though, shared another awesome example that I figured I had to share with you all!

In 1961's Strange Tales #84, just a few short months before Fantastic Four #1 changed the company forever, Steve Ditko and presumably Stan Lee did a cute five-pager...











When the story was reprinted in Monsters on the Prowl #24 in 1973, it was now a Hydra vs. SHIELD story!





Hilarious.

Thanks to Cullen and the Warriors' Comic Book Den for the info and the pages!

Okay, that's it for this week!

Thanks to the Grand Comics Database for this week's covers! And thanks to Brandon Hanvey for the Comic Book Legends Revealed logo!

Feel free (heck, I implore you!) to write in with your suggestions for future installments! My e-mail address is cronb01@aol.com. And my Twitter feed is http://twitter.com/brian_cronin, so you can ask me legends there, as well!

Here's my newest book, Why Does Batman Carry Shark Repellent? The cover is by Kevin Hopgood (the fellow who designed War Machine's armor).

If you want to order a copy, ordering it here gives me a referral fee.

Follow Comics Should Be Good on Twitter and on Facebook (also, feel free to share Comic Book Legends Revealed on our Facebook page!). Not only will you get updates when new blog posts show up on both Twitter and Facebook, but you'll get original content from me, as well!

Here's my book of Comic Book Legends (130 legends - half of them are re-worked classic legends I've featured on the blog and half of them are legends never published on the blog!).

The cover is by artist Mickey Duzyj. He did a great job on it...(click to enlarge)...



If you'd like to order it, you can use the following code if you'd like to send me a bit of a referral fee...

Was Superman a Spy?: And Other Comic Book Legends Revealed

See you all next week!