Today, we look at a hidden Spider-Man tribute to the late, great Mark Gruenwald.

In Meta-Messages, I explore the context behind (using reader danjack's term) "meta-messages." A meta-message is where a comic book creator comments on/references the work of another comic book/comic book creator (or sometimes even themselves) in their comic. Each time around, I'll give you the context behind one such "meta-message."

Sensational Spider-Man was a strange comic book series. It was launched in 1995 by writer/artist Dan Jurgens as the first issue of Ben Reilly's time as Spider-Man, with him debuting a brand-new costume in Sensational Spider-Man #0 (Jurgens was inked by the great Klaus Janson on the series).

This was a time of great turmoil in the Spider-books, though, and Jurgens picked a bad time to join in. He only lasted six issues before leaving the series (seven, I guess, since there was a #0 issue) and Todd Dezago took over as the writer of the series. An issue later, Marvel successfully brought Mike Wieringo over from DC for the series and with 'Ringo working with Richard Case as inker (and Weiringo started plotting the book with Dezago), the book became a sort of delightfully offbeat series. It was a real blast and...within six issues, Ben Reilly was gone as Spider-Man and Peter Parker was back as the star of the series.

The book continued to be a great read for the next couple of years, but eventually the Spider-Man books overall ended in 1998 and relaunched without Sensational Spider-Man (and the long-running Spectacular Spider-Man) in the mix, just like how when Ben Reilly took over as Spider-Man, Web of Spider-Man was canceled and replaced by Sensational (Howard Mackie was named the only writer of the two remaining Spider-Man titles, Amazing Spider-Man and Peter Parker: Spider-Man).

But the issue we're looking at now is a two-parter from October-November 1997, a little over a year after the late, great Mark Gruenwald passed away on August 12, 1996, twenty-five years ago today. Gruenwald was an icon at Marvel, a longtime editor and writer who loved comics more than most people and who put more THOUGHT into comics than nearly everyone who ever worked in comics (and people who work in comics tend to think about comics a LOT, but not quite as much as Gruenwald).

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He was a hero to pretty much everyone who worked at Marvel, and that included Dezago. In Sensational Spider-Man #22, Spider-Man is drawn to a mysterious building and so is Doctor Strange. Strange uses his powers to show Spider-Man that there is a great magical presence in this tower. You see, there is a powerful item known as the Sphere of Sara-Kath that is opening up doorways to other dimensions. One of those doorways leads to a place that called out to Spider-Man, which is how he came to the tower and met Strange there. Meanwhile, there is a demon from another dimension named Buel has broken into our dimension to follow the sphere because if he gets a hold of the sphere, he can use it to take control of the Multiverse.

The problem with the sphere is that it amplifies magical users' powers tremendously. That's why Buel wants it, but that could be dangerous, as well, which is why Strange can't physically just grab it himself, he needs a non-magic user to grab it, which is, of course, Spider-Man. Strange guides him with his astral form.

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Okay, so the sphere keeps opening up doorways as a sort of defense mechanism and so Spidey has to fight through them to get to the sphere. Once there, though, that same doorway (or more specifically, someone who is beyond that doorway) continues to keep on calling to him.

Strange tells him to shape up and eventually Spider-Man gets the sphere under control and the threat is over. He's kind of pissed, though, that Strange won't tell him what was through the doorway. Strange realizes that he is being a jerk (in a nice throwback to Strange's origin, which involved him being arrogant and aloof before he lost his ability to perform surgeries and then learned the mystical arts), so he allows Spidey to go look through the doorway into the other dimension...

Spidey sees someone and sees a sort of paradise. He is content. The issue then ends with a literal tribute to Mark Gruenwald.

Now, it made a certain amount of sense to think that Spider-Man saw Gruenwald through that doorway (especially with the whole tribute to Gruenwald at the end of the issue), but considering that Ben Reilly had only recently been killed in the comics, as well, just a year earlier, that made sense, also, but a while back, Dezago confirmed to CBR that it was, in fact, meant as a tribute to Gruenwald, noting, "At the end of the tale, Spidey is supposed to encounter the "spirit" of. . . someone who had helped him throughout the story. We had just recently lost Marvel Editor Extraordinaire, Mark Gruenwald, and while some were led to believe that the spirit was the clone, Ben Reilly, others thought that it was Mark. We left it ambiguous. The Sphere was named for Mark's daughter and wife, Sara and Katherine, respectively."

Tragically, the amazing artist on this issue (who later created the indie comic book series, Tellos, with Dezago), Mike Wieringo, also passed away at far too young of an age and also, oddly enough, it was on August 12th (2007). So this is quite the day to pay tribute to two amazing comic book creators in Gruenwald and Wieringo (Joe Kubert also passed away on August 12th in 2012). Next year, on the 15th anniversary of Mike's passing, I figure I'll talk about the Spidey comic that Dezago and others did as a tribute to Wieringo).

If anyone else has a suggestion for a future Meta-Messages, drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com

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