A Web of Woeful Spider-Man Foes

Speaking of Backwards Men, DROM, THE BACKWARDS MAN makes for a better sci-fi short story subject than a super-villain. For reasons unknown, Drom's infant self was swapped with his elderly body moments after birth, leading to a backwards-speaking, backwards-aging supervillain, who basically only had life-energy draining powers at his disposal and an arsenal consisting of special machinery to translate his gibberish and to process his food. He also has a magic mirror that does nothing save be utterly essential to Drom's survival, and extremely easy to smash, in that order. Which, given this is Marvel Team-Up, and not Antique Mirror Fancier it eventually, inevitably, is. The most forgettable villain in Spidey's history is literally forgotten after he devolves to infancy, then nothingness. Drom's first and only appearance was in Marvel Team-Up #13.

Who started out as a henchman for the Kingpin? Who does kingpin still consider his worst henchman ever, even worse than Turk? Who was given his powers by ubiquitous Marvel Universe Mad Scientist Dr.Harlan Stillwell? Who was genetically engineered to spontaneously generate whatever superpower he needed to deal with a given situation? Who squandered that awesome power being the lamest most generic villain ever? Who has a giant white phallic symbol pointing at his groin? Who has a girly wee tassle atop his pointy purple head? Who should NOT be allowed to dress himself ever, ever again?? Who is a response to a question no one asked?? THE ANSWER, that's who!

Speaking of which, answers were in short supply during the much-reviled FACADE "saga" in which much was made of the identity of the armored mystery man. Longtime Peter Parker rival Lance Bannon was killed by Facade, and an elaborate mystery was built around his identity, with suspects ranging from J. Jonah Jameson, to John Jameson, to some business guy nobodies introduced during the story's beginning. It doesn't matter, because Spider-Man fought Facade, the armor was destroyed, and a shadowy figure slipped away, vowing to return. The mystery of Facade was never solved and never addressed again, with the infamous Clone Saga taking over the Spider Man spotlight soon after. Who knows, maybe Facade was another Spider-Man clone, lowering the bar for the clone suckage to come.









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