Warning: SPOILERS ahead for Savage Avengers #8When Miles Morales joined the Savage Avengers it was surprisingly not as Spider-Man, but instead as the undead cyborg soldier Deathlok, but now a new upgrade has turned him into a very bizarre version of Spidey.
While Conan the Barbarian is being hunted by a Deathlok for crimes against the time stream in the pages of Savage Avengers, several heroes including Cloak, Dagger, Black Knight, Weapon H, Anti-Venom and Elektra, come to his aid. Conan and Deathlok, along with the heroes, are shoved back in time to Conan's era. During their fighting, latent memories within Deathlok's human brain are activated, and he realizes that he is actually an adult version of the Spider-Man Miles Morales.
In Savage Avengers #8 by David Pepose and Carlos Magno, Deathlok is now firmly a member of this Savage Avengers group as they are trapped in an Ultron-controlled version of 2099, where an army of Deathloks has turned the world into a dystopian nightmare. Before they go up against Ultron, who has positioned himself in Doom’s Latveria, Anti-Venom gives Miles his old web shooters. When they charge into battle, the Miles Deathlok not only uses the web shooters to swing, he also uses his other Spider-Man abilities such as his camouflage and venom blast. Ultimately though, the Savage Avengers fail and Ultron turns them into mindless cyborg drones.
Deathlok Becomes Spider-Man Once Again
Up until this point, Miles has primarily been using his Deathlok abilities for fighting. This was especially true when he was firmly under Deathlok’s programmed influence. There has been very little if any resemblance of his time as Spider-Man, and he was pretty much just Miles Morales in name only. However, acquiring the web shooters completely changes this. Although he still looks like Deathlok, he has begun fighting more like a Spider-Man. It's almost as if the web shooters have changed his entire fighting mindset to become more like his old self.
What's also interesting is that the Spider-Verse and all of the characters that go along with it have been hot commodities as of late. Typically, new Spider-Man variants arise as part of that universe, either as brand-new characters that come from a Spider-Verse crossover or a spin-off of some other Spider-Man title. This Deathlok Spider-Man is neither. He comes uniquely from Savage Avengers. So it will be interesting to see where he fits into the future of the Spider-Verse. Only time will tell if this Deathlok variant of Miles Morales from the pages of Savage Avengers will have a future in the larger Spider-Man universe or if his role will fizzle out.
Savage Avengers #8 is now available from Marvel Comics.