Doctor Octopus is back from the dead in the pages of Clone Conspiracy, and I think they should have given him a new, studlier body. Chubby may be classic, but this is a new century. Spruce this guy up.

Makes quite the first impression

So I bet you’re wondering how Doc Ock is back from the dead, right? Well, this is where things get kind of weird and very comic booky. This is only Doctor Octopus by a weird stretch of comic book science. The ‘original’ Doctor Octopus died when he sacrificed his life at the end of Superior Spider-Man, the best writing of Dan Slott’s tenure on Spider-Man.

Before he died, and before he became the sort of man who would make a heroic sacrifice, Doc Ock made a digital copy of his brain and put it in computer storage to wake up in the event of his eventual death. This digital copy of Doc Ock spent a while in the Living Brain robot before he orchestrated the purchase of his original dead body by the Jackal, who used his new cloning technique to make a new Doc Ock body.

But rather than the usual cloned pod person mind taking control of the body, the digital doctor invaded the brain and took over.

So Doctor Octopus is now the combination of a cloned body and a digital brain scan from before he died. Such are comics.

He even went back to the old, dumb costume

I bring this up because, in my opinion, Marvel should have mad Doctor Octopus hotter.

As you can see from the pictures, his cloned body is the same chubby Doc Ock we’ve always known, with the same dumb bowl cut hairstyle. If you’re cloning a body, even rapidly cloning the body, why would it have that haircut? And since Doc Ock is a master of switching brains, why not have the Jackal produce him a genetically manipulated slender/muscular body?

I bring all this up not just because I want a svelte, sexy Doc Ock, but because body image was a major aspect of Superior Spider-Man. Slott spent a lot of time playing with the fact that Doc Ock went from that old, chubby body to the young, muscular body of Spider-Man. For the first time, he was handsome and in shape, and this was a huge boost to Otto’s self-confidence. He even got an awesome girlfriend!

Anna Maria Marconi is the best new Spider-Man character since Phil Urich

In the story where this digital doctor came back, he even remarked how he wanted to just take over Peter Parker’s body again because it’s an awesome body.

So with all of that build-up, why throw it away just to go back to the classic Doctor Octopus?

Granted, making him a younger, fitter Doc Ock with better hair reeks of pandering. But in this instance, it would work for the story and the character. Otto had a taste of being young, handsome and fit, and I would think he would want that again when cloning a new body.

Yes, everybody loves classic Doctor Octopus, but for the sake of the story and his character growth, I think Marvel should have cloned him a slimmer, younger body, and he should have given himself a better haircut. If he wants to win back Anna Maria, looking handsome would be a good first step — not that she’d take him back, she’s not that shallow, but still.

Considering Spider-Man’s long history of romance, Otto Octavius and Anna Maria Marconi is the best love story Spidey comics have seen in years.

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