Hello! First off wanna thank you for helping me get more into spideytorch have fallen deep into their history of comics! Second, while i was deep diving i keep coming across Ben Reiley and Kaine Parker and im kinda confused on where they come from and what i need to read to understand them (all ik is that theyre clones of peter)
Hey anon! First off, I'm so happy I could you fall into the Spideytorch pit.
Second off, I have a recent-ish post about the clones here, but since you asked about their origins and what you need to understand them, I'm going to tackle them again from that angle.
So first things first, the origins of the clones. I think the common perception of the clones is that they're kind of a 90s phenomenon, but the origins reach back pretty far into Spider-Man canon. The concept of cloning (and Ben himself) dates back to the 70s, but it relied on seeds planted in the 60s. When Peter was in college, he and Gwen had a professor named Miles Warren, who became obsessed with Gwen.
(ASM #53) ESU has the worst hiring policies in the world.
When Gwen died, Warren did not take it well. He later discovered that Peter was Spider-Man, and using biological samples obtained during a classroom experiment, he set out to clone both Gwen and Peter, turning himself into a supervillain called the Jackal. This was always a flawed process. He created a number of clones who either died as a result of the cloning process, or who he killed because they were imperfect, before he finally wound up with Kaine and Ben. (And a number of Gwen clones, but we'll focus on the Peter ones here.)
The first clone Peter encounters is the clone who will eventually be known as Ben Reilly, way back in Amazing Spider-Man #149. (For comparison, ASM #1000 will be released in September, so the clones have been part of the Spider-Man canon fabric for a very long time.) Peter battled the clone, who supposedly died, and had a brief about what if he himself was really the clone, and then decided he wasn't and threw out the scientific evidence proving it in a move that he would shortly come to regret.
(ASM #150) "He has already found his answer." This is what we in the biz call a stupid move.
The presumed-dead clone wasn't actually dead, though, and shortly after that robbed Peter's old clothes, class ring, and some spare cash and hopped on a bus far away from New York.
(Spider-Man: The Lost Years #0) The disposition is unfortunately genetic.
This clone renames himself Ben Reilly, after Uncle Ben and Aunt May. (Her maiden name is Reilly.) He lives out about five years on the road, hopping between different towns and living under a number of presumed identities, for some of it in the company of his girlfriend Janine Godbe, a fugitive who had years prior killed her abusive father. (I LOVE Janine, she's a great character in her own right.) Part of the reason Ben has to keep moving, though, is because he's being pursued by another clone of Peter, Kaine.
Kaine was an earlier attempt to clone Peter. Originally deemed perfect, he soon began to fail, falling apart on a cellular level. When his degeneration became visible, Warren tried to kill him, but Kaine escaped, only to haunt the cloning laboratory Phantom of the Opera style.
Kaine became obsessed with the new, perfect clone that the Jackal had created, viewing the perfect clone as everything he could never be -- and vowing to do whatever he could to protect that clone. But in the chaos, Kaine fell for a ruse: he believed that the perfect clone was Peter, and that Ben was the original. He determined to hound Ben, the supposed original, wherever he went, never letting him have a moment's peace, and keeping him away from New York so that Peter, the supposed clone, could live the life Kaine never could, full of purpose, friends, and family.
So the thing about Kaine is that he is so sad. He is angry and desperate and clawing at the walls. He's in constant pain and he just wants to belong somewhere. He loves the other clone -- or the person he thinks is the clone -- and he feels a deep, haunting connection to Ben that he can never shake no matter how hard to tries to think of it as hatred. He simultaneously despises and yearns for the Jackal, his abuser, who he professes as the only father he's ever known and the devil.
(ASM #404) Oh yeah and Miles Warren is green now. Don't worry about it.
So, obviously, things have to come to a head at some point. Five years after Ben initially left New York, Aunt May falls ill, and Ben returns to the city just in time for her death. (She gets better.) At this point, Ben takes the name Scarlet Spider. Kaine, naturally, follows him, and as a result Peter gets arrested for a string of murders Kaine committed. In Kaine's defense, he didn't know Peter had been fingerprinted previously. But it's one of my favorite parts of canon that I never use as much as I should that Peter has previously been on trial under suspicion of being a serial killer.
Things take a turn here when evidence is fabricated to "prove" that Peter is the clone and Ben was really the original Peter Parker. Ben, unlike Kaine, has the entire set of Peter's memories up until his cloning, so roughly until the age of nineteen. (We see that Kaine does have a few of Peter's memories, but they're more sporadic, and tend to be focused on the experiences of childhood.) Peter ultimately turns over the Spider-Man costume and identity to Ben and moves to Portland with Mary Jane, who was pregnant at the time. (The baby would later be murdered by Norman Osborn.) During Ben's time as Spider-Man, he and Kaine have a confrontation intended by Kaine to be a murder-suicide, but where Ben's empathy saves both their lives, and instead Kaine surrenders and goes to prison. (He'd break out a few years later.) Ben would continue to be Spider-Man for a while, even after Peter returned to New York, only to be murdered by Norman on Halloween.
The clone canon gets a little chaotic at this point. Kaine was largely absent from the pages after his prison escape for a few years, before returning post-Brand New Day. He sacrificed himself for Peter, dying by the hands of Kraven the Hunter's family, before resurrecting as a spider-like monster. He was captured by the Jackal and further mutated, but ultimately cured of both this spider form and his clone degeneration by Peter. (This will not make him more normal about Peter.) Kaine takes off for Houston and ultimately adopts the Scarlet Spider identity, a psychic teenage he shares a special bond with, and gets the both of them adopted by a local gay couple. Ben wasn't resurrected until the recent-ish Clone Conspiracy arc, where he took on a villainous identity as the second Jackal. (Freudian.) Later reformed but missing a few screws, he ended up in Las Vegas. Currently he's missing a good chunk of his memory and going by the name Chasm. It's a disaster.
Personality-wise, Ben is a lot like Peter. But while they're similar in personality, they've lived very different lives. Ben is used to living rough, hiding his identity, and bouncing from place to place. Kaine, by comparison, is pretty different in personality. Having lived years in a self-hating spiral, clinging to the idea of this other perfect clone and hounding Ben relentlessly, Kaine is deeply damaged and initially tries to eschew the idea of being a hero. Too bad for him he's really good at it. Both clones are really interesting characters, both in and of themselves and in their relationships with other characters.
So, where to read for the clones. If you've been hanging around Spider-Man fandom, you've probably heard about the Clone Saga. People will tell you it's bad. They're lying. The Clone Saga is the greatest soap opera ever written. People will tell you it's confusing to read. That, unfortunately, is an accurate statement. Digital reading will help considerably, since it allows you to easily switch between titles, but it still requires you to jump between several different titles. But I think it's possible to get acquainted with the clones by reading around the Clone Saga before hitting the whole thing, especially since Kaine's more recent canon is significantly different than his earlier canon. This is not a dig at either. I think it's an interesting evolution.
This is in rough chronological order, skirting the Clone Saga but not altogether ignoring it. Once you get a good handle on the clones, I think the main body of it is easier to read, not in the least because you're invested in the characters.
The Original Clone Saga: Amazing Spider-Man #145-150: Where it all began with the very first clone story. Ben doesn't show up until #149, but it's worth reading the whole thing.
Spider-Man: The Lost Years #0-4: Picking up with Ben after the end of the original Clone Saga, this details his years on the road, his meeting Janine, and his early encounters with Kaine.
Spider-Man: Redemption #1-4: Consider this a bookend to The Lost Years. Ben is in New York, living as Spider-Man and as Ben Reilly, friendly neighborhood barista, when both Kaine and Janine reappear in his life with disastrous consequences for everyone. Both The Lost Years and Redemption are must reads for getting into Ben and Kaine as characters.
Ben Reilly: Scarlet Spider #1-5: This is a more recent (2022) miniseries, written by DeMatteis, king of the clones. Set during Ben's tenure as Spider-Man, Ben tries to solve a series of murders by the "first date killer" who might be more connected to him than he thinks.
Peter Parker: Spider-Man #75: Ben's death on Halloween and Peter's return as Spider-Man.
Amazing Spider-Man Annual #36, ASM #608-610: Damon Ryder, a man who blames Ben Reilly for the murder of his family, wants Peter Parker dead.
Grim Hunt: Amazing Spider-Man #634-637: The Kravinoff family wants to sacrifice Peter to resurrect Kraven the Hunter. Kaine sacrifices himself in his place. Just a really great atmospheric Spider-Man story in general, but the Kaine parts are painful in the best way.
Spider-Island: Deadly Foes: "What I Did For Love" details the Jackal's experiments on Kaine and features one of my favorite one appearance Gwen clones, Abby-L.
Spider-Island: I am loathe to recommend anyone reads Spider-Island, but if you just care about Kaine, he gets dunked in clone degeneration cure in ASM #671 and helps Peter defeat the Queen in ASM #672. He sees off Aunt May secretly in ASM #673. If you want to read the whole thing, here's a chronological reading list.
Scarlet Spider (2011): This is one of my favorite Spider-Man series. Trying to escape his past, who he used to be, and the shadow of both Spider-Man and Ben Reilly, Kaine makes a detour in Houston and accidentally winds up the local vigilante after he saves a young girl named Aracely -- who forms a psychic bond with him and may have a god in her head. It's so good and it's got a great cast of characters. It falls apart a little at the end because Yost was forced to wrap up the plot quickly, but if you like Kaine and Aracely, check out New Warriors (2014).
Canon past this point is very messy for the clones. There's good moments, but very few series I'd recommend past this point. (Clone Conspiracy and Spider-Man Beyond had so much potential.) For Kaine, the Spider-Verse comic book event is important, so here's a reading list for it, and he and Ben later reunite in Ben Reilly: Scarlet Spider by Peter David. I just don't think either of those are particularly good, although BR:SS has some interesting character stuff. So my recommendation is to start with the comics I recced above and then circle back to the Clone Saga proper. Here's a good reading list for it.
Also, since you mentioned Spideytorch, Johnny and Ben Reilly have had a few run-ins over the years. (He and Kaine have largely avoided each other.) For Johnny and Ben Reilly, read Amazing Spider-Man #407, Spider-Man Holiday Special 1995 (these two conflict each other, because Marvel has never had editors and apparently they never will), and Spider-Man Team-Up #3.
I hope that helps you get into the clones!
