I originally dismissed this as yet another silly crossover that focuses on time-travel and parallel dimensions, but I read everything over the weekend and it's surprisingly good (or at least, better than any crossover event that Marvel has done in the past few years.)

I'm not updated on the Spiderman franchise, so I have no idea who Morlun is and his history with Parker, and the book didn't provide much except for passing mentions, but prior knowledge is a must if you want to get everything. A simple wiki should be enough.

Familiarity with the Superior Spiderman thingie is also a plus if you want to enjoy the story arc, though not a requirement. Basically, the event itself centers on Peter after he's regained his body from Doc Ock, but when all the spidermen from different times and realities assemble, the Peter and Doc Ock spideys meet (with Doc Ock mistaking Peter as a Spiderman from the past, because he can't imagine losing the body back to its original owner.)

If anything, it's fun seeing all the different spideys: steampunk spider woman, bruce banner spiderman, captain britain spider-man, uncle ben spider-man, the japanese Spiderman from his TV show (along with his robot leopardon), 2099, punk rock spiderman, comic strip spiderman, archie spider-girl, videogame spiderman, etc. Highlight is the monkey spider-man, who thought SpiderHam was ridiculous.

I am a bit baffled by what is going on with Marvel's Battleworld continuity thing. Apparently the Earth is going to be a fusion of different storylines ranging from Old Man Logan to the Ultimate universe, to Spider-man 2099? Is this part of that?

I have no idea if it's connected. It seems to have no actual effect on the mainstream continuity, it's fairly self-contained.

It didn't even feature any non-Spidey franchise characters, with the exception of Punisher 2099 and the Avengers (they were featured in a sidestory, when the events convinced Jessica to finally quit The Avengers.)

It seems like Marvel is aware of the continuity cluster fuck their comic universe has become and want to kinda-sorta-but-not-really start over. I don't really buy the comics anymore because of the cost and the fact I want to spend my money on other stuff, but I'll read through the character wiki's and it seems like the publisher has, over the past ten years, retconned a lot of characters history or completely fucked up characters. Magneto's real name is Max Eisenburg, Tony Stark is adopted, all the shit with Spiderman, etc. plus the fact that they ruined the Ultimate line by letting Jeph Loeb get control.

At this point marvels been around longer than DC had been around when DC had to reboot with crisis.

Wait, Tony Stark is adopted? But he looked so much like his dad, right down to the facial hair.

His real father was Morton Downey Jr.