20 Reasons you should love Spider-Girl!

Happy May Day one and all. Since this day shares a name with a certain daughter of our friendly neighbourhood wall-crawler (and because this year marked her 20th anniversary) we’re going to list of 20 reasons you should love Spider-Girl!

No deep dive analysis I am afraid and these are in no particular order.

Without further adieu…

Longest running female Marvel hero with her own series

In a day and age when much discussion is devoted to female characters in leading roles Spider-Girl was something of a trail blazer, though she gets far too little credit for it.

Spider-Girl was (and still is to my understanding) the longest running female Marvel character to have her own solo-series; at least without any re-launches.

This feat is even more impressive considering Spider-Girl was an out-of-continuity series which usually do not sell as easily as titles within the mainstream 616 universe.

Her costume

When discussing Spider-Man’s costumes thought inevitably drifts to Spider-Man’s original red and blue outfit or his black and white one. However the third horse in the race is the 1996 costume created by Ben Reilly and thus lovingly nicknamed the ‘Spider-Ben’ outfit.

It is simply a brilliant and beautiful design succeeding in evoking something unique and yet distinctly ‘Spider-Man’.

Whilst anyone coming to the black costume completely cold and with no context could be forgiven for mistaking it for an entirely different character (as Ron Frenz did way back in the early 1980s), nobody could look at Mayday’s costume and not   realize it has something to do with Spider-Man.

Shifting around elements of the classic costume Mayday’s outfit succeeds in maintaining a balance of primary colours (as the best superhero costumes do) and making her distinct from any artistic angle.

The costume also (according to superstar artist Sal Buscema) in fact works more effectively on Mayday’s feminine form than on the typical male superhero body build.

Her other costumes

The beauty of Spider-Man’s black costume lies in its simplicity. However this doesn’t mean it is above being redesigned and around 20 years after its debut one of the key architects in its introduction (Ron Frenz) did just that when he created a black costume for Mayday.

Much like her red and blue outfit, her own black costume succeeds in being unique but retaining most of the strong visual elements that made her Dad’s counterpart outfit a hit. Sleek, simple and using white/silver in moderation to create a stark contrast this is probably Mayday’s most out and out badass look.

But Mr. Frenz had one more trick up his sleeve. In 2015 as part of the Secret Wars mega event Marvel was involved with Ron Frenz took to redesigning Mayday’s costume once again. Her previous appearance in Spider-Verse had controversially seen her hang up her original costume in favour of wearing one of her father’s old suits.

Quite apart from how the costume simply didn’t work as effectively on the Mayday’s female figure compared to Spider-Man’s, fans didn’t take kindly to the change. Apparently neither did Mayday’s co-creators Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz and so we wound up with yet another costume that combined elements of Peter Parker and Ben Reilly’s costumes together to create something once again familiar yet ultimately unique.

Whilst most Spider-Girl fans would’ve preferred a return to her classic look the costume unto itself has been acknowledged as a beautiful design.

A true all ages book

The majority of Spider-Girl’s run played out in a day and age when the content of comic books was going down an allegedly more ‘realistic and mature’ direction.

Titles such as the Ultimate Universe line, though paying lip service to being aimed at younger readers, were far from being for all ages. This was very much true of Marvel and DC as a whole throughout the 2000s and early 2010s.

Spider-Girl was a brave exception to this trend, actively engaging in sophisticated and at times challenging stories that nevertheless presented events in a way that tweens, teens and adults could enjoy.

Survival of cancellations

Infamously Spider-Girl lived under a near perennial threat of cancellation.

But Mayday’s fans were both too smart and too in love with her stories to let her go under.

Repeatedly they exploited their knowledge of the pre-ordering system LCSs use and saved Mayday’s series from cancellation.

No comic book has ever defied expectations and escaped cancellation more times than Spider-Girl.

Tackled tough and relevant subject matters in a frank, mature and realistic way without being grim dark

As I mentioned above, Spider-Girl was an all ages book but that didn’t mean it stayed away from tough subjects.

More than once Spider-Girl used mutants to discuss bigotry and prejudice.

Issue #26 of Mayday’s first series was a vital turning point for the narrative and it fundamentally hinged upon addressing issues related to suicide and the vicious cycle of abuse that can exist within families.

Multiple subplots touched upon women being physically and emotionally abused, to the point where the topic was brought up in the very issue where Mayday celebrated being the longest running female Marvel character. This is best exemplified in Spider-Girl #89 which has one of the most uncomfortably realistic pages in a comic book I have ever read.

Perhaps most audaciously one issue dedicated an entire scene to talking fairly frankly about the topic of abortion and making the characters’ stances on the issue very clear. What is perhaps even more impressive is that this was the second  time that writer Tom DeFalco had dared touch that subject within a Spider title.

Regardless of what your personal views are on that or on any of the topics above, the sheer guts of the creative team to ‘go there’ must be admired and respected.

Consistent art that also has amazing action sequences!

Spider-Girl has been drawn by several artists across the years but the two most dominant ones are Pat Oliffe and Ron Frenz.

Whilst both artists evolved their styles across the run of the series there was enough relative consistency that the book rarely felt alienating to long time readers.

And it helped that both artists’ styles are just beautiful.

Oliffe leans more towards illustration and makes the characters seem realistic and yet fluid at the same time.

Frenz is more of a cartoonist and yet his art is not usually overly stylized and manages to retain the iconic features of each character he draws. His rendition of Mary Jane for example could never be mistaken for any given typically attractive redhead, it looks distinctly like Mary Jane evoking Romita Senior’s design for her.

Not only are each artist great in their character work but in their raw sequential storytelling craftsmanship. Nowhere is this more evident than in their well paced, cleverly choreographed and all round dynamic action sequences. At the time the stories were published (and even today) you’d have been hard pressed to find any action sequences in Marvel or DC that could rival those of Spider-Girl’s.

Continuity porn and fan service done right

Dan Slott’s run on Spider-Man has in the past been criticised of indulging in ‘continuity porn’. That is to say utilizing or referencing past continuity excessively to the point where it either takes you out of a story or outright undermines a story itself.

Spider-Girl demonstrates how continuity and fan service can be done well given the right context. There are in fact probably a million times more continuity references and examples of fan service within Spider-Girl’s whole run than in Slott’s collective Spider-Man bibliography.

The difference though is that the continuity Spider-Girl first and foremost concerns itself with involves organically building upon previously established events, whether it’s from its own series, Spider-Man’s wider history or Marvel lore in general.

Case in point Spider-Girl’s debut storyline hinges upon continuity surrounding the DeMatteis/Buscema run of Spectacular Spider-Man as it shows us Harry Osborn’s son following in his father and grandfather’s footsteps by becoming the new Green Goblin. He is even arrested in a scene that is framed near identically to a scene of Harry being arrested in Spectacular Spider-Man #189, whilst singing a variation of the 1960s Spider-Man theme song no less. Furthermore the climax of the issue takes place at the site of Gwen Stacy’s death, which happened in another Goblin story and Mayday’s first words as Spider-Girl are also her mother’s famous first words from ASM #42.

We are talking layers and layers of continuity here. But it never goes to the point of alienating readers, being obnoxious or hurting the stories.

The most significant and obvious ways in which the story (and any Spider-Girl story) utilizes continuity is the way continuity is supposed to function. That is to say it provides good world building and verisimilitude for the story and characters so that they can grow and react to events (and their repercussions) in much the same real people react to events in their lives day-to-day.

And the other references found in the story are subtle enough to not alienate new or casual fans, but still provide a fun nod for those in the know. Critically though for those in the know such references never grow obnoxious because they serve legitimate story purposes as well.

Every time in a Spider-Girl story where Mayday or Normie say, do or are simply drawn in a way that references old stories starring their family members it is touching upon the fundamental themes of family and legacy that define the series. It creates a subtext that spells out how they are the inheritors of their families’ respective legacies and have their ancestors’ traits within them.

And this is just me looking at one   story.

You could make a whole series dedicated to just spotting various continuity Easter Eggs scattered throughout the series.

Revived the Hobgoblin

Remember back in 2010 when Dan Slott launched the Big Time era and there was a lot of chatter about the apparent return of the Hobgoblin?

The reason for the chatter was due to Hobgoblin being a major league bad guy during the iconic Roger Stern run of Amazing Spider-Man and his return marking the first time he’d be appearing in well over a decade.

Well guess what? Spider-Girl had Slott beat.

During the build up to her 100^th issue the Hobgoblin was dusted off by DeFalco and Frenz (who used the character extensively during their own iconic run on ASM in the 1980s) and reintroduced in all his glory, proving to be one of Mayday’s most formidable foes.

For many Spider-Girl fans Hobgoblin was actually an even more effective villain for Mayday than he ever was for her father, owing much to the gap in their respective experience levels.

It might have happened outside the mainstream Marvel Universe but for many people at the time (and I’d bet many people who read through Big Time) this was the true return of the Hobgoblin.

And a more magnificent comeback you couldn’t have asked for. 

The best symbiote character ever!

Symbiotes have traditionally been divisive within Spider-Man fandom, with seemingly few readers neutral on them. More often than not you either love them or you passionately despise them with the rage of a thousand burning suns.

Much of the latter point of view is owed to a perception (right or wrong as it may be) that the symbiotes are shallow and one note characters that emphasise style over substance.

To such detractors I present for you April Parker, a.k.a. Mayhem!

She is a clone of Mayday (or is she?) who also has DNA from the Venom symbiote granting her both the spider powers of Peter Parker and the symbiotes metamorphic abilities.

Putting aside the clever word play going on with her names, Mayhem has genuine substance to her character. She struggles with issues of identity desperately wanting to legitimize herself as the ‘real’ Spider-Girl as opposed to a clone and also make good as a superhero in her own right, but much like Venom (albeit far more successfully) her approach to crime fighting involves a desire to use lethal force in direct opposition to Mayday’s philosophies.

Her relationship with Mayday is beautiful in its complexity and contradictions. She views May as a usurper of the life that rightfully belongs to her and competes to outdo her in and out of their costumed lives; hence naming herself April, because it comes before May. But she nevertheless cares for May as a sister and can become violent when believing her to be threatened or harmed.

The dynamic between the two also ties into themes and relationships from the Clone Saga, as Mayhem is a combination of all three of Peter’s clones (Spidercide, Kaine and Ben Reilly) and his relationships with each of them has commonalities with Mayday’s and April’s relationship.

And on top of all that…she just looks drop dead cool.

Organic continuation of canon stories

Spider-Man is fundamentally about responsibility and there is no greater responsibility than family. This has been a hallmark of the series since literally Peter Parker’s first appearance.

Whilst Spider-Man’s series (when done right) emphasises family as part of the broader theme of responsibility, Spider-Girl flips the script and instead makes family and the related theme of legacy the primary point of the character and her adventures.

Thematically this makes Spider-Girl an organic continuation of Spider-Man’s story but more than this the nuts and bolts of the series and the universe built around it honestly feel totally believable as a continuation of the Marvel universe, or at least as it existed circa 1998.

All the child and teen heroes of the regular Marvel universe grew up to become the main heroes of Spider-Girl’s day and the surviving old guard adopted mentorship and commander roles within the superhero community.

As for Peter Parker and Mary Jane, if you took them circa 1998, gave them a baby and cut to 15 years later they’d be near identical to their Spider-Girl counterparts.

Various subplots within Spider-Girl also follow through on being an organic continuation of the Marvel universe of the later 1990s. One of her villains, the Black Tarantula, was last seen in the pages of Amazing Spider-Man as a young boy fleeing the influence of his father who wished to make him the new Black Tarantula. John Jameson and Ashley Kafka who were seen dating in the 1990s are shown as married in the world of Spider-Girl. Johnny Storm is the leader of the Fantastic Five which includes a grown up Franklin Richards. Normie Osborn becomes consumed by his family’s legacy of evil and becomes the Green Goblin, etc.

A robust rogue’s gallery

I admit it. Spider-Girl has neither the best nor the most original villains out there.

But I will say this…she at least has  a rogue’s gallery.

In all honestly think about just how many superheroes out there honestly couldn’t say as much. Maybe they have 5 or so villains to call their own and be reliable sources of conflict but by and large try naming 6 villains Carol Danvers has consistently had personal one-on-one encounters with across the decades…besides Moonstone or Doctor Minerva.

Try doing the same for the Black Panther when you exclude Klaw and Killmonger.

You’d not run into such a problem with Mayday though

Super villains are vitally important  to a superhero series and having some to call your own that you can definitively say are your  rogue’s gallery is something to be proud and protective of. As Geoff Johns proved on his run on the Flash, villains are what you make of them. So even if Mayday doesn’t have the best rogue’s gallery she at least had the scope to never run out of opponents to challenge her and rivalries to explore.

Additionally, what made her rogue’s gallery special was it’s healthy mix of relatively original foes, her own spins on classic Spidey enemies and a handful of Spidey’s old foes (for example Hobgoblin).This created a robust villain pool from which to draw stories from as they allowed the creative team to explore similar power sets from a different point of view, pit a Spider character against a whole new type of opponent or explore Mayday and a villain’s identity via contrasting her battles with her fathers’.

It gave the Venom symbiote a character arc

In 1984 Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz introduced the world to what would later be revealed as the Venom symbiote. Though they weren’t involved in every step of its consequent development in their own little universe they gave the symbiote a poignant death scene that totally re-contextualized its older appearances, granting it emotional layers, sympathy and a beautiful character arc. Oh and it was also the first ever example I know of where the symbiote was referred to as female.

It inspired things in the 616 universe and MCU

Much like the return of the Hobgoblin the MC2 universe both pioneered ideas later repeated in the mainstream 616 Marvel universe and also directly inspired concepts later introduced within it as well as the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

These include: making Cassie Lang a superhero called Stinger, giving Jessica Drew a son called Gerald, giving Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne a daughter named Hope, introducing a villain team named the Savage Six, making the Venom symbiote female, granting the symbiote to a supporting cast member and making them a hero, introducing an A.I. Iron Man suit programmed with Tony Stark’s brain patterns, giving Wolverine a daughter, and other stuff I am sure I am forgetting.

It could make lemonade out of terrible lemons

Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz were nothing if not inventive problem solvers during their time on Spider-Girl. In particular they had a knack for making something worthwhile out of a bad situation.

In the 1990s a new female version of Doctor Octopus was introduced and roundly lambasted by the fan base faithful. Was this criticism unfair? Maybe…then again her plans did almost exclusively revolve around nonsense involving virtual reality.

Nevertheless the Spider-Girl creative team dusted off the character and introduced her afresh, doing away with her old schemes and playing her as a more straightforward and down to Earth villain who could easily overpower Mayday. Though she had but a few appearances it ultimately redeemed her character.

More significantly though when Dan Slott as part of Spider-Verse controversially killed off Mayday’s father and established her as now wearing his old costume DeFalco and Frenz decided to do a follow up story that believably and touchingly showcased Mayday’s grieving process and moving on.

Though most were unhappy with the situation that existed they nevertheless respected and appreciated the creative teams’ never flagging efforts to serve the character.

Actually involved the parents instead of killing them off as would be the cliché

Many critics and readers have praised Kamala Khan and other recent superheroes for subverting the typical superhero clichés of having dead parents.

However Spider-Girl is a precursor to many of these modern series. In fact as mentioned above her parents being recurring characters was essentially the wholesale point of the series.

And they weren’t just there as background characters either.

Through subplots such as their new baby and accepting April Parker into their family Peter and Mary Jane were given subplots of their own that were organically woven into the wider fabric of Mayday’s life.

Whilst Peter would on occasion suit up and go into action as Spider-Man, act as a mentor and dispense fatherly advice when necessary, MJ got to be a counterpoint to Peter and had two issues focussing almost exclusively upon her character.

Mayday was a brilliant fusion of her parents

Speaking of her parents, one of the charms of Mayday’s character was how believable she was as the child of Peter and  Mary Jane.

This is evident from her very first appearance.

Like her mother Mayday is very popular and on the higher echelons of the high school social ladder. And yet she is scientifically inclined and friends with the ‘nerds’ as well as the ‘jocks’.

She has Peter’s hair and eye colour and sense of guilt, but her mother’s facial features and outgoing personality.

In a very real sense she is the embodiment of both of her parents’ best qualities.

The first ever digital Marvel series

Not much to say about this one.

Marvel Unlimited is huge now but once upon a time in the earliest days of its predecessor service Spider-Girl blazed the trail as the first and to y knowledge only digital Marvel series.

It was an all-ages female led comic book series at a time when none of those things were strong sellers 

In addition to being an all-ages female led book, Spider-Girl deserves major, major credit for existing as those things within a marketplace actively hostile to them.

These days as much as digital series or female led books might struggle it must be said the playing field is far kinder to such books than it was in the late 1990s and throughout the 2000s.

Outside of some big names like Batgirl or Wonder Woman making a female led book an ongoing success was a profound uphill struggle doomed to fail as Marvel and DC were far less open to the idea that there was an untapped market of female fans, let alone a notable segment of their existing fan bases that were female. In truth there is a case for neither company having figured how to exploit those facts in the near decade since. The point is that female led books were a rarity and expected to fail more often than not. And yet Spider-Girl tried and succeeded in spite of that.

The same was very much true of an all-ages book. Though these had arguably better success in the 2000s then female led books they were still books that lived on borrowed time and yet despite being able to ‘course correct’ this fact the creative team stuck to their principles and resolutely refused to fall in line with the sensibilities of most of other comics of the day which were almost outright rejecting the idea of younger audiences.

The ultimate Spider-Man legacy character

Take your Miles Morales and your Miguel O’Hara’s and go home kids, because Mayday is without a doubt the  greatest legacy character Peter Parker could ever ask for.

What makes Mayday so brilliant in this regard is that because she is Peter’s daughter isn’t just a legacy to Spider-Man but to Peter Parker too.

This provides a totally realistic justification for why she shares so many similarities with him and yet because she’s been raised differently and has her mother’s influence in her too she can zig where Peter zagged.

When she does act like her Dad (or her Mom for that matter) it is satisfying to the readers because we see her parent(s) in her. It’s a little bit like if you have an old friend and then see them in their children and how they act. Because we love Spider-Man, we love seeing Mayday honour his heroic legacy as well as just be like  our old friend in her general personality.

And when she does act differently to how we’d expect Peter to behave, it brilliantly helps shine a light upon who Peter himself is as a character because we are so intimately familiar with who he is. At the same time it subtly clues us into what Peter is like as a parent as he had a hand in shaping Mayday to be the kind of person who’d act in those different ways he would have in similar situations.

This is beautifully demonstrated in Mayday’s debut story where she doesn’t need tragedy to drill the old great power/great responsibility lesson into her head. In fact she doesn’t need to be taught that lesson at all. She intuitively knows it because her Dad made sure  she grasped it better than he did at her age.

Then you have her costume. It is of course Ben Reilly’s old Spider-Man suit and as such was conveniently custom built to work as evoking Spider-Man’s look whilst being its own thing. Which is exactly  what you want out of a legacy character. Something unique that nevertheless honours and reminds you of the original.

The fact that it is also Ben’s design enables Mayday to serve as a dual legacy to both her father and her Uncle Ben.

And there you have it. 20 reasons you should love Mayday. Now head over to Marvel Unlimited and check out her adventures!