We had a bit of coverage on Marvel’s books announcements — your “Uncanny X-Men” Annuals, your “Angela” ongoings, your SHIELD books, your “Star Wars” et al — , but one that sneaked through the cracks is that Marvel is doing a new “Spider-Woman.” Thankfully, because that means I get to write about it now!
Marvel has seemingly wanted a “Spider-Woman” book for some time now. When the character returned to popularity in Bendis’ “New Avengers,” she was quickly featured in her own mini-series (illustrated by the Luna Brothers) before an attempt at an ongoing was made, spinning out of “Secret Invasion” and featuring Alex Maleev on art. While the book was cancelled, rumors have persisted that Marvel was still interested in featuring Spider-Woman in her own title — reaching somewhat of a fever pitch when “Captain Marvel” disappeared from solicitations and “Avengers Assemble” was cancelled, as rumors began circulating that Kelly Sue DeConnick would be writing a new “Spider-Woman” book spinning out of both.
However, none of that ended up being true. Yet, in my opinion, there’s still a rather large silver lining here. Spinning out of “Spider-Verse,” the series will written by Dennis Hopeless and illustrated Greg Land and will follow Jessica both during and after the event, though much of the plot and direction of the book is being kept under wraps. The series will largely feature Jessica on the run, though, and hopping through multiple alternate universes as she essentially goes on missions for the “Spider-Verse” ‘war.’
What’s interesting about the book is that the series will team Spider-Woman up with Silk, the new Spider-character unveiled in “Amazing Spider-Man” #4 as part of its “Original Sin” tie-in, though she was teased as early as issue #1 and revealed some time ago in a news post. This essentially means that Hopeless has the chance to define Silk for the ongoing Marvel Universe, which is an interesting prospect. It’s essentially similar to the idea of Kid Loki; introduced by Matt Fraction in “Thor,” but defined by Gillen in “Journey into Mystery.” (At least, that’s teh vibe I’m getting from reading about the series.) And though the series will be titled “Spider-Woman,” the book will feature Silk for at least the first major arc of the series as a foil for Jessica.
So it’s a solo team-up book, written by Dennis Hopeless — which to me is a good thing, as I’m quite a fan of his work. In fact, if nothing else, Hopeless does seem quite perfect for the role, as I’ve written about his strong voice before — and I imagine it’d fit well with Jessica here. There’s also quite a lot for Hopeless to work with in terms of the character, as he notes in an interview with CBR:
The coolest thing about Jessica is that she has such a deep, dark history, just about anything goes. She was abducted and replaced by an invading Skrull Queen. She worked for both HYDRA and S.H.I.E.L.D. She’s spent time as a private eye, a super hero and a Skrull-hunting Agent of S.W.O.R.D. The sky is pretty much the limit. All she has to do is survive this war.
Of course, many comic readers are quite apprehensive about Greg Land’s work. Quite often a point of contention for fans, Land is an artwork with consistent work at Marvel — both in terms of output and in terms of quality. Land’s penchant for hyper-realism in his art has turned many readers off, let alone the consistent visible tracing elements. However, when writers collaborate and write towards Land’s strengths — such as what Kieron Gillen did in “Iron Man’s” opening arc, told explicitly through Tony Stark-Vision (ie all glitz and glam) — the product can be quite great.
I would personally hope for the best with this series. I can’t imagine Hopeless won’t do the character justice, at the very least.
“Spider-Woman” will debut later this year with Marvel’s “Spider-Verse” event, perhaps in November or October.
