Spider-Girl (Mayday Parker)
Spider-Girl (May "Mayday" Parker) is a superheroine appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. She has been referred to as both Spider-Girl and Spider-Woman. The character appears in the MC2 universe. The character was created by Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz as the teenage daughter of Peter Parker (Spider-Man) and Mary Jane Watson, and first appeared in What If #105 (February 1998). She later acquired her own ongoing comic book, Spider-Girl, written by DeFalco and drawn by Frenz and Pat Olliffe, which was the longest-running superhero book with a lead female character ever published by Marvel before being relaunched as The Amazing Spider-Girl, and later The Spectacular Spider-Girl.
May Parker
Spider-Girl
What If #105 (February 1998)
Tom DeFalco (writer)
Ron Frenz (artist)
May "Mayday" Parker
Human mutate
Spidey, Spider-Girl Red, Spider-Woman
- Superhuman strength, speed, agility, stamina, durability, reflexes/reaction and endurance
- Precognitive spider-sense, ability to stick to any surface and webbing ability
- Bio-magnetism manipulation
- Ability to sense the weak points in her enemies, and repel objects and people
The character made her cinematic debut in the 2023 feature film Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, with an infant Mayday depicted as the daughter of Peter B. Parker and his universe's Mary Jane Watson.[2]
Publication history[edit]
Spider-Girl first appeared in a one-shot story in the ongoing series What If. Following positive fan response to the concept, Spider-Girl and two other series (A-Next and J2) set in the same alternate future universe were launched under the MC2 imprint.[3] Although each of these titles were slated to be 12-issue limited series, Spider-Girl's initial sales justified their continuation as ongoing titles.
After initial interest, Spider-Girl drew low sales. The book's active fan base convinced Marvel to revoke several cancellation announcements. Reprints of the series in digest size trade paperbacks sold well. Marvel Associate Editor Nick Lowe revealed in a Nov. 2005 interview that "Spider-Girl, for the first time, is completely safe from cancellation."[4]
Despite Lowe's statement, Marvel announced that No. 100 would be the title's final issue. The book was relaunched as The Amazing Spider-Girl, with issue #0 appearing in Oct. 2006.
On October 11, 2008, Tom DeFalco announced that The Amazing Spider-Girl would be canceled with issue #30, though he revealed that, due to the company's love for the character, she could possibly be given a sixteen-page back-up strip in The Amazing Spider-Man Family.[5] On November 8, 2008, Marvel EIC Joe Quesada confirmed that Spider-Girl would become a feature in the monthly anthology magazine Amazing Spider-Man Family. The series would replace the feature Mr. and Mrs. Spider-Man, written by DeFalco, which served as a prequel series to the Spider-Girl universe.
On March 18, 2009, Marvel announced that Spider-Girl would continue publication as The Spectacular Spider-Girl, a web-comic released through Marvel's Digital Comics Unlimited.[6] The title would continue to be simultaneously published in paper form within Amazing Spider-Man Family. The Amazing Spider-Man Family #5 (published April 2009) through No. 8 (July 2009) contained these Spider-Girl stories until the title's cancellation with issue #8.
The new The Spectacular Spider-Girl stories were then contained in Web of Spider-Man. This lasted for seven issues before being moved to its own four-issue limited series, Spectacular Spider-Girl, which tied up most of the series plot threads. This was followed by one last Spider girl tale, Spider-Girl: The End.
In November 2010, a new Spider-Girl series was launched that was unconnected to the MC2 universe. The MC2 Spider-Girl title was cancelled, having surpassed publisher expectations for longevity. The new series featured a new character, Anya Corazon, whose adventures occurred on Earth 616. The series was canceled after only eight issues. No official reason was given for the cancellation. This character returned for a "Spider Island" limited series.[7]
Mayday and her family were reintroduced, as part of the Spider-Verse crossover event, in the eighth issue of the third volume of The Amazing Spider-Man, which was the first story with Mayday to be written by Dan Slott, the first time a fully-grown Mayday appeared in the pages of her father's flagship title, and the first story to highlight the "Spider-Marriage" in the regular comics since 2007's controversial One More Day.
She appeared again, handled by the original creative team, in July 2015 as part of Marvel's Secret Wars event, serving as a backup story in Christos Gage's Spider-Island. She also returned for the sequel event to Spider-Verse, Spider-Geddon. Shortly after her father reunited with her family, Mayday reverted back to her original Spider-Girl codename. In November 2022, a new serialized adventure starring Mayday was launched on the Marvel Unlimited Infinity Comics app, with the story penned by Stephanie Williams.
Powers and abilities[edit]
May Parker inherited many of her abilities from her father, Peter Parker. May possesses superhuman strength but has less than her father, can leap several stories high, and can cover the width of a city block. Spider-Girl's reflexes are also heightened to levels well beyond that of an ordinary human. She heals somewhat faster than a normal human, and is more agile than Spider-Man.
Spider-Girl can adhere to almost any surface through a bio-magnetic field her body generates, allowing her to scale the sides of a building, just like a spider. Wall-crawling doesn't come as naturally to May as Peter; she has to concentrate to keep herself from slipping off surfaces. In addition to adhering to surfaces, May can also repel herself like an opposing magnet, or she can repulse and adhere another object or person through a shared medium. For example, she can cause a person to stick to a wall they're touching just by touching that same wall and willing them to, or she can just as easily violently push them away.
May Parker has inherited a "spider-sense", a clairvoyance that warns her of danger, that is somewhat more powerful and reliable than her father's. It tells her the direction a threat is coming from with a high level of accuracy. Through intensive training, she learned to fight blindfolded using only her spider-sense. She can use it to spot weaknesses in an opponent and use them to her advantage. She can also sense mundane threats or observations like her father, but unlike him, she can use it to sense deception. Her spider-sense is also capable of differentiating between various threats, allowing May to "recognize" a familiar danger. By touching her father's clone, Kaine, she experienced a shared precognitive vision, but she does not normally have that ability.
May also has mechanical web-shooters based which are on Ben Reilly's web-shooter design, but longer and narrower. They can fire impact webbing and metal needles called "Stingers". May rarely uses the stingers, thinking them to be "too brutal". Her mobile phone is modified to attach to one of her web-shooters, and looks like one of its cartridges. She occasionally uses spider-tracers, but as they are tuned to her father's spider-sense and not hers, she needs a receiver to detect them. She wears a skin tight spandex unitard which she was uncomfortable with at first because of its revealing characteristics but has grown accustomed to it and even enjoys wearing it as she has been quoted as saying "it feels like a second skin."
Spider-Girl once lost her powers due to an electric shock. However, she borrowed the Green Goblin equipment from Normie Osborn until she regained them.
May has also received martial arts training from the Ladyhawks and Elektra Natchios, as well as being drilled in the use of her powers by her father.
Other versions[edit]
Prime Earth (Earth-616)[edit]
May Parker also existed in the primary Earth-616 timeline in which most Marvel Comics are set.
Mary Jane became pregnant at the beginning of the Clone Saga. Impending fatherhood was one of the main reasons Peter retired as Spider-Man during that story-line, passing the mantle to Ben Reilly. However, at the end of the story, Mary Jane was poisoned by Alison Mongrain, an agent of the Green Goblin, and the baby was stillborn (or seemed to be, as Mongrain took the infant away with her).[28] The stillbirth of his child, combined with the death of Ben Reilly at the hands of the Green Goblin that same night, prompts Peter to retake the Spider-Man identity.
There were hints during the "Identity Crisis" story-line, one of Tom DeFalco's last story-lines on the title, that Baby May would be returned.[29] Instead, the subplot was dropped, and a few issues later DeFalco was replaced by Howard Mackie and John Byrne. Under that team, Aunt May was brought back instead.[30] In a flashback in Spider-Girl #49, an alternative version of this story was presented, with the younger May returned instead of the elder.
However, baby May and her parents were never reunited in Marvel's main continuity. Editors repeatedly stated that the baby died, or at the very least would never be seen again; the child was considered a major factor in the aging of the characters. In Marvel Knights Spider-Man issue #9, Mac Gargan, while speaking of Norman Osborn, states "He kills your unborn child, you kill his son". To date, this is the most conclusive evidence of the infant's fate.
The action in The Amazing Spider-Man #439 (Defalco's last on the title) takes place 1,000 years in the future. Two archaeologists stumble across relics belonging to Spider-Man (such as his web-shooters). They speculate on his career, and discuss other heroes who were inspired by him, Spider-Girl and Spider-Man 2099.
In several interviews at Comic Book Resources following the publication of "One More Day," Joe Quesada mentioned that the Spider-Girl title would be the ideal place for disgruntled readers to follow the development of an aged, married Peter and M.J. as they raise a family.[31] Quesada's comments were followed by a feature article on Spider-Girl with an interview with Tom Defalco, who acknowledged that Quesada was a fan of the character and the title.[32] Moreover, during the 'One More Day/Brand New Day' story arc, Peter and Mary Jane have visions of a very young girl with red hair, who, after the deal is made with Mephisto, is revealed to be the daughter they would never have now that the deal is done. Despite this, Quesada has stated that he feels the MC2 universe is the natural progression of the characters.
During the "Sinister War" arc, it is revealed that Mephisto erased the Parkers' marriage to ensure that their daughter does not exist, as she would one day end his eventual reign over the Earth.[33]
Earth X[edit]
There are two variant and alternate universe versions of Spider-Girl. One was raised by a Ben Reilly who survived after her father died during her childhood, as seen What If? vol. 2 #86, and later revealed in the Paradise X: Heralds miniseries. Another version of Spider-Girl is actually Venom, who is seen in the Earth X miniseries and its two sequels, Universe X and Paradise X.
The Venom version of May Parker is later recruited by Kang the Conqueror as part of a scheme against the Apocalypse Twins and the Avengers Unity Squad.[34]
The world of MC2 is designated as "Earth-982". The world where Spider-Girl was raised by Ben Reilly is known as "Earth-1122" and the world featuring Venom as Spider-Girl along with the other heroes of the Earth X saga is known as "Earth-9997".
Spider-Man: Clone Saga[edit]
In 2009, Marvel published a miniseries based on the original plans for the Clone Saga. As in the original Clone Saga, Allison Mongraine kidnaps the infant May after she is born. However, the circumstances are a bit different. Mary Jane and Peter actually get to hold May before she is stolen, and Mongraine later hands the baby over to Kaine (who is working for the Green Goblin in this continuity). Holding the baby in his arms makes Kaine begin to doubt the Goblin's plans. His shadowy boss (later revealed to be Harry Osborn) notes to Kaine "You'll have to kill her if things go wrong."[35] At the end of the series, Kaine returns May to Peter and Mary Jane.
Spectacular Spider-Girl[edit]
In a time-travel arc taking place in the UK-based publication The Spectacular Spider-Man, aimed at a much younger audience, Peter meets a Spider-Girl whilst trailing the Sandman in the future. With the aid of Spider-Girl and H.E.R.B.I.E., Peter defeats the Sandman and returns to his own time with H.E.R.B.I.E. At the conclusion of the strip, Spider-Girl returns home to her parents, revealed as Peter and Mary Jane Parker, and unmasks to reveal the features of Mayday Parker. Mayday tells her parents of her experience with a "new Spider-Man", before Peter assures her that the individual she met was a past version of himself. Peter also reveals in the conversation that, like his MC2 counterpart, he was forced to abandon his career as Spider-Man due to a leg injury. This continuity is separate from both MC2 and 616, making this the second continuity to adapt the MC2 version of how Peter relinquished the Spider-Man identity.
Mayday would again cross paths with her father's past self when Lady Octopus travels back in time to assassinate him. Mayday teams with her father but does not reveal her identity to him, despite desperately wanting to, for fear it may damage the timeline. The two defeat Lady Octopus and Mayday returns to the future.
Swiney-Girl[edit]
Tom Defalco briefly returned to his other Marvel creation Spider-Ham, an alternate version of Spider-Man that is a pig, in 2009 and 2010. Within those stories he introduced an alternate version of Spider-Girl known as Swiney-Girl. May "Mayday" Porker has similar background history with Spider-Girl, with her being the daughter of Peter Porker and Mary Crane Watsow, her father losing his leg after the final battle between Norman Osbird/Green Gobbler, and saving her father as Swiney-Girl from the grandson of the Green Gobbler, Norman Osbird Jr.[36]
In other media[edit]
Television[edit]
A character inspired by Mayday Parker as Spider-Girl named Petra Parker appears in the Ultimate Spider-Man four-part episode "The Spider-Verse", voiced by Olivia Holt. She is a gender-swapped incarnation of Peter Parker / Spider-Man from an alternate universe.
Film[edit]
Two incarnations of Mayday Parker appear in Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023), with one being the infant daughter of Peter B. Parker and his universe's Mary Jane Watson (voiced by Michelle Ruff) and the second being an adult with Heterochromia iridum operating as Spider-Girl and a member of Miguel O'Hara's Spider-Society.[2]