[UPDATE TO THIS STORY]: Marvel and Sony announced that Spider-Man will be returning to the MCU for at least two films. It’s a landmark agreement between the two studios to help with the tensions between the two of them. You can read about that story here.

After news of Sony and Marvel’s reconciliation, Sony dropped a bomb by announcing a Madame Web movie. With titles like Morbius and Venom 2 coming next year, Madame Web adds one more name to spider-mix.

Madame Web: Comic Book Origins

Cassandra Web is usually depicted as an elderly blind woman suffering from a neurological disease. It’s a disease that makes it difficult for her to breath and move. Altogether, she has to be connected life support machine in the shape of a spider web. She has precognitive abilities that allow her to see the future. Also, another one of the great powers she is known for is telepathy.

She made her comic book debut in The Amazing Spiderman #210 in 1980. Teaming up with the web-slinger for the first time in order to find a kidnapped journalist. Her next edition had Spider-Man save her from juggernaut after he had ripped her from her life support. Her story lines did not only had her deal with Spider-Man and the X-Men, however. Some editions had her as Charlott Witter, a/k/a Spider-Woman’s grandmother.

This issue has her take part in a ritual called ” Gathering Five” giving her immorality, youth and lastly curing her of her horrid disease. Lastly, she made a comeback in The Amazing Spider-Man #600. Looking into Peter Parker’s future Madame Web sees someone “unraveling the web of fate,” warning that ” they’re hunting spiders.” This issue ends up with her evident death and finally, her passing of the mantel to Julia Carpenter, the second Spider-Woman.

Appearances

Madame Web
Image: Marvel

TELEVISION – Madame Web made her first television appearance in Spider-Man animated series in 1994. She was tasked with testing Spider-Men from other realities to get them to try and stop Spider-Carnage from destroying the multi-verse. Peter agrees with the promise that Web would help him find his Mary Jane. In 2016 another version of Madame Web was introduced as a young woman by the name of Julia Carpenter. This showed her demonstrating her precognitive powers, this time in a suit and in battle.

GAMES– Madame Web first was in Questprobe in 1984. A graphical adventure video game designed by Scott Adams and developed by Adventure International. She didn’t make an appearance but her existence was made known by The Human Torch mocking Spider-Man, saying that she is faster than him.

Finally, Madame Web made her real first appearance in Spider-man Shattered Dimensions. Game published by Activision in 2010, written by Dan Slott. In it, she summoned four Spider-Men from other realities to assist her in bringing all realities back to balance. The team Spider-Men included The Amazing Spider-Man, Spider-Man Noir, Spider-Man 2099 and Ultimate Spider-Man.

My Thoughts on Madame Web

Sony has not been one to bite their tongues when it comes to their upcoming projects. With big names such as Venom and Morbius being on the works we actually got a title that deals with a new upcoming project that involves our neighborhood friendly Spider-Man. Cassandra Web’s introduction to the Sony Spider-Verse could open the door to the multi-verse being introduced to the movies. Following the success of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, Sony gave us an animated taste of the numerous possibilities they can play around within the multi-verse. The movie featured several Spider-People including two Peter Parkers, Spider-Gwen, Spider-Man Noir, Miles Morales, Penny Parker, and Peter Porker.

Madame Web could be Sony’s way to open up this big Spider-verse, setting it up for more upcoming projects involving multiple Spider-Men. For example, Sony has the rights of all the Spider-Man movies made, those include Sam Raimi’s trilogy starring Toby Maguire and Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man films starring Andrew Garfield. Sony has the upper hand owning the Spider-Man movie rights, but we could see more collaboration between Marvel and Sony on this. They could use this to their advantage by making an Avengers level threat movie that features their Spider-Men saving their realities. It would be a great way to bridge the gap between Sony’s universe and Marvel’s.