When is it 'Gwen' enough?

[Spiderfang]

Spider-Gwen, Gwenpool. When is it Gwen enough?



I get it that Spider-Gwen and Gwenpool are just fun "what ifs" and these other versions are just mock cover variants, which actually seem to show some level of self awareness on the writer's parts suggesting that Gwen has become a meme of sorts. Aside from the "what if Gwen lived and got spider powers" scenario that spawned Spider-Gwen, I don't get the appeal of her being made into a version of every other existing character, I dare say that it is worse than replacing a well loved character with a new obscure one. Maybe a few years down the road we will get Rocket Gwen or Gwemora and the Guardians of the Galaxy or the Gwen Pin vs the Gwen-Devil or Black/Gwen-Cat vs Superior-Gwen.

[AngelJD]

That was just a fun new theme month variant cover Marvel does every month but this time to celebrate the success of Spider-Gwen that was unexpected and people loved the issue Edge of the Spider-Verse #2. MJ had the same theme month variants recently as well. From that variant theme covers Gwenpool came to be when that cover became sold out on day one due to consumer interest and a writer pitch an idea that Marvel approved and now due to hard work from a writer and artist team continues today.

Gwen (Gwen Stacy of Earth-65 or Gwen Poole that lives on 616 both who are different characters with different bios, tales, and powers) hasn't 'replaced' anybody. Once agian if a person enjoy a quality story and character good for them. If they like the varous once a month fun variants themes that might pop up that hopefully cost the same price as the regular issue covers are that also their own enjoyment to have.

As far as 'What ifs' go. Those two words hold tons of potential. All heros and villians and scenarios at some point for a writer was a 'What If' in their heads that got written down and the writers hope people will embrace and enjoy what they create.

[Digifiend]

Yeah, Spider-Gwen is basically a What If story as an ongoing (What if Gwen was bitten by the Spider instead of Peter - though that's far from the only difference in Earth-65). Gwenpool was a Gwen Stacy variant on a Deadpool comic, that was so popular they fleshed it out as a unique unrelated character. When Deadpool guested in Gwenpool, he pointed out that unknowledgable readers (people who've never read Gwenpool) would think she's Gwen Stacy. So they actually acknowledged her origins. I think those two will be the end of it.

[Frontier]

I feel like Mary Jane is due her own spinoff at this point to even things up .

[John Ossie]

I feel like Mary Jane is due her own spinoff at this point to even things up .

By day she works at Stark Industries (I'm assuming she still works there LOL) but by night she is MIC BASHING GIRL!

[Sensational C]

People responded so well to both concepts either with art/cosplay/buying their issues making them an ongoing is a nice service to those devoted fans that Marvel can benefit from. I don't think Marvel has announced any more Gwens so the answer is 2, the rest were just for a fun varient month and to see the fan response.

If Mary Jan does gets one, my vote would be the Iron Fist Mary Jane all green really complements her hair.

[WebLurker]

I never really got the "Gwen bandwagon" in the first place, but just because I have no use for a character doesn't mean that others don't. If there's a market for it, I don't see the problem; so long as I'm not forced to get something I don't like, it doesn't harm me and makes others happy.

[AngelJD]

People responded so well to both concepts either with art/cosplay/buying their issues making them an ongoing is a nice service to those devoted fans that Marvel can benefit from. I don't think Marvel has announced any more Gwens so the answer is 2, the rest were just for a fun varient month and to see the fan response.

If Mary Jan does gets one, my vote would be the Iron Fist Mary Jane all green really complements her hair.

For the 'Iron Fist' MJ maybe for the fun of it and keeping with a duo best friends theme Gwen would be 'Power Woman' Gwen or Doctor Gwen. The two gals being best friends and still love rivals while trusting each other to have their backs covered and work well together.
For the Doctor Gwen idea Gwen is a woman of science and plans to earn a doctorate with a strong foundation gets attacked but unlike other versions is not killed but is left crippled. Leaves and eventually comes back as a sorceress who moving around the city transported by her cape and spells and MJ understands partially the mystical side of it do to knowledge of ch'i but in the team dynamic is the physical attacker complementary to the magical 'blaster' side Gwen covers. In time Gwen earns an honorary doctorate but in the field of 'Mystical theology' which officially makes her a 'doctor'.


I saved up and collected both the Gwen and MJ variants because I found the idea fun and loved the various takes and individual flairs that different artists did with both Gwen and MJ (both whom I'm a big fan of).

My personal favorites from the Gwen side was: Hulk Gwen and Doctor Gwen (both from the same artist), Angela Gwen, Wolverine Gwen, and Captain America Gwen.
From the MJ side of the variants made: Phoenix MJ, Iron Fist MJ (green and red are complementary colors (colors directly opposite each other in the color spectrum) thus it works well for our eyes and also why during the holidays you'll seen those colors used often together) Wolverine MJ, Iron Man MJ (though to be honest I like that the artist who did Iron Man Gwen made a more silly yet special design armor for Gwen vs the basic Iron Man armor for MJ whom is shown wearing a special "zero suit" instead), Captain Marvel MJ, and Baby MJ Groot for being cute and funny.

One of the reasons I love this various variants was not just seeing thru 'a window' the various different styles and interpretations of a Gwen and a MJ somewhere within the wide Multiverse that we are peeking at by a cover but sometimes I enjoy thinking up what possible tales those versions might be for fun. Some of the covers sparked that imagination.
I written down a few of these ideas that got sparked by these covers at another site.
In the ever growing Multiverse it's not unreasonable that all characters have or can have somewhere a version who is a 'super' (hero, villain, or has powers but not active in the hero nor villain community of their Earths).

Maybe one Earth has a version Peter has no powers but MJ and Gwen does (and whenever they try to setup a date the gals are always running late)

I know that these variant themes and characters shown 99% of the time starts and ends only with the fun theme covers only but once in awhile interest and fascination and love can be shown by the fandom and more importantly a talented writer in Marvel maybe might get a spark of imagination and motivation and build off from that. If something of high quality comes from these fun themed variants that many people come to enjoy or or drawn into the tale and characters presented then that is fantastic.

Maybe next year the character Black Cat/Felicia will have a June variant Multiverses Felicias as various token heroes and villains or May Parker (so far in the Multiverse May actually has and we seen tales of two Earths where she is a Spider-Woman type hero one where she was bitten and the other she made the technology from a steampunk world).

[Spiderfang]

I never really got the "Gwen bandwagon" in the first place, but just because I have no use for a character doesn't mean that others don't. If there's a market for it, I don't see the problem; so long as I'm not forced to get something I don't like, it doesn't harm me and makes others happy.

Yea I don't really care if people like her or not, I just thought it was weird that it seemed like these artists wanted to experiment and see what all of the super-powered versions of Gwen (who is normally a boring non-powered civilian) would look like.

[WebLurker]

Yea I don't really care if people like her or not, I just thought it was weird that it seemed like these artists wanted to experiment and see what all of the super-powered versions of Gwen (who is normally a boring non-powered civilian) would look like.

Maybe it has to do with her being a character of note in the Spidey franchise, hence being somewhat higher profile among the civilian characters. She's also has a fairly distinct look as well. (Didn't a lot of those Gwen stuff first come out around the time of the ASM movies? Gwen did get a brief popularity boost then, thanks to Emma Stone, so maybe that factored in?)

[Digifiend]

Yeah, Spider-Gwen and all the other stuff was around the time of ASM2.

[AngelJD]

Amazing Spider-Man 2 came out on: May 2, 2014

Edge of the Spider-Verse #2 came out on: September 17, 2014

Gwen Variants came out around June 2015 (but obviously the art had to be made by different artists some time before that thus when Spider-Gwen was a happy surprize hit did Marvel put that theme down set for June)

Gwen-pool came out after the Secret Wars event had ended (or at least planned to end).


Now it's been some time and my memory isn't the best but based on what I read and podcasts about the behind the scenes with everything involving the main story Spider-Verse was thought up years before but between the time it was thought up and the time it was officially written and the art was made some edits came it to improve it.
Edge of the Spider-verse series was a tie in to promote the upcoming Spider-Verse event by showing 5 different tales of different Spider-heroes/villians. One was already known (Noir) while 4 others would be new (one of them being evil and would die in his issue).
When thinking up ideas for the 4 unknowns the teams looked up who was a spider-hero already and who wasn't. Basically everybody from Peter's long time cast has had a spider hero version (MJ has two before the Spider-Verse or Renew Your vows happened) but when looking at the various Gwen Stacys of the Multiverse she didn't yet have one shown. Gaining a fanbase not just from the ones who knew her from the 616 world but also other Multiverse versions such as Ultimate 1610 who was popular/well liked, plus the Spectacular Spider-man series whom many people that was their first 'Gwen Stacy' plus the Amazing Spider-man (first movie of that series) was coming out (as written some ideas had been in the works for some time) and when it came out people love Gwen Stacy acted by Emma Stone. It was selected that four the 4 new spiders shown for the 'Edge of the Spider-Verse' that a Earth where Gwen Stacy was a Spider hero would have a issue. Nothing else was really considered nor future knowledge of her popularity (She isn't found in issue number 1 where Noir was showcased but can be found in issue number 2 of the series)

I believe (and if I'm wrong please tell me as I like to keep it factual plus having references for accuracy as the internet is a amazing tool for research and discovery but also a place full of false rumors, inaccurate expectations, and assumptions taken at face value) according to an interview or some podcast I read or heard a different team then Jason Latour and Robbi Rodriguez was first assigned but the main Spider-verse project took longer to work out and the first team was resigned. Then came Jason Latour and Robbi Rodriguez. Scott wanted Gwen's hero design to look like that famous fashion Gwen of 616 wore on the night she died but with Spider-man color scheme and half mask. The team didn't get that memo. https://www.cbr.com/slott-details-th...d-spider-punk/


Here is a interview done by ComicVine with Latour and Rodriguez:
CV: How did the idea of Spider-Gwen come about? Did Nick Lowe or Dan Slott bring up the concept? Did you come up with her backstory?

JL: I was approached with the idea of doing a SPIDER-VERSE one shot. And after some discussion about other ideas, Nick mentioned that Dan had written down a single sentence that said “Gwen Stacy as Spider-Woman”. So that was the prompt. The more I thought about it the more I liked it.

Given how prevalent she is in other media, and the new context it put her death in... it just seemed like there would be a lot of catharsis in seeing her get to be Spider-Woman. Almost like she was owed it. And I knew it would be a lot of fun to see this world. Robbi and Rico [Renzi] were my first choice to help me do that. So when Nick approved them, it just seemed natural to pull from things we shared in common. Gwen as a drummer and an aspiring artist seemed like a neat parallel to the struggle of being Spider-Woman. In either role she’d be unsure of how much of herself belonged to the world and how much she should covet and hold onto. Her father being a cop was the perfect fly in that ointment. It was all just very organic.

CV: How did this amazing costume come about?

RR: When given the chance to redesign that suit, I really rolled up my sleeves to make something that was cool to look at as well as fun to draw since I was going to draw it over and over. That's why I tried to keep as minimalist as possible. I also wanted a look that even if someone draws her in an objective manner, it will just look wrong. I'm not against cheesecake, but doing a design that forces the hand to step away from it is just refreshing in my opinion.

CV: Have you seen the huge number of artists drawing Spider-Gwen after only one appearance was released?

RR: It's wild to see. When I first saw them come in, it made my shake my fist in the air and yell "f-yeah MF!" But that also got me cut off from the bartender.

I'm so appreciative all of the fans love.

CV: Did you also come up with the color choice for her costume?

RR: I didn't want to do the traditional Spidey colors and I wanted to give it that streetwear look. I figure that magenta, teal, and white worked best. The black was my Alex Toth influence so I can play around with in solids and let the reader's head fill in the gaps if I place her in a full on black background.




Another interview this time by PopcultHQ:

PopcultHQ: How did she come about?

Robbi Rodriquez: “Well it started out with Dan Slott and who he wanted put into the Spider-Verse, Nick (Lowe) contacted Jason (Latour) and Jason shot some ideas back and forth with me and we shot some ideas back and forth at each other. That got the ball rolling on the character. We knew it was not going to be Gwen. It was Gwen by name only, it would be a totally new character. We built up that character and built up Mary Jane. We built up more on Gwen and the relationship between her Dad and that type of thing. The ball kept rolling and rolling and rolling, totally organic from the beginning. So we shot the idea past Nick, and he was cool with it, we’re going to do it in the Spider-Verse and it will be one and done. I was going on to do Moon Knight but Spider-Gwen just blew up!”

[DieHard200904]

I never really got the "Gwen bandwagon" in the first place, but just because I have no use for a character doesn't mean that others don't. If there's a market for it, I don't see the problem; so long as I'm not forced to get something I don't like, it doesn't harm me and makes others happy.

Yep, pretty much describes my sentiments.

[WebLurker]

Yep, pretty much describes my sentiments.

Yeah, the only harm Spider-Gwen has done me so far was force me to buy a Spider-Gwen trade to get an All-New Wolverine comic (it was the only trade that issue was found in), but that's the fault of Marvel, not the series itself, and that's pretty inoffensive in the grand scheme of things (even if the Spider-Gwen book is a blight on my All-New Wolverine collection ).

[Child of the Atom]

All these pointless multiple Gwens just makes a mockery of her death IMO