Across the Spider-Verse: Jessica Drew’s Redesign is Based on the First Spider-Woman from the 70s

Jessica Drew is the most popular incarnation of Spider-Woman, and though she was usually portrayed as a white brunette from London in the comics, the upcoming Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse has decided to revamp the character into a black woman.  

Though I can imagine some ‘fans’ already crying about ‘woke-ism’ changing the character’s race, her appearance is actually a very deep-cut Easter Egg. Some fans have pointed out that Jess Drew in the film looks a lot like the first Spider-Woman, Val the Librarian, who debuted in the comics back in the 70s. Check this out:

It seems that they made a Jessica Drew variant inspired by Valerie, judging by the webs and look of the character! https://t.co/Zp9vT1OGIR pic.twitter.com/g8QvEzUhT3

— best of spider-woman (@bestofjessdrew) December 13, 2022

They even have Jess fighting the Vulture in her clip, the very same Spidey rogue she took on in the comic she debuted in.

Admittedly Val never really took off as a character, but she remains to be the first Spider-Woman. So I guess it’s pretty fitting that they have her as some kind of variant of Jessica Drew as a kind of melding of the two characters. They even made her pregnant in the film (which was confirmed by producers Phil Lord and Chris Miller).

Though Into the Spider-verse was already pretty wild with their concept of multiple Spider-Men, Across the Spider-Verse just ups the ante with all the different ones we saw in the trailer. We don’t know if all of them will be able to play a significant role, but I absolutely can’t wait for the movie just based on how much I loved the first one.

Catch Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse when it premieres in theaters