Marvel’s Spider-Man is unbound to any established Spider-Man lore, meaning that it can have its cake and eat it too with whatever content it would like to have. Some characters definitely share commonalities with previous iterations and there are explicit comic book references interwoven in certain situations, such as the imagery shown when Peter Parker frees civilians from rubble in the Fisk Tower siege. Likewise, Marvel’s Spider-Man could choose to inherit these comic book storylines fully if it wanted to, but Insomniac seems intent to carve its own path for the character instead while splicing these references in for fan service.
Now that Marvel’s Spider-Man 2’s principal characters have been revealed, there are a few implications that can be made about where its story may go and what it might reference from particular comic book runs. Because Peter has the black suit and Kraven appears as a villain, for example, it is easy to assume that Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 could find a way to represent Kraven’s Last Hunt. There are already a lot of moving parts to Marvel’s Spider-Man 2’s narrative and a lot probably hasn’t even been hinted at yet, but Kraven’s datapad and its map of potential prey contenders in New York City point toward a couple of comic book moments the sequel could replicate between Black Cat and Venom.
Amazing Spider-Man’s Venom Interrogates Black Cat
In one of the more brutal if not overlooked acts of violence related to Venom in the comics, Amazing Spider-Man #316 has Venom savagely beat Felicia Hardy’s Black Cat for information about Spider-Man’s whereabouts. Unlike comic book action that can often seem tame on the page, these panels showed horrendous violence with Black Cat having her face broken and slammed into a surface, and she is left kneeling on the floor with her costume in tatters.
The beating doesn’t continue, but it leaves an incredible impact on Todd McFarlane’s art as the hulking villain bends down to Black Cat while holding her hair in his fist. Because Black Cat was a profound part of Marvel’s Spider-Man’s DLC and has been shown on Kraven’s datapad in Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, it would not be surprising to find her playing an integral role in the sequel.
Therefore, there is a huge opportunity for Peter to talk to Black Cat while he wears the symbiote, and for Venom to interrogate Black Cat similarly once the symbiote is removed from Peter. It would be horrifying to see this level of brutality from Venom and cement him as a truly malicious villain in Marvel’s Spider-Man2, especially now that fans have likely grown fond of Insomniac’s interpretation of Black Cat.
Spectacular Spider-Man’s Black Cat Sewed Peter a Cloth Version of the Black Suit
Culminating the symbiote run and celebrating its tenure, Spectacular Spider-Man #99 has Felicia make a cloth rendition of the black suit for Peter, allowing the character to continue wearing the now-iconic costume without needing to worry about how it is parasitically affecting him. In Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, this would be an excellent idea for multiple reasons: Felicia has already gifted Peter a black-and-red Dark suit in Marvel’s Spider-Man for completing all the open-world stakeout activities, and her own take on the symbiote suit’s design would make for another unique suit that players could potentially earn by completing a side quest of hers.
It’s unknown how Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 plans to handle the symbiote’s removal from gameplay, but Felicia making a similar suit for Peter would be a great way to commemorate it and also pay homage to the comics. This scene might never take place if the symbiote is not abandoned, however, and it would be interesting to see how Insomniac’s Felicia responds to Peter’s emotionally compromised state compared to how she responds to him and the entire symbiote ordeal in the comics.
Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 launches on October 20, exclusively for PlayStation 5.
