DC Comics recently announced that its Infinite Frontier initiative would launch in March of 2021 and see exciting new creative teams assigned to its current catalog of ongoing titles. This shake-up is intended to propel the publisher’s roster of legendary comic book superheroes into the present-day narrative following the events of Dark Nights: Death Metal and DC Future State. One such compelling development will appear in the pages of Batman/Superman with the comic book debut of Superman’s first cinematic supervillain: The long over-looked Spider Lady.
Superman made his live-action silver screen premiere in 1948 in a 15-part film serial released by Columbia Pictures. Simply entitled Superman, the serial established its story with three introductory chapters and then gave way to subsequent segments each ending in a cliffhanger. Superman screened mostly as matinees and was a commercial success, launching the careers of Kirk Alyn and Noel Neill who played Clark Kent and Lois Lane. Interestingly enough, Superman’s writing team passed up such contemporary comic book adversaries as the Ultra-Humanite or Prankster opting instead to create an original enemy. Thus, the Spider Lady was born.
The Spider Lady is the queen of Metropolis’ criminal underworld and commands a virtual army of mafia henchmen. Through a series of underhanded dealings and timely murders, the Spider Lady obtains the powerful Relativity Reducer Ray. While the serial remains ambiguous about the ray’s exact purpose, it was developed by the United States Government and is coveted by criminal elements. By the end of the fifteenth and final installment, the Man of Tomorrow has saved Lois and foiled the plans of the evil villainess. As the credits roll, the Spider Lady fades into obscurity. The character would vanish for the next seventy-two years.
DC’s Infinite Frontier initiative will kick off with Infinite Frontier #0 on March 2 while the Spider Lady will make her triumphant return in Batman/Superman #16 three weeks later per March Solicitations. Gene Luen Yang, Ivan Reis and Danny Miki are the creative team responsible for the character’s imminent revival. While initial cover art depicts the Spider Lady’s costume as very similar to that of the original, how similar the modern interpretation of the character will actually be to her onscreen counterpart is as of yet unclear.
DC Comics’ Infinite Frontier portends a return to basics for Superman. The reintroduction of a legacy character like Spider Lady is an example of this purification. In the 1948 serial, the Spider Lady was portrayed by Carol Forman, an actress known almost exclusively for playing antagonists. This was unusual for a female performer of the period. Long-time Superman fans should be thankful not only for a return to the Man of Steel’s roots, but also for the reemergence of a groundbreaking character who subverted gender expectations almost eighty years before that was cool.
Source: GamesRadar