Ghost-Spider, Spider-Woman, Gwen Stacy, Spider-Gwen - whatever you call her, she's about to be the hero of a new Marvel multiversal event story titled Gwen-Verse that brings together multiple variants of Gwen Stacy from around the Marvel multiverse for a team up in 2022.
Weirdly enough, Ghost-Spider (the latest codename used by the alt-Earth version of Gwen Stacy who is a superhero) debuted in Spider-Verse, a story about numerous versions of Spider-Man from different worlds all working together to face a murderous threat, meaning that with the onset of her own Gwen-Verse event, she's coming full circle at Marvel Comics.
Gwen-Verse will be a five-issue limited series from writer Tim Seeley and artist Jodi Nishijima with character designs by Peach Momoko. Each issue will showcase different versions of Gwen Stacy from around the Multiverse who follow in the footsteps of heroes other than Spider-Man.
To wit, David Nakayama's cover for Gwen-Verse #1 shows Ghost-Spider front-and-center, along with mashed-up versions of Gwen combined with Captain America, Wolverine, Iron Man, Thor, Captain Marvel, and even her Night-Gwen/Nightbird incarnation from the recent Heroes Reborn event.
You may notice the premise of Gwen-Verse's mash-ups of Gwen Stacy and other Marvel heroes comes hot on the heels of a similar set of mash-up stories for Gwen's long time ally Miles Morales, with the newly announced title What If?: Miles Morales focusing on alternate reality versions of Miles who follow in the footsteps of heroes such as Captain America and Wolverine, rather than Spider-Man.
In other words, basically the exact same concept, but featuring Miles instead of Gwen.
To go along with the concept, artist Greg Land has created variant covers for all five issues of Gwen-Verse which feature some of the mash-ups from the title. Here's a gallery of all five Land variants:
Marvel's penchant for mashing up its characters, especially on variant covers, is nothing new - the publisher has embraced the idea as part of its ongoing philosophy of the 'illusion of change.'
In fact, Marvel mashing up Gwen Stacy with other heroes isn't even a brand new idea, even beyond Spider-Gwen, as the publisher created a series of variant covers a few years ago featuring similar Gwen Stacy mash-ups.
That series of variant covers eventually led to the creation of Gwenpool by Chris Bachalo, a mash-up of Gwen Stacy and Deadpool who later became her own totally separate character named Gwen Poole, who has since become part of the mainstream Marvel Universe.
And in that same vein, Marvel is celebrating Gwen-Verse with a line of variant covers mashing up Gwen Stacy with different members of the X-Men for many of the publisher's February 2022 titles.
Here's a gallery of all the X-Gwen (couldn't have gone with 'Gwex-Men'?) variant covers:
And here's a list of all the titles on which the X-Gwen covers will appear, along with the artists who drew them:
- Amazing Spider-Man #88 - 'Gwen Grey' by Francesco Mattina (February 2)
- Captain Marvel #37 - 'Gwenstique' by Rian Gonzalez (February 9)
- Ghost Rider #1 - 'Gwenna Frost' by Taurin Clarke (February 9)
- Moon Knight #8 - 'Gwenclops' by Todd Nauck (February 9)
- Devil's Reign #4 - 'Gwen Stacy as Psylocke' by Betsy Cola (February 9)
- Avengers #53 - 'Gwen Stacy as Kitty Pryde' by Leonardo Romero and Jordie Bellaire (February 9)
- Hulk #4 - 'Rogue Gwen' by Nick Bradshaw (February 16)
- Iron Fist #1 - 'Gwemino' by Nick Dragotta (February 16)
- Shang-Chi #9 - 'Gwenbit' by Tony Fleecs (February 16)
- She-Hulk #2 - 'Gwenverine' by David Nakayama (February 16)
- Thor #22 - 'Gwen Stacy as Angel' by Marc Aspinall (February 16)
- X-Men #8 - Gwen Stacy as Boom-BOom' by Logan Lubera and Rachelle Rosenberg (February 16)
- Black Panther #4 - 'Phoenix Gwen' by Phil Noto (February 23)
- Miles Morales: Spider-Man #35 - 'Captain Gwendolyne' by Pete Woods (February 23)
- Silver Surfer Rebirth #2 - 'Polaris, Mistress of Gwenetism' by Rod Reis (February 23)
- Iron Man #17 - 'Gwen Stacy as Banshee' by Ernanda Souza (February 23)
- Fantastic Four #41 - 'Gwen Stacy as Jubilee' by Rickie Yagawa and Emi Fuji (March 2)
As for the mainstream Marvel Universe Gwen Stacy, who remains as dead as ever in the current timeline, she had a flashback title of her own that's been missing in action since early 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic caused supply chain disruptions that necessitated many publishers rearranging their schedules for several months.
Gwen-Verse #1 goes on sale in February 2022. Stay tuned to Newsarama for Marvel's full February 2022 solicitations, coming later this month.
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