CinemaCon Footage Just Introduced Issa Rae’s Jessica Drew in ‘Into the Spider-Verse’ Sequel

Some lucky people were able to see 15 minutes of unfinished footage from the upcoming (but very delayed) Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse sequel, Across the Spider-Verse, at CinemaCon. A lot of good information and character stuff was shared in a Gizmodo article about the footage, but I’m really interesting in one particular cameo featuring Issa Rae’s Jessica Drew.

It was announced that Rae was playing Drew last year, but still it is exciting to hear how she has been introduced so far.

SPOILERS FOR THIS 15 MINUTES OF ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE. DON’T READ IF YOU DON’T WANNA KNOW.

Here is what Gizmodo’s Germain Lussier has described from their viewing of the sneak peak:

“Enter Jessica Drew of Earth-404, played by Issa Rae. She’s riding a motorcycle and Gwen is very excited to see another Spider-Woman. Especially one…that’s pregnant. Five months, to be exact, Jessica says. Gwen asks if she’ll adopt her and then the fight continues. As it continues, Jessica says to Miguel that maybe they should ask for Gwen’s help. He says no and that she knows why he can’t do that—we don’t know what he’s referring to. The fight flies up and outside of the museum into the air where the police helicopter isn’t sure who is the bad guy, Vulture or Miguel. The battle disables the helicopter, and it begins falling. Gwen uses her spider sense to begin to shoot webs to stop its fall. Miguel shoots his own webs and flies through the cockpit to save the pilots. Then Jessica helps to slow the helicopter down which stops right before it hits the ground. Vulture has been captured and the hostages saved.”

Alright, as soon as I saw “pregnant,” I was like—oh, excuse me. But let’s back up to Ms. Drew herself.

Jessica’s character, Spider-Woman, was initially created as a one-off character in order to establish the IP. The comic sold well, and that prompted Marvel to then create a spinoff series starring her. Originally created to be an actual spider evolved into a human, Jessica was eventually retconned to have had memories of being a spider implanted into her mind by HYDRA, because Marvel realized that origin was a little bit … extra.

Marv Wolfman established her antagonists like Morgan le Fay and the Brothers Grimm, but then would leave the series to Mark Gruenwald. Gruenwald leaned into the feelings of isolation that Jessica had as a result of her fear-inducing pheromones. The writers continued to rotate on the series, and eventually they tried to kill her off, but the readers got pissed about this. She would come back as an Avenger and would have appearances throughout the comics—always a very visually iconic character, but struggling with writers who didn’t always know what to do with her.

Still, due to her bad-ass powers and iconic venom blasts, I have always loved Jessica.

Now, back to pregnancy. This did happen in the comics, right after secret war, with Jessica showing up in her second trimester, pregnant with a son who would eventually be named Gary. It is cool to see pregnant Jessica being introduced and showing that a pregnant superhero can still kick ass. I am already looking forward to the maternity wear and hearing Issa Rae bring the character to life.

(via Gizmodo, image: HBO/Marvel)