{"id":34027,"date":"2023-06-04T19:56:00","date_gmt":"2023-06-04T19:56:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=34027"},"modified":"2023-07-02T07:53:40","modified_gmt":"2023-07-02T07:53:40","slug":"across-the-spider-verse-and-the-latino-legacy-of-spider-man","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/across-the-spider-verse-and-the-latino-legacy-of-spider-man\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Across the Spider-Verse\u2019 and the Latino legacy of\u00a0Spider-Man"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Regina Marie Mills<\/a>, Texas A&M University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a Latino literature and media scholar, a lifelong gamer and a Guatemalan-American girl whose dad read her comics every night, I quickly became a fan and then scholar of Miles Morales<\/a>, the Afro-Puerto Rican Spider-Man who first appeared in comic book form in 2011\u2019s \u201cUltimate Fallout #4<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just seven years after his introduction, Morales swung into theaters in \u201cSpider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse<\/a>,\u201d a visually stunning, 3D-animated film that won an Academy Award for best animated feature<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, its sequel, \u201cSpider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse<\/a>,\u201d features two Latino Spider-Men in starring roles. Irish-Latino Spider-Man Miguel O\u2019Hara of \u201cSpider-Man 2099,\u201d voiced by Oscar Isaac, is jumping into the fray. And although he was a well-received Spider-Man as a Marvel comic book character in the 1990s, there\u2019s a good chance you\u2019ve never heard of him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Breaking the mold<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Latino characters, particularly ones who have a starring role, have traditionally been underrepresented in mainstream comics<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marvel\u2019s first Latino hero, Hector Ayala, debuted in 1975, after the success of \u201cBlack Panther<\/a>.\u201d Written by Bill Mantlo and drawn by legendary comic artist George P\u00e9rez<\/a>, Ayala, known as White Tiger<\/a>, was a Puerto Rican college student living in New York. His powers came from a magical amulet that bestowed him with speed and martial arts expertise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Latino comics scholar Frederick Luis Aldama argues<\/a>, Mantlo and P\u00e9rez avoided many of the stereotypes that plagued Latinos in comics, which often cast Latinos as criminals or drug dealers. Later iterations of White Tiger<\/a> included his niece Angela del Toro and his sister, Ava Ayala.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first Marvel Latina superhero, also co-created by Mantlo, was Firebird \u2013 real name, Bonita Ju\u00e1rez \u2013 who first appeared in 1981. A Catholic social worker from New Mexico, she represented a departure from the Black and Latino comic characters who predominately come from big cities like New York<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Spider-Man\u2019s web extends into Latin America<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In Latin America, Spider-Man has been a popular character since the hero first appeared in his own series, \u201cAmazing Spider-Man,\u201d in 1963.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marvel licensed Mexican publisher La Prensa to print Spanish translations of Spider-Man issues just a few months<\/a> after its release in the U.S.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

La Prensa also extended Spider-Man\u2019s reach to Argentina, Chile, Uruguay and Per\u00fa. In Mexico, Spider-Man quickly became more popular than any other Marvel character, save for his girlfriend, Gwen Stacy<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So in the 1970s, La Prensa began to create its own Spider-Man stories<\/a> on weeks when Marvel didn\u2019t release a new Spider-Man issue. These new stories, like an issue where Peter Parker dreams that he married Gwen Stacy, only appeared in Mexico<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps Spider-Man\u2019s popularity in this part of the world is due to the fact that he\u2019s scrappy, hardworking, and trying to help his family. Or maybe Latin Americans love his luchador-esque costume<\/a> \u2013 Peter Parker did, after all, debut his Spider-Man title and threads as a professional wrestler<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An Irish-Latino swings into the Spider-Verse<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Firebird and White Tiger never headlined their own series, though. And the Spider-Man who Latin Americans embraced in the 1960s and 1970s was white.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So it was a big deal when Miguel O’Hara took on the mantle of Spider-Man in his own series, which ran for four years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the multiverse<\/a> is a recent development in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, multiple Earths \u2013 each with its own versions of Marvel superheroes \u2013 have existed for decades in the comics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This has allowed for different iterations of the same superhero.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Peter Parker is the Spider-Man of Earth-616, the official Marvel universe. Miles Morales began as the Spider-Man of Earth-1610.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Miguel O’Hara is the future Spider-Man of Earth-616 in the year 2099, a post-apocalyptic future run by greedy corporations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When O\u2019Hara first appeared in 1992 as the main star of the \u201c2099\u201d series, fans embraced him<\/a>, with little controversy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s possible that O’Hara was uncontroversial because questions of race and racism didn\u2019t factor explicitly into the plots of each issue<\/a>. And perhaps O’Hara\u2019s light skin made it easy for readers to forget that he was Latino in the first place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet comics scholar Kathryn M. Frank argues in the collection \u201cGraphic Borders<\/a>\u201d that the writers of \u201cSpider-Man 2099\u201d were aware of their hero\u2019s ethnic identity and subtly incorporated commentaries on race into the series.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the comics, O’Hara has an accent due to his elongated, spiderlike teeth, which may reflect the assumed foreignness of Latino citizens in the U.S. and the discrimination they suffer for it. He also embraces his difference in his own style. As fans have pointed out, his costume<\/a> mixes a Day of the Dead skull<\/a> with the classic spider insignia in an explicit connection to his Mexican heritage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Recasting Spider-Man as an Afro-Latino<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Then, in 2011, Marvel announced Miles Morales, the first Spider-Man who was both Black and Latino.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This time, the responses<\/a> were more polarizing<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Former Fox News pundit Glenn Beck blamed then-first lady Michelle Obama<\/a> for the creation of Morales, pointing to a clip of her saying,<\/a> \u201cWe\u2019re going to have to change our traditions.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, to some fans, recasting Spider-Man as Black made perfect sense. Walter Moseley, a popular crime novelist, has provocatively argued that the original Spider-Man of the 1960s is actually \u201cthe first Black superhero<\/a>,\u201d since his backstory \u2013 raised by his extended family, growing up in poverty and demonized by the media \u2013 was more relatable to Black New Yorkers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When Morales came on the scene, he wasn\u2019t merely a carbon copy of Peter Parker, though. He was raised by his African American father \u2013 an ex-con who had turned his life around \u2013 and Puerto Rican mother in Brooklyn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Smiling
Actor Shameik Moore, who voiced Miles Morales in \u2018Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse,\u2019 celebrates after the film won best animated feature at the Academy Awards in 2019. Matt Petit\/A.M.P.A.S. via Getty Images<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

How Morales\u2019 race and ethnicity would play into the stories has been a point of contention. As English professor Jorge J. Santos, Jr. argues in the collection \u201cMixed-Race Superheroes<\/a>,\u201d the first comics series featuring Morales \u201cbarely makes any mention of Miles\u2019s ethnicity.\u201d He didn\u2019t seem to speak Spanish, nor did he have any Puerto Rican or Latino friends. He even resisted being seen as a Black Spider-Man<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That somewhat changed in the following series, which came out in 2018 and was written by Saladin Ahmed and drawn by Javier Garr\u00f3n. In December 2022, Cody Ziglar, a Black comic writer, took over as the head writer of Morales\u2019 story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Latino representation in the Spider-Verse is still somewhat lacking. Ara\u00f1a, a Mexican-Puerto Rican Spider-Girl<\/a> conceived in 2004, is the only other major Latino Spidey character.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marvel has tried to highlight Latino diversity in its other comics<\/a>. In 2021, the comics publisher released an entire collection showcasing Latino characters titled \u201cMarvel\u2019s Voices: Comunidades #1<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The sequel to \u201cInto the Spider-Verse\u201d is sure to make viewers of color in the U.S. cheer. As Latino media scholar Isabel Molina-Guzm\u00e1n<\/a> argues, while race complicates Hollywood casting and writing, Black and Latino viewers reacted very positively to Morales. But she insists that the movie also invites longtime fans and audiences of all backgrounds \u201cto stand in Miles Morales\u2019s space\u201d and root for the mixed-race teen trying to save the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To me, that\u2019s what makes superhero films starring characters of color so compelling. These characters are, in many senses, outcasts searching for community \u2013 in their real lives and in costume.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Frank, the comics scholar, notes, these differences can lead to feelings of alienation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But they can also be a source of empowerment. https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/cqGjhVJWtEg?wmode=transparent&start=0 \u2018Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse\u2019 follows its 2018 predecessor, which incorporated a groundbreaking mix of 2D and 3D animation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Regina Marie Mills<\/a>, Assistant Professor of Latinx and U.S. Multi-Ethnic Literature, Texas A&M University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Regina Marie Mills, Texas A&M University As a Latino literature and media scholar, a lifelong gamer and a Guatemalan-American girl whose dad read her comics every night, I quickly became a fan and then scholar of Miles Morales, the Afro-Puerto Rican Spider-Man who first appeared in comic book form in 2011\u2019s \u201cUltimate Fallout #4.\u201d Just […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":34029,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[293,8025],"tags":[14166,3182,786,671,2677,14162,14164,1336,3348,498,6253,14165,14163,1745,6600],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34027"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34027"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34027\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34297,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34027\/revisions\/34297"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34029"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34027"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34027"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34027"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}