Da-Silva, E R et al 2014 Marvel and DC Characters Inspired by Arachnids. THE COMICS GRID The Comics Grid: Journal of Comics Scholarship, 4(1): 11, pp. 1-14, DOI: Journal of comics scholarship http://dx.doi.org/10.5334/cg.aw RESEARCH Marvel and DC Characters Inspired by Arachnids Elidiomar Ribeiro Da-Silva*, Luci Boa Nova Coelho*,†, Thiago Rodas Müller de Campos*, Allan Carelli‡, Gustavo Silva de Miranda§, Edson Luiz de Souza dos Santos*, Tainá Boa Nova Ribeiro Silva‖ and Maria Inês da Silva dos Passos* This article compares arachnid-based Marvel and DC comics characters. The composition of a comic book character often has interesting ‘real-life’ influences. Given the strong connection between arachnids (especially spiders, scorpions and mites, all belonging to the zoological class Arachnida) and human beings it is not surprising that they have inspired many fictional characters. We recorded 84 Marvel Comics characters and 40 DC Comics characters, detailed in the dataset that accompanies the article (Da-Silva 2014). Most characters have been created recently, since the 1990s. Marvel has significantly more arachnid characters than DC. As for taxonomic classification, the characters were based mostly on spiders (zoological order Araneae). Of the total characters, the majority are human beings, but an overwhelming number have at least some typical arachnid features. Villains (60.91% of total) are significantly more numerous, considering the sum of the two publishers. Arachnids have bad reputation for being dangerous (Thorp and Woodson 1976; Ruppert and Barnes 1996). Since the public usually considers spiders, scorpions and mites “harmful” in general, we expected a larger contingent of villains. However, there was no statistical difference between the amount of villains and heroes in Marvel characters. It did not happen probably due to the success of one character: the Amazing Spider-Man. Keywords: Zoology; Arthropoda; Arachnida; pop culture; entertainment; comics; spiders; superheroes Introduction mites, all belonging to the class Arachnida) and human Comics often have details and sophisticated allusions that beings (Mundkur 1983; Cloudsley Thomson 1990, 2001; could and should be leveraged in various ways, includ- Monzón and Blasco Gil 1995, 1996a, b, c, d, 1997, 1998; ing in the classroom, to arouse the interests and hold Ruppert and Barnes 1996; Melic 1997, 2002, 2003), it the attention of students (Rama and Vergueiro 2004; is not surprising that they have inspired many fictional Marchiori 2011; Quartim 2013; Miranda 2014). characters. Despite being a creatively free process, the compo- Focusing only on the two major American comics pub- sition of a comic book character often has interest- lishers, DC Comics and Marvel Comics, we conducted an ing ‘real-life’ influences. Given the strong connection inventory of the characters that have been inspired by between arachnids (especially spiders, scorpions and arachnids in some way. We have compared the features of these characters with the morphology, biology and behav- iour of living arachnids from the ‘real’ world. * Department of Zoology, Instituto de Biociências, Universidade Federal do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (UNIRIO), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Materials and Methods [email protected], [email protected], For the inventory of characters, we used basic sources [email protected], [email protected] like encyclopaedias (Beatty et al. 2009; DeFalco et al. † Departament of Zoology, Instituto de Biologia, Universidade 2009; Saunders et al. 2010; David and Greenberger 2010; Federal do Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) - Rio de Janeiro, Brazil [email protected] Beatty et al. 2012), available comics and websites. We classified the characters according to the publisher, social ‡ Department of Entomology, Museu Nacional, Universidade Fed- eral do Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) - Rio de Janeiro, Brazil role (hero or villain), taxonomic classification (order) of [email protected] the inspiring arachnid, the presence/absence of features § Center for Macroecology, Evolution and Climate, Natural His- associated with arachnids, and the decade of creation. tory Museum of Denmark (Zoological Museum), University of We also considered the “femme fatale” effect, something Copenhagen – Copenhagen, Denmark the general public in general observe in spiders, derived [email protected] from the fact that some female spiders devour their ‖ Sistema Elite de Ensino, Unidade NorteShopping – Rio de Janeiro, Brazil partners after copulation (Thorp and Woodson 1976; mrs_ [email protected] Foelix 2011). Art. 11, page 2 of 14 Da-Silva et al: Marvel and DC Characters Inspired by Arachnids The classes were statistically compared through the ancient Egyptian myths emphasize the sacred character Pearson’s nonparametric chi-squared test (Siegel 1981), of the scorpion as the protector of marriage, and this and the results were considered significant with “p” values curious veneration results from accurate observations of less than 0.05, always comparing one by one (1 degree of scorpions’ sexual behaviour and courtship (Ferrer 2009). freedom). In pop culture, spiders have been highlighted in epic liter- ary sagas (and consequently in the movies), such as Harry Animals (Especially Arthropods) in Cultural Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2003) and The Lord of Expressions the Rings - The Return of the King (2004). The spider gener- Issues relating Zoology to cultural events have been gain- ally symbolizes patience and tenacity, due to its hunting ing prominence recently. Coelho (2000, 2004) studied skills. In addition, it has a lugubrious side that fascinates insect references in the lyrics and cover art of rock music and scares, enhanced by its poison, which causes paralysis albums, respectively. Ashenden (2000–2001) made an and death to its victims. entomological survey of the renowned novel Ada, by In the Roman poet Ovid’s collection of stories about Vladimir Nabokov. Cherry (2002, 2005) studied the role of the rivalry between gods and mortals, Arachne was a insects in mythology and magic, respectively. beautiful girl highly skilled in weaving who was once Mariño Pérez and Mendoza Almeralla (2006) made challenged by Athene (Minerva), goddess of the wisdom, a critical analysis of the presence of insects and other weaving, and strategy, to a contest. Arachne wove a tap- arthropods in films from 1938 to 2002. Costa Neto (2006) estry of marvelous beauty on which she depicted the surveyed the use of insects in popular customs and cel- amours of the gods and goddesses. The beauty and the ebrations in northeastern Brazil. Mendonça (2008) stud- subject of the tapestry so enraged the goddess that she ied folkloric demonstrations that could enhance the ripped Arachne’s work into shreds. Arachne, overcome learning of Zoology at school. Chantoury-Lacombe (2009) with despair, hung herself. Mercifully, Athene gives her studied the connection between insects and painting life back turning her into a spider and cursing her and her techniques used in renaissance Europe. Monserrat (2009, descendants to weave for all time (Thorp and Woodson 2011) approached the presence of arthropods in paint- 1976; Fantham 2004). ings of Hieronymus Bosch and Salvador Dali, respectively. Carvalho (2010) investigated the symbolic meaning of A Brief Zoological Characterisation of two butterfly species represented in paintings of the XV Arachnids century. Monserrat (2010) made a study of tattoos con- Arachnids are zoologically placed in the class Arachnida, a taining visual references to arthropods. Nemésio et al. group that contains 114,275 species described so far, dis- (2013) approached the use of different taxonomic groups tributed among 11 extant orders (Zhang 2013). They are of animals in postage stamps. Recently, animal species part of the subphylum Chelicerata, one of the largest of have been named after pop culture icons, such as artists the phylum Arthropoda (Zhang 2013). The class includes (Dumas et al. 2013), athletes (Santos and Nessimian 2009) many common and familiar forms, such as spiders, scor- and fictional characters. Of the latter, interesting exam- pions, and mites (Ruppert and Barnes 1996; Brusca and ples include a leafhopper (insect) named after Batman Brusca, 2003; Zhang 2013). (Rodrigues et al. 2012) and a shrew (mammal) named after The main morphological characteristics of Arachnida the god Thor (Stanley et al. 2013). are the division of the body into two parts, the pro- soma (or cephalothorax) and the opisthosoma (or abdo- Arachnids and Culture men), the presence of chelicerae (the mouth part of the Through history, arachnid symbolism in culture and arachnids, also called fang), and the presence of eight mythology has been remarkable. The cultural entomology legs (Figure 1A, B). The fangs of all arachnids lacerate of the Sumerian era (3,500 B.C.), for example, is funda- their prey, and spiders have venom glands (Figure 1B). mentally based on arachnids. The most important arthro- Scorpions also have venom glands, but they are present pods in this mythology are scorpions and spiders (Melic in the last segment of the metasoma (Figure 1A) that 2002). Astronomers of Babylon were the first to recognize also helps immobilize and digest their prey. All arachnids the Tauro and Scorpion constellations around 4,000 years are easy to recognize because of their body divisions and ago, showing the influence of these animals on that peo- their eight legs, but the Acari (mites and ticks) have great ple (Melic 2003). In Navajo