Ex-Terminators Part Two

While trying to find Spider-Man, who had recently gone missing, Mary Jane hired the Black Cat to help her find him. Unfortunately, this trail led to Doctor Tramma who was responsible for restoring the Black Cat’s long lost bad luck powers. Now Mary Jane begin given the guided tour by Doctor Tramma, who decides to tell her origins. She explains that she was born in North Korea and when he intelligence scored off the charts she was sent to be trained as a spy. At the time, the North Korean government would kidnap Japanese citizens so their spies could learn about the outside world. The woman assigned to the future Doctor Tramma was a woman named Kumi who instantly recognized that the young North Korean woman was incredibly innocent and naive. Kumi captured Tramma’s imagination with stories about about Japan that were rife with animé and manga cliches. At age sixteen, she was finally sent to Japan and she discovered that Kumi had lied to her just as much as her in North Korea did. Japan turned out to be just an ordinary place just like anywhere else. However, she became determined to make her fantasies a reality and opened her first Body Shop in Japan shortly thereafter. Thanks to funding from Mister Negative she was eventually able to move operations to New York City where she offers her services to people who want artificial enhancements.

Still thinking that Mary Jane is a potential customer, Doctor Tramma gives her a run down on the services her Body Shop provides to keep models looking young. When Mary Jane cringes at the surgical options Tramma suggests a glamour generator instead that bends light in a manner that triggers the pleasure centers of the brain. That’s when Mary Jane asks about a device that is firing webbing and is told that it is a prototype of an anaerobic adhesive system. Mary Jane recognizes that technology as similar to Peter’s web-shooters and knows that Tramma is lying to her. Mary Jane is then taken to a room where she can strip down to an operating gown for surgery. There she produces the claw that was given to her by the Black Cat and thinks back to how she was given it thirty minutes earlier. At that moment, she had just learned that the Black Cat had gotten her bad luck powers from Tramma recently.[1] As the two women bicker back and forth quietly, Tramma had asked what they are talking about, but the two women insist that it was just small talk. The Cat then handed Mary Jane the talon, telling her to find Spider-Man while she keeps Doctor Tramma busy.[2]

As Mary Jane breaks out of the room and begins searching for Peter, the Black Cat tries to trick Doctor Tramma into thinking that her powers are malfunctioning. However, Tramma knows that the Cat recently started working with Spider-Man again and raided Mister Negative’s headquarters recently and knows this is all a ruse to try and find the wall-crawler.[3] As the two women fight it out, the Black Cat learns that Spider-Man’s organs are going to be harvested for the Origins Corporation after Mister Negative gets to unmask him.[4]

By this time, Mary Jane has found the room where Spider-Man is being held. Using a lighter, she lights a pack of maxi-pads on fire to set off the smoke alarm. When the scientists monitoring Peter leave the room, Mary Jane sneaks in and frees him. Asking what happened to him, Peter explains that he was looking into Doctor Tramma’s organization after learning that the Extremist got his powers from her Body Shop. His investigation led to Tramma’s connection to Lola Huxley. Unfortunately, before he could meet with Mary Jane and learn more about the model’s sudden resurgence in popularity, he was captured by Tramma’s Repo Men. As leave the lab, Mary Jane explains how she got the aid of the Black Cat to rescue him, which surprises the web-slinger as he thought that Mary Jane hated Felicia. When they track the Cat down they discover that Doctor Tramma has strapped her down to a chair for some unnecessary surgery. When Spider-Man frees her, Doctor Tramma orders her Repo Men to stop them. However, when Spider-Man destroys the device blocking Felicia’s bad luck powers, they make short work of the armored thugs. By the time they are done, both Spider-Man and the Black Cat are impressed to see that Mary Jane was more than capable of dealing with Doctor Tramma on her own.

Later, Felicia Hardy arranges a meeting with Mary Jane, and has figured out that she has met Mary Jane before and realized it when she used Felicia’s real name in the battle. She remembers that Mary Jane was friends with a dumb jock she used to date, but surprisingly can’t place the name of Mary Jane’s boy friend at the time.[5] When Mary Jane asks Felicia why she called her out, Hardy admits that she doesn’t have any girlfriends anymore. Mary Jane agrees that they should hang out and thinks this is the start of a good friendship. Watching from afar, Spider-Man thinks that his ex-girlfriends becoming friends will not end well for him. Resigning to this as just another example of the ol’ Parker luck, Spider-Man swings away.

Recurring Characters

Spider-Man, Mary Jane Watson, Black Cat, Doctor Tramma, Repo Squad

Continuity Notes

1. The Black Cat had originally got her bad luck powers from the Kingpin’s scientists back in Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #89. A side effect of these powers caused Spider-Man to get permanent bad luck until Doctor Strange cured him, inadvertently stripping that Cat of said powers in Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man #115.

2. The Black Cat questions why Mary Jane is instantly thinking the worse of her. This is because Mary Jane knew all about the Black Cat from her relationship with Peter Parker. The Black Cat no longer remembers this because her memory of Peter’s secret identity was erased along with virtually everyone who knew his secret when Mephisto altered reality in Amazing Spider-Man #545. Mary Jane still remembers because she is one of the few people who was spared this mind wipe.

3. Spider-Man and the Black Cat raided Mister Negative’s hideout in Amazing Spider-Man #620.

4. The Origins Corporation was mentioned in Incredible Hulk #620. They were a corporation that used DNA from gamma mutates to give the Gamma Corps their powers.

5. In the original timeline, the Black Cat was upset when she learned that Peter and Mary Jane got married (Amazing Spider-Man #316) She decided to get revenge by dating one of Peter’s friends and breaking their heart, her intended target was Flash Thompson. The pair started dating in Amazing Spider-Man #329 until they broke up in Spectacular Spider-Man #210. In the new timeline, she presumably got upset learning that Peter was engaged to another woman and was now living with her.

Arms Against a Sea of Troubles

Thinking back to his childhood, Otto Octavius recalls how a class trip to the aquarium and how he was mesmerized at the sight of an octopus. However, his enthusiasm was not met by his fellow students. Due to his intelligence, Otto was bumped up a number of grades and he was frequently bullied by his classmates as he was much younger than they were. The only thing he shared with them was their mutual scorn. At home, his father pressured Otto to stand up for himself, while his mother coddled and protected the boy. Octavius graduated from high school by the age of 15 and was given a full scholarship at MIT. His focus on his studies led to fewer and fewer interactions with his classmates, which was just as well for Otto.

His father died after a construction accident when Otto was an undergraduate and after the funeral his mother warned Otto that an early death was the curse of a commoner and told him that she expected better of him.[1] Two years later, Otto graduated summa cum laude. His mother was never prouder of her son. He obtained his first doctorate when he was 21 and began making a name for himself in nuclear research. He developed his mechanical arms for his research, but his coworkers made fun of him behind his back, something he was aware of and dismissed them as inferiors. At home, his mother criticized the woman he loved and told him that no woman was good enough for him.[2] However, when his mother began dating again, Otto became furious and his confrontation with her upset Mary Octavius so badly she suffered a fatal heart attack and died.

Despite the death of his mother, Otto returned to work. He remembers that on the day of the accident his co-workers were debating the motivations of the new hero, Spider-Man.[3] That day he was caught in the nuclear explosion that fused his mechanical arms to his body. Driven mad in the blast, Otto took over the facility where he worked only to be opposed by Spider-Man. Now calling himself Doctor Octopus, Otto easily defeated the young hero and reveled in the fact that he had now become the man that his father insisted that he become. Unfortunately, this victory proved short-lived as Spider-Man and defeated him in their second fight and Otto was arrested for his crimes.[4] His lawyer, tried his best to represent him in court, but this didn’t prevent Otto from being sentenced to a maximum security prison.[5]

He remembers his first day in prison out in the yards, the other prisoners thought he was an easy target because his mechanical arms were in shackles. Creating a distraction on the exercise yard, some of the inmates decided to use the opportunity to try and convince Otto to do their bidding. However, Doctor Octopus was easily able to free his mechanical arms and beat the men into submission before the guards could see. Returning his mechanical arms to their shackles, Otto then met with the prison psychologist, where he put on a meek personality to fool him. Returned to his cell, Doctor Octopus gloats about how easy is has been to fool everyone and has been spending his time in his solitary cell practicing the use of his mechanical arms knowing that he’ll be ready when it comes time to face Spider-Man again.

Recurring Characters

Doctor Octopus, Spider-Man, Tobert Octavius, Mary Octavius, Mary Anders, Matt Murdock

Continuity Notes

1. The death of Otto’s father tracks with other origin stories except for the one told in Spectacular Spider-Man (vol. 2) #7, which states that Otto was just a boy when his father died. At that particular time Otto was mentally unhinged and was likely misremembering the details surrounding his father’s death.

2. Although unnamed here, the woman that Mary Octavius sends away crying is Mary Anders as identified in Spider-Man Unlimited #3.

3. One of Otto’s co-workers mentions how J. Jonah Jameson is just jealous that Spider-Man saved his son. This is a reference to Amazing Spider-Man #1.

4. This is a recounting of the origins of Doctor Octopus and his first battle with Spider-Man which happened back in Amazing Spider-Man #3.

5. The identity of his lawyer is not specified here, but Spider-Man Unlimited #18 confirms that this was Matt Murdock — aka Daredevil.