Spider-Girl (May "Mayday" Parker) is a superheroine appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. She has been referred to as both Spider-Girl and Spider-Woman. The character appears in the MC2 universe. The character was created by Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz as the teenage daughter of Peter Parker (Spider-Man) and Mary Jane Watson, and first appeared in What If #105 (February 1998). She later acquired her own ongoing comic book, Spider-Girl, written by DeFalco and drawn by Frenz and Pat Olliffe, which was the longest-running superhero book with a lead female character ever published by Marvel. The title was relaunched as The Amazing Spider-Girl and later The Spectacular Spider-Girl. The character would then return in a supporting role in the event series Spider-Verse, Web Warriors, Spider-Girls, Spider-Geddon, End of the Spider-Verse, and Spider-Boy, and in a starring role in the digital series Unlimited Spider-Girl.
The character made her cinematic debut in the 2023 feature film Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, voiced by Michelle Ruff, with an infant Mayday depicted as the daughter of Peter B. Parker and his universe's Mary Jane Watson.
Publication history
Spider-Girl first appeared in a one-shot story in the ongoing series What If. Following positive fan response to the concept, Spider-Girl and two other series (A-Next and J2) set in the same alternate future universe were launched under the MC2 imprint. Although each of these titles were slated to be 12-issue limited series, Spider-Girl initial sales justified their continuation as ongoing titles.
After initial interest, Spider-Girl drew low sales. The book's active fan base convinced Marvel to revoke several cancellation announcements. Reprints of the series in digest size trade paperbacks sold well. Marvel Associate Editor Nick Lowe revealed in a Nov. 2005 interview that "Spider-Girl, for the first time, is completely safe from cancellation."
Despite Lowe's statement, Marvel announced that No. 100 would be the title's final issue. The book was relaunched as The Amazing Spider-Girl, with issue #0 appearing in Oct. 2006.
On October 11, 2008, Tom DeFalco announced that The Amazing Spider-Girl would be canceled with issue #30, though he revealed that, due to the company's love for the character, she could possibly be given a sixteen-page back-up strip in The Amazing Spider-Man Family.DeFalco Confirms Amazing Spider-Girl Cancellation, Comic Book Resources, October 13, 2008 On November 8, 2008, Marvel EIC Joe Quesada confirmed that Spider-Girl would become a feature in the monthly anthology magazine Amazing Spider-Man Family. The series would replace the feature Mr. and Mrs. Spider-Man, written by DeFalco, which served as a prequel series to the Spider-Girl universe.
On March 18, 2009, Marvel announced that Spider-Girl would continue publication as The Spectacular Spider-Girl, a web-comic released through Marvel's Digital Comics Unlimited. The title would continue to be simultaneously published in paper form within Amazing Spider-Man Family. The Amazing Spider-Man Family #5 (published April 2009) through No. 8 (July 2009) contained these Spider-Girl stories until the title's cancellation with issue #8.
The new The Spectacular Spider-Girl stories were then contained in Web of Spider-Man. This lasted for seven issues, completing the storyline Who Killed Gwen Reilly?, before being moved to its own four-issue limited series, Spectacular Spider-Girl, which tied up most of the series plot threads (the earlier stories republished as The Spectacular Spider-Girl #1–7, the remaining four being Spectacular Spider-Girl #8–11). This was followed by one last Spider-Girl tale, Spider-Girl: The End, collected as Spider-Girl: The Last Stand.
Mayday and her family were reintroduced, as part of the Spider-Verse crossover event, in the eighth issue of the third volume of The Amazing Spider-Man, which was the first story with Mayday to be written by Dan Slott, the first time a fully-grown Mayday appeared in the pages of her father's flagship title, and the first story to highlight the "Spider-Marriage" in the regular comics since 2007's controversial One More Day.
She appeared again, handled by the original creative team, in July 2015 as part of Marvel's Secret Wars event, serving as a backup story in Christos Gage's Spider-Island. She also returned for the sequel event to Spider-Verse, Spider-Geddon. Shortly after her father reunited with her family in End of the Spider-Verse, Mayday reverted back to her original Spider-Girl codename. In November 2022, a new serialized adventure starring Mayday was launched on the Marvel Unlimited Infinity Comics app, Unlimited Spider-Girl, with the story penned by Stephanie Williams. She and her family also returned in the 2025 graphic novel Spider-Boy: The Dragon's Challenge, Mayday and her father both active as Spider-Girl and Spider-Man at the same time.
Fictional character biography May "Mayday" Parker is the daughter of Peter and Mary Jane Parker and the great-niece of Aunt May in the future, alternate universe continuity. Peter and Mary Jane named their daughter after his Aunt May. In the MC2 continuity, they were reunited with their baby girl by Kaine, who found the child living with Alison Mongraine, the con artist who had kidnapped the baby on instruction from the Green Goblin. After they were reunited, Peter lost a leg during the horrific final conflict with the Green Goblin. After the battle, Peter was offered a bionic replacement from Mister Fantastic but, considering it a wake-up call, decided to retire and focus on being a husband and father (the battle is glimpsed in Spider Girl #7, and fully explained in Spider Girl #49). For years, they chose to keep their past from May and hoped that she wouldn't develop powers of her own.
Despite her parents' hopes, May began developing versions of her father's spider-powers when she was 15. At the same time, Normie Osborn, grandson of the original Green Goblin, set out to restore the family name. May donned Ben Reilly's Spider-Man costume to stop him and soon took to crime-fighting, at first hindered, then helped, by her worried real parents.
May shares traits of both of her parents. Like her mother, she is a beautiful, charismatic, and popular student in her high school, and she is intelligent and talented just like her father. She also inherited his love for in-fight bantering and his intolerance for injustice. Even without her spider powers, she is a very good athlete and excelled in her girls' basketball team until she quit, her resignation coming after the manifestation of her powers. On the one hand, May seems to have inherited the "Parker luck" in which her dual identity wreaks havoc in her private life. On the other hand, her superhero career, unlike her father's, begins with her successfully protecting her family. From the early part of her career onward, Spider-Girl has developed a reputation for avoiding unnecessary battles with anyone and reforming her former adversaries, like Normie Osborn and Raptor. Spider-Girl quickly establishes herself in the superhero community and gets along with other superheroes easily, gaining reserve status in the Avengers and allies in the New Warriors and Fantastic Five.
In The Amazing Spider-Girl, May promises to give up costumed super-heroics, dates Eugene Thompson, and runs for student council. When Mary Jane becomes aware that the Hobgoblin poses a threat to her goddaughter's teenage friends, she allows May to resume her activities as Spider-Girl (a situation they wanted to keep secret from Peter). After a battle with the Hobgoblin, May tells her godfather the truth, and after a conversation with Mary Jane, they allowed May to resume her Spider-Girl identity. After Mary Jane has an argument with May's real parents, she realizes that May will come to the truth about Peter someday but Peter planned it all along. Because of this action, she continues her fight to keep the city safe.
After an attempt at helping the S.H.I.E.L.D. government agency, a case filled with a piece of the Carnage symbiote was released. It attaches itself to May's friend Moose, who becomes the new Carnage. In exchange, Carnage will bond itself to Moose's terminally ill father, curing him in the process. Carnage causes a stir at May's school and kidnaps Peter and Baby Ben, forcing May to confront her friend. May tries to talk to Moose within the symbiote but fails, and it bonds with her cousin Ben. Peter escapes as May battles the two symbiotes and gathers sonic gear that may be able to defeat the symbiote. However, it is May who uses the weapons, thereby destroying the piece of the Carnage symbiote. Her success is not without a measure of collateral damage: not only is Moose furious at Spider-Girl for dooming his father, but the sonic weapon renders Ben deaf.The Amazing Spider-Girl #12
Ben's hearing is eventually restored thanks to the intervention of Normie Osborn. Normie later stumbles on one of Norman Osborn's former labs and discovers a fluid tank containing what appears to be a physical duplicate of May Parker. Notes left behind by his grandfather indicate that this Mayday is the original he kidnapped years ago, hinting that the Mayday raised by Peter and MJ is yet another clone.The Amazing Spider-Girl #20
Fury the Goblin Queen begins acting out the Green Goblin's final gambit against Peter Parker. While kidnapping the retired Spider-Man, Fury also activates a signal that awakens the unconscious girl within the Osborn labs' tank. The changeling escapes, confronting Mayday on the roof of her high school just as she is changing into Spider-Girl. The two briefly battle before being caught in an explosion. A critically injured May is rescued from the debris by Araña's forces. Araña is suddenly traumatized by her own ordeal, and, thinking that May might not survive her ordeal, offers to merge with her. However, she intervenes in a vision quest that Mayday is undergoing. By aiding her to overcome a force she was meant to overcome alone, she obstructs Spider-Girl from uncovering whether or not she is the true May; mainly because May is half Latina on her father's side and Araña is only going by the trauma she went through not thinking of what could happen to May and her school. Araña also has an ulterior motive: by assuming the body and power of Spider-Girl she hopes to take the Black Tarantula, an adversary and former lover, by surprise and defeat him. Araña successfully completes the merger and temporarily assumes control of May's body, leaving May and a third, blond woman who shares her name (later revealed to be the spirit of Aunt May) trapped within Araña's body.The Amazing Spider-Girl #25
Meanwhile, the changeling emerges from the blast relatively unharmed and attempts to resume May's life. However, her presence deeply disturbs Benjy. She later receives a call from Normie, telling her about the capture of Peter Parker, leading the changeling into taking on the role of Spider-Girl.The Amazing Spider-Girl #25–27
The two women are restored to their rightful bodies while in battle with others. May, in Araña's body, runs into the changeling just as Araña, in May's body, enters the lair of the Black Tarantula. The Black Tarantula is able to see through Araña's trick and nearly knocks her unconscious, just as May, in Araña's body, is knocked unconscious as well, leading the two of them to recover their original bodies.The Amazing Spider-Girl #28