Featuring the following heroine!

Spider-Woman

Real name: Jessica Drew
AKA: The Dark Angel. The "original" Spider-Woman.

First appearance: Marvel Spotlight 32

Favorite quote: "Shew! Escaping from death traps takes it out of a girl!" (Spider-Woman25. I think this is the only time I've ever seen "Shew" as an comic book expletive.)

Spiderwoman 28Team affiliation: Jessica was trained by HYDRA, but balked at killing Nick Fury. Like most Marvel heroines, she appears to have a long complex relationship with Wolverine that no one ever bothered explaining to the readers, and that simply vanished when a new writer came on board (Wolverine 1-16. She saw through his "Patch" identity in seconds).

Powers: Originally thought to be a spider evolved into human form by the High Evolutionary, Spiderwoman has the various arachnid attributes of another famous Spiderperson. In addition, Jessica can generate "venom blasts", apparently bioelectric bursts that can startle, stun, or kill her prey, but which sometimes leave her depleted of energy. The general feeling of "creepiness" she exudes is the result of pheromones, as is the occasional abrupt attraction some men feel for her. Repressing these pheromones using drug therapy also repressed her powers, so Jessica decided to live with her sometimes unpredictable body chemistry. She lost her venom blast as well as her toxin immunities and other side-effects of her unique blood chemistry in Avengers 240-241, but was still hanging off of walls and even airplanes in Wolverine's early solo stories despite Dr. Henry Pym's assurances that her adhesive qualities were forever lost.

Favorite storyline: Well, actually, the story was only so-so, but I rather liked Spider-Woman 27-29. Spider-Woman28 features one of my all time favorite covers. And, anyway, something about the Enforcer's cheerful, psychotic sleaziness and writer Michael Fleisher's warped view of Los Angeles appealed to me. Undoubtedly the occult-edged Claremont issues with Morgan Le Fay and Viper are much better. Yet...I prefer Spider-Woman27-29. Call it a guilty pleasure.

Least favorite storyline: The oh-by-the-way announcement in Captain America 281 that the multiple issue story arc revealing Viper as Jessica's mother was just all a big misunderstanding. I really hate it when a previous story is blown off like that. (Although I remember at the time being more annoyed by the fact Jessica was always answering the phone without her clothes on. Issue after issue after issue...)

Jessica Drew sighting! Yes, that was the original Spider-Woman seen being rescued from a magic dimension by her best friend Lindsay McCabe and the second Spider-Woman, Julia Carpenter, in The Sensational Spider-Man '96 annual. How Jessica got there from her last appearance in Wolverine 16, how many of her powers (if any) remain, and what the Marvel Universe is going to do with two Spider-Women are questions that have yet to be answered...