Vanessa Fisk

Vanessa Fisk is a Marvel Comics character. She is the wife of Wilson Fisk, the so-called Kingpin of crime, and mother of Richard Fisk.

Fictional character biography

Little is known about Vanessa Fisk's personal life and early years. No maiden name has ever been revealed. As the wife of Wilson Fisk, the "Kingpin" of New York's criminal underworld, Vanessa did not approve of her husband's criminal activities. At one point their son Richard Fisk became involved in a plot to overthrow his father's criminal syndicate after discovering he was the Kingpin.

After the Kingpin had a near-death experience, Vanessa gave him an ultimatum; he had twenty-four hours to get out of crime, or she would leave him. The Kingpin was about to kill Spider-Man when the deadline passed, and Vanessa forced him to choose between Spider-Man's life or their life together. He chose his wife and spared Spider-Man as a result. ^[1]

The two went into retirement in Japan. Kingpin prepared to settle his remaining business with his fellow mobsters by cooperating with the authorities and leaving the world of crime forever. This infuriated one of Kingpin's closest advisors, Lynch, who believed that Vanessa was a liability and had turned the once mighty Kingpin into a henpecked husband. When Fisk's former lieutenants in New York caught wind of his plans to sell them out in exchange for immunity, they kidnapped Vanessa, who was in town to secure the legal services of Matt Murdock and Foggy Nelson.^[2]

Fisk started a gang war against the mob in New York to rescue his wife. The mob bosses attempted to ransom Vanessa off in exchange for the evidence against them Fisk had intended to turn over to the authorities, but during the exchange, Kingpin used a sonic device to stop the criminals, and found her bound and gagged in a building. However Lynch fired an explosive at Vanessa, in an attempt to deprive Fisk of the thing that kept him retired and bring him back as the Kingpin of Crime. However, Vanessa didn't die. Instead, she was buried alive in the rubble and presumed dead.^[3] As planned, this drove Kingpin back into the world of crime, although he found out Lynch was behind the explosion, partially due to a headache he gained, and took revenge by murdering his traitorous advisor. He then forced the remaining mob leaders to confess to hiring the assassin Bullseye to kill several of Fisk's men.^[4]

Weeks later, Matt Murdock's alter ego, Daredevil, found Vanessa in the sewers. Being buried alive had left Vanessa amnesiac and mentally unstable, and she ended up taken in by a grotesque mutant who lived in the sewers. Daredevil ultimately used her as leverage to force Kingpin to order his puppet Randolph Cherryh, newly elected to the office of mayor, to resign and to confirm to the media that he was indeed a mob puppet. After reuniting with her, Kingpin had his now catatonic wife shipped off to a sanitarium in Europe in order to have her regain her sanity. This would take years, as Vanessa's husband's organized crime empire would fall and be rebuilt during the period that Vanessa was institutionalized.

Ultimately Vanessa would recover, and she would remain in Europe. But when her husband was the victim of an assassination attempt orchestrated by her son, Vanessa arranged for her husband to be shipped out of the country to recover from his injuries, and to cut a deal with his fellow mob bosses to divide up Fisk's recently rebuilt crime syndicate in exchange for a truce. Vanessa then took the final, brutal step of personally murdering her own devoted son, who admitted to Vanessa that his motivation was to rid the family of his father, who he blamed for his family's troubles.

The act of murdering her own beloved son caused a horrific physical toll on Vanessa, causing her to slowly lose the will to live, which along with the injuries she sustained when she was buried alive, culminated in her body undergoing terminal organ failure. Blaming both her husband and Matt Murdock, who had recently been revealed to be Daredevil, for the endless cycle of violence that had consumed her family, Vanessa faked the death of Foggy Nelson in an attempt to provoke Murdock into killing Fisk while they were both in prison. When that failed, she manipulated the super-hero Iron Fist into posing as Daredevil, which ultimately drove Matt to break out of prison to find Foggy's murderer and the identity of the man impersonating him, culminating in her confronting Matt with an offer to clear his name in exchange for him clearing Kingpin, so that the two would be free to try and kill each other anew.^[5]

Though Daredevil refused this deal, Vanessa went ahead and arranged for the murder of Leland Drummond, the corrupt FBI director who outed Matt in order to advance his own career within the FBI. To discredit his outing of Daredevil, the murder was made to look like a suicide and a false and highly damning suicide note was planted at the scene, claiming that Drummond took his own life after it became apparent that his scheme to frame Matt Murdock was about to be exposed. Shortly afterwards, Vanessa died and Murdock found himself morally guilted into serving as the Kingpin's lawyer, getting the charges dropped on the grounds that the evidence was too tainted to bring him to court. But Daredevil would exact his own form of Faustian bargain with Kingpin, as he forced the crime boss to renounce his American citizenship and leave the country forever in exchange for his nemesis's legal services, stating that any attempt to continue their vendetta would be an insult to the memory of the good woman Vanessa had once been.^[6]

Wilson Fisk was later seen at her grave where he emotionally broke down. She has since been talking to Wilson as a ghost taunting him about that he'll never regain his former power. However this is all in the Kingpin's head, showing the death of his wife is still greatly affecting him.

Other versions

Intercompany Crossovers

In Batman & Spider-Man #1, Vanessa is infected with terminal cancer by Ra's Al Ghul, who offers the Kingpin the cure for it in exchange for his help in a plot that will destroy New York. Disgruntled under Ra's, the Kingpin forms an alliance with Spider-Man and Batman and succeeds in defeating Ra's, only to be denied the cure for his wife's cancer by the beaten eco-terrorist. Vanessa is cured near the end of the storyline by an antidote provided by Ra's Al Ghul's daughter Talia Al Ghul, who recognizes Vanessa as a kindred spirit, as both of them loved a man that society would regard as a monster.

Marvel Zombies 3

It's revealed that she wasn't infected or eaten when the zombies took over this world. In fact her husband, the Kingpin, who is zombiefied, has kept her alive as a secret kept from other zombies. She goes on to say that he manages to hold back the hunger when she is around. The Kingpin also has other Marvel Zombies search for food (sometimes pet food), medical supplies or whatever a non-zombie needs by telling they are an offering to him so they could eat from a factory for human clones. She meets Machine Man, and Jocasta. They ask for a sample of her blood, explaining it is a matter of life and death for other humans. She readily complies. The two androids ask if she wishes to leave with them, but she chooses to stay. Later, Machine Man decides to destroy the clone pens and kill many of the zombies. In his distress, Kingpin eats Vanessa.^[7]

Ultimate Marvel

Vanessa Fisk has had only a cameo in Ultimate Spider-Man, but she is nonetheless important to Kingpin's character.

The Kingpin sought the Tablet of Time, but was stolen by the Black Cat,^[8] who wanted revenge on Fisk for putting her father in jail, and leaving him to die. She threw it in the Atlantic Ocean before being impaled by Elektra's sai. Kingpin wanted the Tablet for his wife Vanessa, who was in a coma. Although he didn't believe in its alleged powers, she did, and he would do anything to wake her up.^[9]

Later, after Kingpin torched his law office, a crazed Daredevil broke into Fisk's home and threatened to murder the comatose Vanessa by snapping her neck, but was stopped by Spider-Man. Fisk ordered Vanessa to be taken out of the country before he was arrested himself over the attempted murder of Moon Knight.^[10]

PunisherMax

In the Punisher Max series, set in Marvel's MAX universe, Vanessa is also married to the Kingpin, but their marriage collapses as Wilson Fisk's takeover of the mob causes the death of their son Richard (who, in this version, is an eight-year-old child). Vanessa blames Wilson for not preventing Richard's death, and attempts to kill him while they are having sex. The Kingpin kicks her out of their tower. Later, in order to protect himself from the Punisher, Kingpin hires the Hand the services of Elektra as a bodyguard. It is revealed that Elektra was actually hired by Vanessa, who is plotting the Kingpin's downfall. The two women are also in a lesbian relationship. Later in the story, Vanessa is threatened by the Punisher, but Elektra saves her at the cost of her own life. After the Kingpin is killed by the Punisher in issue #21, Vanessa has his body cremated and throws the ashes in the toilet. She appears ready to take charge of her husband's former empire, as her chauffeur calls her "Madam Kingpin". But in issue #22, she is ambushed and killed by Nick Fury.

In other media

Television

• Vanessa Fisk has appeared in Spider-Man: The Animated Series, voiced by Caroline Goodall. In the episodes "Tablet of Time" and "Ravages of Time," she is one of the few characters who are aware that Wilson Fisk is the Kingpin. In the end of "Ravages of Time," Vanessa decides to leave New York and Wilson for good, unable to deal with being the wife of a criminal. Sadly, she divorced her husband.

Marvel Cinematic Universe

Vanessa appears in the Netflix Daredevil series, portrayed by Ayelet Zurer.^[11] She does not have the last name Fisk but goes by Vanessa Marianna, giving her a maiden surname. She works in an art gallery as a curator where she meets Wilson Fisk for the first time, as they talk about a painting which is shown to have great significance to him over the course of the series. When they are together, Fisk is respectful of her boundaries and promises to always be honest with her. While Vanessa brings out a desire to be genuinely loved in Fisk, his violent nature dovetails with his protectiveness of her. Their first date is interrupted by one of Fisk's subordinates; enraged, he brutally kills the person that interrupted their dinner by severing his head with a SUV door, despite the man being important to Fisk's alliance with the Russian mob.

In later episodes, Vanessa's relationship with Fisk grows as she finds out more about the man, his dreams, and his methods for achieving those dreams. Unlike her comic book counterpart, Vanessa is not disgusted by Fisk's criminal activities and knows about them from near the beginning of their relationship. She brings a gun hidden in her purse to their second date, and tells Fisk that she knows he is a dangerous man when he asks about it, though she later hands over the gun to him after he promises her that the safest place she will ever be is by his side. His relationship with her inspires him to reveal himself to the populace of New York as a businessman and philanthropist, taking his campaign to improve Hell's Kitchen public. Fisk becomes devoted to Vanessa, causing his business partners to remark several times on how much he's changed since the beginning of their alliance, which progresses to them openly questioning his effectiveness. However, Wesley, Fisk's assistant and close friend, believes that Vanessa is beneficial to Fisk. In a series of events similar to a plotline in the comics, Vanessa is targeted by Fisk's allies, who hope to remove her influence on him. Thanks to Fisk rushing her to the hospital, and to Vanessa's own strength, she survives the assassination attempt. Later in the hospital, Vanessa tells Fisk she trusts him to make those responsible suffer for what they have done to her, highlighting the difference between this Vanessa and the Vanessa of the comics. Throughout the series, she repeatedly states that no one will be able to take Fisk away from her.

Vanessa also interacts with series star Matt Murdock, when he comes to her art gallery under the guise of a desire to purchase some art. As Murdock is blind, Vanessa describes a red painting to him and tells him that sight is not the most important thing for appreciating art. The two have an easy rapport, but in reality, Murdock noticed her public connection to Fisk and hoped that by talking to her he could discern something that might help him take Fisk down. However, when Fisk shows up at the gallery to see Vanessa, Murdock sees that the two love each other and realizes that Vanessa would mourn Fisk if Daredevil were to kill him.

References