Jackal (Marvel Comics)

The Jackal is a fictional supervillain appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics.

Publication history

The character first appears in The Amazing Spider-Man #129 (Feb. 1974), and was created by writer Gerry Conway and artist Ross Andru.^[1] In The Amazing Spider-Man #148 (Sep. 1975), the identity of the Jackal was revealed to be Professor Miles Warren, a supporting character of Spider-Man, who first appears in The Amazing Spider-Man #31 (Dec. 1965),^[2] and was created by writer Stan Lee and artist Steve Ditko.

The character is the main antagonist of the controversial 1990s story arc, the Clone Saga, as well as the 2011 storyline, Spider-Island.

Fictional character biography

Miles Warren was a professor of biology at Empire State University.^[3] There, he met Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy.^[4] During his tenure there, Warren secretly fell in love with the much younger Stacy. After Stacy was murdered by the original Green Goblin, Warren swore vengeance on Spider-Man, falsely believing it was the superhero who caused her death, not realizing that the Green Goblin had the motives to kill her. Gwen's death drove Warren into depression and despair, which drove him further into insanity as a mad geneticist who eventually became the Jackal. Miles also had a brother named Raymond, who was a science teacher at Peter Parker's high school and introduced Peter to Miles.^[5]

Early career

It was revealed that Miles had previously been an assistant of the High Evolutionary at Wundagore Mountain after he earned his Ph.D in biochemistry. Warren had assisted the High Evolutionary in experiments that involved turning animals into humans and vice versa. There was conflict between Warren and the Evolutionary because Warren had succeeded "New Men" who looked practically human, whereas the Evolutionary was not able to. Eventually Warren had evolved a jackal that exhibited a Jekyll-Hyde personality. When the test subject escaped, the Evolutionary had banished Warren from Wundagore. Warren continued his research and eventually settled down with a woman named Monica who bore him two small children, who were all killed in what was originally believed to be a car crash; however, later revealed to be the result of an assault by his highly evolved Man-Jackal, envious of his creator.^[6]

Origin of the Jackal

The day after the death of Gwen Stacy, Warren's lab assistant, Anthony Serba, revealed that he had successfully cloned a frog using their Research technology. Warren secretly gave Serba tissue samples of Gwen Stacy and Peter Parker, stating to Serba these were only rat cells. Sometime later, Serba confronts Warren, stating that the tissue samples he was asked to clone were indeed human and that they must be destroyed immediately. Panicking, Warren attempts to cover Serba's mouth to shut him up, accidentally suffocating him. Unable to accept responsibility for his action, Warren resorts to his alter ego dubbing himself "The Jackal", which he took after overhearing a professor describing a jackal as a "cowardly predator". This also was something Warren further develops his alter ego by fashioning a green suit and training himself athletically.^[7] It was later revealed that Kaine was the first successful attempt at cloning Peter Parker, despite suffering from a slow cloning degeneration and having regenerative abilities to elude death several times.^[8]

The Jackal's hatred for Spider-Man manifested by his belief that he is solely responsible for allowing Gwen Stacy, whom he loved, to die at the hands of the Green Goblin. He initially harasses Spider-Man numerous times, setting him up against various other adversaries and manipulating these Spider-Man foes into his plans. Warren allied himself with the Punisher against Spider-Man, but his alliance with the Punisher was quickly dissolved when it was revealed that Jackal was manipulating him.^[9] Jackal's next attempts were to incite a gang war between Hammerhead and Doctor Octopus.^[10] Later, the Jackal equipped wrestler Maxwell Markham with the costume and powerful exoskeleton of the Grizzly and sent him to assassinate newspaper publisher J. Jonah Jameson.^[11] The Jackal then held Peter Parker hostage in a scheme to trap Spider-Man.^[12] Sometime after, he became aware of Spider-Man's identity and set out in his next major agenda.

Meanwhile, his early cloning experiments had a variation of results—out of his numerous attempts to clone Peter Parker, only one was a perfect copy of the original. He also created two clones of himself, one a direct copy, the other a modified clone harboring the Carrion virus who would surface later. His most prized creation, however, was what he perceived was a perfect copy of Gwen Stacy. Realizing the end of his plan was near, the Jackal battled Spider-Man with the assistance of the original Tarantula. The Jackal beat and drugged Spider-Man unconscious and transported him to Shea Stadium, where he was set to do battle with the perfect Spider-Man clone while holding Daily Bugle reporter Ned Leeds hostage.^[13] The two Spider-Men fought, until the Gwen Stacy clone tore off the Jackal's mask and confronted him on his crimes.^[14] A subsequent explosion of a bomb the Jackal had placed killed the Jackal and apparently the Spider-Man clone.^[7]

Clone Saga

It was much later revealed that the clone of Peter had survived the explosion and gone into hiding and creating the alias Ben Reilly - Peter's uncle's first name and aunt's maiden name. The Jackal who died at Shea Stadium was later revealed to be a clone. Nearly 5 years after the battle at Shea Stadium, another Jackal clone would marry the original Gwen Stacy clone and would live under the assumed names Warren and Gwen Miles. This clone of Warren eventually died of the clone degeneration that afflicted most of the clones created by the Jackal. Jackal resurfaced where his experiments mutated his own DNA and give himself attributes of an actual Jackal. Prior to these events, the Jackal's physical abilities had merely been the result of training rather than any superhuman powers.

Reilly returns years later to New York City, allied himself with Spider-Man, and became the Scarlet Spider. The Jackal also returned to unleash his clone army ^[15] and convinced both Parker and Reilly that Reilly was the real Peter Parker and that the other man was the clone, respectively. Jackal created a number of other Peter Parker clones who came into conflict with Spider-Man, the Scarlet Spider, and Kaine. The Jackal clone who was thought to have died at Shea Stadium was revealed to have survived and married the Gwen Stacy clone under an assumed name.^[16] Ultimately, the Jackal, in the process of attempting to kill and replace millions of people with clones he could control, was killed falling off a tall building while trying to save the Gwen clone.^[17]

Near the end of the Clone Saga it was revealed that the Jackal and the other major players of the Clone Saga had unknowingly been duped by Norman Osborn, the man who originally killed Gwen Stacy. The Jackal and various others (including Kaine) had been tricked into thinking Ben Reilly was the original and that Peter Parker was the clone. All of the Jackal's machinations during the Clone Saga were influenced by his incorrect assertion that he knew who the real Peter Parker was.^[18]

Spider-Island

Warren returns in the "Infestation" back-up feature of The Amazing Spider-Man, unleashing genetically-engineered bed bugs to pass on Spider-Man-like powers to thousands of citizens in Manhattan, building up to the "Spider-Island" storyline.^[19] It is later revealed that he achieved this through the aid of several human clones of himself, and funding from a mysterious female benefactor, later revealed as the Queen.^[20] Although the bed bugs had later died, the virus Warren gave to New Yorkers which gave them their spider-powers had become airborne to infect the world to create a new race of Homo-Arachnus, as part of the Queen's plan to overtake the Great Web of Life.

Jackal has also enlisted the aid of a regenerated Kaine after his death at the hands of the Kravens^[21] in Grim Hunt, which Warren had mutated into his man-spider henchman, Tarantula.^[8][22] It was revealed that the Gwen Stacy clone introduced in Amazing Spider-Man #144 was only the Jackal's second clone of Gwen Stacy. Abby-L, the first attempt to clone Gwen Stacy, was a flawed clone with the degenerative debilities of Kaine, the flawed clone of Peter Parker. Before this seemingly perfect copy of Gwen died at the hands of Abby-L, it was revealed she actually had some degeneration on her hand, suggesting that she was not perfect after all. Abby-L was also infected with the Carrion virus and had the same abilities of Carrion. Abby-L was manipulated by the Queen into killing the other Gwen clone, who was living in London under the alias Joyce Delaney, and coming into conflict with Jackal and Kaine.^[8]

With his own ulterior motives, the Jackal manipulated various gang leaders into adorning duplicate Spider-Man costumes to cause chaos in the city.^[23] While experimenting with the Spider-King (who was a captured Steve Rogers at the hands of the Queen) by injecting him with various embryo spiders to hatch outside of New York City Quarantine to spread the Infestation on a global scale.^[24] The Jackal reveals that he still knows Spider-Man's true identity despite the world-wide mind wipe of that information by the rest of the world.^[20] After a cure was created by Reed Richards and Horizon Labs using Anti-Venom's symbiotic antibodies, when Warren assured the Queen that no cure was possible, she seemingly killed Warren after realizing her powers were amplified due to a frequency that returned Spider-Man's spider-sense, giving her the power of a god.^[24] It appeared that as though the original Jackal was killed by the Queen; however, in the aftermath of Spider-Island it was revealed that the Jackal who died was one of the clones, and the real Jackal had kept his distance the entire time. Jackal revealed this to his surviving Miles Warren clones, anticipating the outcome, in order to gain a sample of a husk of Spider-God DNA, recognizing his success when managing to obtain Peter Parker's DNA. Unbeknownst to the Avengers and Spider-Man, the Jackal was ordering the clean-up crew to obtain the slain Queen's DNA.^[25]

Post Spider-Island

It was revealed that the Jackal has been monitoring Peter Parker's accidental creation of Alpha, and has set his sights on Spider-Man's new protege.^[26] Jackal resurfaces accompanied by his first wave of cloned mutated human-spider hybrids of the Spider Queen and is bent on harvesting Alpha's powers for himself in order to clone a race of Alpha males alongside his Spider-Queens. However, his plans fail as Alpha breaks free and all the clones are destroyed by Alpha. It was revealed that the two Jackals Spider-Man and Alpha fought were also clones.^[27]

Superior Spider-Man era

After Doctor Octopus's mind possesses Spider-Man's body, he encounters the X-Men. The group battles a giant human-spider hybrid attacking New York, which turns out to be a human transformed by the Jackal.^[28] Jackal later attacks Superior Spider-Man and Scarlet Spider.^[29] Jackal escapes and it is revealed that he kept samples of Scarlet Spider's (Kaine's) DNA. Jackal tells Carrion that he is prepared to develop Spidercide 2.0.^[30]

Clone versions

Prior to the death of the Warren clone at Shea Stadium,^[7] he had created a clone of himself. The clone remained in stasis within a cloning casket that malfunctioned and super-aged the clone beyond death. Eventually, it emerged and became known as Carrion that wielded power and had no conscience for its actions. He was the first carrier of the Carrion virus, which Warren designed to destroy humanity. Carrion contained all Warren's memories which contained within his RNA, that included his hatred and knowledge of Spider-Man's secret identity. Carrion wielded the power to create a Red Dust that would spread as pestilence as well as his touch that would incapacitate or even cause organic matter to degenerate to the point of disintegration.^[31] The original Carrion intended to kill Spider-Man with a spider-amoeba, but failed as Carrion was absorbed by the amoeba, engulfed in flames that ensued from his battle.^[32][33]

Much later, fellow ESU rival Malcolm McBride stumbled across Warren's old lair, where he was infected with a strain of the Carrion virus and became the second incarnation of Carrion. The virus allowed McBride to become endowed with the knowledge of Spider-Man's secret identity; however, he was unsure whether he was Dr. Warren's first clone or Malcolm McBride.^[34] Eventually, McBride teamed with the likes of Demogoblin and Carnage, but was later cured of his condition and incarcerated in Ravencroft Asylum.^[35]

However, another clone of Miles Warren later appeared, who was even further genetically altered to the point where he frequently displayed animalistic tendencies. His body is always cold, requiring him to wear a thick fur coat even in the hottest weather. He became a crime lord, calling himself "The Professor", and allied himself with Hammerhead, but the two of them eventually went to jail.^[36]

A man dressed as the Jackal once attacked Alpha Flight and claimed to be Miles Warren's son.^[37] It was later indicated that this Jackal was the Ani-Man Warren created that ultimately murdered the Professor's family.^[38]

Powers and abilities

After regeneration, Miles Warren had the strength, speed and agility of a jackal, amplified to superhuman levels. Miles Warren was a genius in the fields of biochemistry, genetics, and cloning, and was a talented gymnast and martial artist. As revealed in Spider-Island, he is unaffected by the worldwide mind purging of Spider-Man's identity.

Notable clones created by the Jackal

The following clones were created by Jackal:

• The Miles Warren clone who died at Shea Stadium in The Amazing Spider-Man #149.^[7]

• The Miles Warren clone who married the Gwen Stacy clone and died of clone degeneration in Web of Spider-Man #125.^[16]

• The Miles Warren clone in the Daredevil/Punisher Limited Series.

• The original Miles Warren clone who became Carrion.

• The Gwen Stacy clone introduced in The Amazing Spider-Man #144. She went by the aliases Joyce Delaney and Gwen Miles.^[39]

• Abby-L, the original Gwen Stacy clone who is also infected with the Carrion virus; introduced in Spider Island: Deadly Foes.^[8]

• The Gwen Stacy clone introduced in The Amazing Spider-Man #399 who dies of clone degeneration.^[40]

• Ben Reilly aka the Scarlet Spider/Spider-Man.

• Kaine/Kaine Parker aka Tarantula aka Scarlet Spider - the first Peter Parker clone who suffers from clone degeneration.

• Spidercide - Peter Parker clone who has control over his own molecules.

• Jack - Peter Parker clone, the Jackal's diminutive henchman who dies from clone degeneration.

• Guardian - Peter Parker clone who guarded the entrance to one of the Jackal's headquarters. He also died of clone degeneration.

• The Spider-Man skeleton found in the smokestack Ben Reilly was dumped down at the end of the original clone story.

• The army of Spider-Man clones in Maximum Clonage.

• The multiple Miles Warren clones featured in "Spider-Island" who act as the henchmen for Jackal and the Queen.

• The Spider-Queen clones that were harvested from the Spider Queen's DNA sent to fight Spider-Man.^[26]

• The two Jackal/Miles Warren clones that kidnapped Alpha and his family, which Spider-Man fought.^[41]

• The Alpha clones created to harvest/clone the Parker Particles.^[41]

Other versions

Marvel Zombies

In Marvel Zombies Universe, when the Zombie Galacti left the Earth (after eating Galactus), Wilson Fisk (Kingpin) makes an empire. The zombiefied Jackal plays an important part in it, creating human clones to feed the remaining Marvel Zombies. This process utilizes Inhuman technology.^[42]

Spider-Man: Clone Saga

Jackal appears in the re-imagining of the Clone Saga by Tom DeFalco, who was exploring the storyline as it was originally conceived. He infects both Aunt May and Mary Jane with a genetic virus. When Kaine betrays Jackal and leads Spider-Man and Scarlet Spider to his lair, all three are captured. Jackal then reveals his plan to create an army of Spider-Clones to take over the world and clone Gwen Stacy. The clones prove unstable, however, and Jackal comes to the conclusion that Ben is the original. Before he can do anything, Kaine breaks free and burns his mark onto Jackal's face before breaking his neck.^[43]

Ultimate Marvel

Miles Warren was Harry Osborn's hypnotherapist and helped him repress memories about his father, the Green Goblin.^[44] Later in the Deadpool story arc of Ultimate Spider-Man, he was revealed to be dating Aunt May.^[45] However, as of now, he had no involvement in the Clone Saga in this continuity and has yet to make any more appearances. His involvement has been taken over by Doctor Octopus.^[46] He last appeared when Aunt May tried to introduce him to Peter, but they had to leave town because of Norman Osborn and he had a patient to handle.^[47]

Spider-Verse

In the Spider-Verse storyline, the Miles Warren of Earth-802 is one of the top scientists working for Jennix of the Inheritors. Jennix once quoted to Miles "I keep you around because you were once the most brilliant mind on the planet."^[48] Spider-Man of Earth-94, Scarlet Spider, and Black Widow of Earth-1610 later encounter Miles Warren when they infiltrate the Baxter Building to disable Jennix' cloning device (which is used to create new bodies for the Inheritors if they get killed in action).^[49]

Secret Wars: Spider-Verse

During the Secret Wars storyline, Spider-Gwen encounters the Jackal of Arachnia and covers him with webbing as he is robbing a grave, after which he exclaims he is the best geneticist of his generation.^[50]

What If?

In "What If The Punisher Had Killed Spider-Man?", Warren successfully dupes the Punisher into killing Spider-Man and abandons him to take the fall in his place. Becoming a hunted fugitive, Punisher eventually hunts Warren down and intends to surrender him to the police. But when the NYPD is about to arrest him instead, threatening to kill him should he shoot Warren, Warren is executed (off-panel) by the Punisher after the latter gleefully concludes the story with the words: "See you on the other side, Jackal."^[51]

In other media

Television

• Miles Warren appears in the two-part Spider-Man episode "The Return of Hydro-Man" voiced by Jonathan Harris. Here, Miles Warren is a scientist whose cloning experiments were banned by the government. He continued his experiments in secret with help from the crime lord Silvermane (whom he kept anonymous) where Warren worked in an underwater lab. Warren's clones were unsuccessful where their cells would not hold together and they disintegrated into nothing. Interested in Hydro-Man and his ability to change his molecules into water, Warren finds a sample of Hydro-Man's DNA at the scene of his evaporation and creates a clone of Hydro-Man. Like the real Hydro-Man, the clone loved Mary Jane Watson and demanded that Warren creates a clone of her. Warren does create a clone of Mary Jane after stealing some hair samples from her brush while Anna Watson was mourning her niece's loss, unable to notice him in her grief. In the end, the clones of Hydro-Man and Mary Jane Watson degenerate, though Warren is able to steal a sample of Spider-Man's DNA from a piece of his costume with the intent to clone him. With part of his underwater lab trashed, he contacted Alistair Smythe to have Silvermane's men repair it. In an alternate universe, Warren managed to clone Spider-Man. The clone had escaped and became Ben Reilly. His presence in this dimension caused the real Peter Parker to willingly combine with the Carnage Symbiote to become Spider-Carnage.

• Miles Warren first appears in The Spectacular Spider-Man episode "Blueprints" voiced by Brian George (who also voices Miles' brother Aaron). In this incarnation, Miles Warren is much younger and East Indian. Warren, along with his assistant Debra Whitman, joins his brother Aaron Warren, Dr. Curt Connors, and Dr. Martha Connors in scientific research at the ESU labs with a grant from Norman Osborn. Warren bases his genetic research on Curt's work with lizard DNA, but Curt discourages his work. When Kraven the Hunter tracks down Spider-Man at ESU labs, Warren offers to alter Kraven's genetic material for a large sum of money. Kraven agrees, and Warren uses the same procedure that caused Curt to become the Lizard to mutate Kraven into a lion-like creature (with elements of cheetah and leopard thrown in). After Eddie Brock steals a vial of Curt's gene cleanser, Miles talks to the college board and plots to take away Connors' control of the lab for himself. In the episode "Subtext", he is seen in an old rundown police station which happens to be another one of Norman Osborn's laboratories. Here he uses Mark Allan, Liz Allan's brother as an upgraded experiment from Dr. Otto Octavius' previous Sandman experiment. He then injects a thermal suit into Mark which turns him into Molten Man. Dr. Warren then convinces Mark that the suit can only be controlled by sheer will when actually it can only be controlled remotely. At the end of the episode, Connors discovers Warren's research, and threatens to tell the school board. However, Warren retaliates by threatening to inform them of his own Lizard experiments, and reveal how his human limb regeneration project turned him into The Lizard.

Video games

• Jackal appears in the PlayStation 2 and PSP versions of Spider-Man: Web of Shadows voiced by Greg Baldwin. He is in alliance with Spencer Smythe and is his double agent when Spider-Man encounters Jackal on the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier. After being defeated, Jackal gives Spider-Man a serum that will enhance his symbiotic suit before he gets away. Jackal later steals the Sonic Emitter from the top of Fisk Tower and gets away as Spencer Smythe unleashes Black Cat on Spider-Man. Spider-Man encounters him in Central Park where he has made modifications to the Sonic Emitter so that he can control the symbiotes. Spider-Man defeats him and programs the Sonic Emitter to destroy the symbiotes.

Reception

DeMatteis, the creator of the Clone Saga, claimed in an interview that he thought Jackal is "a terrific villain...one of his favorites", and that it "was a blast bringing the character back, if only for this one story."^[52] Dan Slott claimed in an interview with Newsarama about the upcoming Spider-Island saga that Jackal is "one of the wonderful mad scientists of Spider-Man's world."^[53]

References

External links

• Jackal at Marvel.com