Those who watched Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse must have sympathized with the anime version of Spider-Man, the character named Peni Parker. In this article, I did some research and will talk about some curiosities, origins, and references of this character.
The first thing you should know is that Peni Parker is not exclusive to the movie and has already appeared in comics. She first appeared in the comics in October 2014 and was created by Gerard Way and drawn by Jake Wyatt.
Her origin in the comics is from Earth-14512 while in the movie it is Earth-3145. Her appearance was in the Spider-Verse comics, in Edge of Spider-Verse #5 and Edge of Spider-Geddon #2 and some others.
The story of Peni Parker
She is a girl of Japanese descent who lost her parents and was adopted by Aunt May and Uncle Ben. Peni Parker is 14 years old and studies in high school; she is also a vegetarian.
Her father died in an accident while piloting a super technological suit called Sp//dr. She decided to continue her father’s project and allowed herself to be bitten by a radioactive spider that allows a psychic connection with the suit and the pilot.
With this suit that does the same things as a Spider-Man and more, she defends the city as the usual cliché. She knows Daredevil, who knew her father, has fought against Mysterio, and also met Spider-Ham.
In the comics Spider-Geddon, Peni Parker encounters a rival of her Meka SP//dr called Ven#m, equivalent to Eddy Brock. Peni also has to face M.O.R.B.I.U.S, a kind of Kaiju (giant monster) which forces the Sym Engine, developing its own independence in her Mecha Suit. All inspired by Evangelion and Venom.
Curiosities about Peni Parker
The character Peni Parker was clearly inspired by Japanese animations and mangas. It seems a bit cliché, but they tried to fit a Meka (robot) into the character, due to the high influence of robot animes in the West like Evangelion.
The trailer for the movie Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse was what popularized the character. Although the character emerged in 2014, only in 2018 did the number of searches on Google increase by 100x.
Like anything that appears on the internet, rule 34 was applied. That is, after Peni Parker's popularity on the Internet, several Fan Arts appeared, including hentais.
The Sp//dr from the comics is quite different from the movie, much darker and really resembles the robots from Evangelion. Even its suit resembles the plugsuits from the anime.
Several of Peni Parker’s classmates are references to mecha anime characters, such as:
- Kei from Dirty Pair;
- Simon from Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann;
- Asuka Langley Sohryu from Neon Genesis Evangelion;
- Hikari Nagisae Shinji Ikari from Neon Genesis Evangelion;
All appearances of Peni Parker in Spider-Man comics: Spider-Geddon Vol 1 #5, Edge of Spider-Verse Vol 1 #5, Spider-Gwen: Ghost-Spider Vol 1 #4, Spider-Geddon Vol 1 #4, Spider-Geddon Vol 1 #3, Spider-Geddon Handbook Vol 1 #1, Edge of Spider-Geddon Vol 1 #2, Amazing Spider-Man Vol 3 #12
I hope this article helped you learn a bit about Peni Parker and some curiosities about her. What did you think of the reference to Japanese culture in the Spider-Man comics? Did you like the article? Share and leave your comments.
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