What You Need to Know For 'The End of the Spider-Verse'

For people with spider-based powers, there are few foes deadlier than the Inheritors, who have nearly wiped out the Multiverse’s various Spider-Heroes on two occasions. The villains of “Spider-Verse” (2014) and SPIDER-GEDDON (2018), the Inheritors are a group of vampire-like hunters from Earth-001, AKA Loomworld, who seek to feed on all the Spider-based characters in the Multiverse. With the Spider-Verse saga set to continue in “The End of the Spider-Verse,” here’s what you need to know about the story so far.

Spider-Verse

Dan Slott, Olivier Coipel, and Giuseppe Camuncoli’s “Spider-Verse” crossover ran from 2014 until 2015. The story kicked off with the Inheritors hunting down Spider-based characters across the Multiverse to steal their life forces. To accomplish their goals, the Inheritors traversed the Web of Life and Destiny, which was under the control of their captive, the Great Weaver. 

The original group of Inheritors was made up of Solus and his children Bora, Verna, Brix, Daemons, Morlun, Jennix, and Karn. The lattermost of those children functioned alongside the group rather than as part of it, since he’d been cast out for his hesitation in a battle that cost his mother her life. This motivated Karn to kill Spider-Heroes in order to earn his way back into his family’s good graces. 

Once they discovered what was happening, Spider-Heroes from across the Multiverse gathered to take on the Inheritors. Among them was the time-displaced Otto Octavius, who at the time was in control of the body of Earth-616’s Peter Parker. They made Earth-13 their base, as the Spider-Man on that world still possessed the Enigma Force and thus the incredible abilities of Captain Universe. Together, they formed the Spider-Army.

Around the same time, Earth-616’s Parker freed Cindy Moon, AKA Silk, from her bunker. This attracted the attention of the Inheritors, as Moon was a special Spider-Totem known as the Bride. Together with the other two major Spider-Totems—the Other and the Scion—Silk’s existence posed a major threat to the Inheritors, and the villains set their sights on Earth-616 to ensure their victory. 

The Spider-Army successfully extracted Earth-616’s Parker and Moon to Earth-13, but the Inheritors soon attacked. While they successfully killed Daemos, the Spider-Army soon learned that Jennix possessed advanced cloning technology, allowing him to bring dead Inheritors back almost immediately. Solus also killed Earth-13’s Spider-Man, stealing the incredibly powerful being’s life force in the process. Finally, the Inheritors stole Earth-982’s Benjy Parker, who was the Scion.

Moon and Earth-616’s Jessica Drew, AKA Spider-Woman, ended up on the run from the Inheritors. However, Moon’s teleporter was damaged, and she was forced to use Drew’s to continue her escape. Eventually, she ended up on Earth-3145, which was irradiated from a nuclear war. The Inheritors were unable to pursue her there due to their weakness to radiation. Moon found a bunker on Earth-3145, and the Spider-Army soon came to plan its next steps. 

Drew, though, ended up stranded on Loomworld. There, she discovered the Master Weaver purposefully manipulated events to bring her there and entrusted her with scrolls that held the key to defeating the Inheritors. Moon returned to try and rescue her, but her teleporter got destroyed again, leaving them stranded behind enemy lines.

At the same time, the Spider-Army launched a multi-pronged attack on the Inheritors to rescue Benjy and stop their villainous plans. Kaine Parker, Ben Reilly, and Ultimate Spider-Woman set out to destroy Jennix’s lab and succeeded. However, Reilly died in the process. Kaine, who was the Other, headed to Loomworld to get revenge. In his Man-Spider form, Kaine successfully killed Solus, only for Morlun to murder him in revenge. 

With their victory nearly secure, the Inheritors prepared to sacrifice Benjy. However, the Spider-Army arrived on Loomworld just in time and swapped Spider-Ham, AKA Peter Porker, out for Benjy, saving the Scion from his would-be killers. Karn also join the battle, but this time on the side of the Spider-Army, as the group used the aforementioned prophecies to turn him against the Inheritors. In the end, the Spider-Army stranded the Inheritors in the bunker on Earth-3145.

The battle wasn’t quite over, though. Octavius, wanting to stop the Inheritors from ever returning, killed the Master Weaver and wrecked the Web of Life, nearly doing major damage to the Multiverse in the process. Soon, the Spider-Army learned Karn was an alternate version of the Master Weaver, and the former Inheritor took his predecessor’s place and began rebuilding the Web of Life. While most went back to their normal dimensions, a small contingent of the Spider-Army stayed behind on Loomworld to form the Web-Warriors, a group tasked with undoing the damage caused by the Inheritors, all while keeping them imprisoned.

Spider-Geddon

The Inheritors remained imprisoned on Earth-3145 until SPIDER-GEDDON (2018) by Christos Gage and Jorge Molina. That event kicked off with Octavius using technology appropriated from the Inheritors and the Jackal to clone himself during his time as the San Francisco-based hero Superior Octopus. Using the Web-Warriors’ Spider-Bots, Jennix hijacked Octavius’ lab and revived his family. The Web-Warriors attempted to stop the process and destroy the Superior Octopus’s lab, but they arrived too late. 

In the aftermath of the Inheritors’ return, a new Spider-Army formed, this time with Octavius and Earth-616’s Miles Morales in leadership roles. The two fought over whether to kill the Inheritors, with Octavius advocating for their deaths. However, they were eventually forced to reconcile when Earth-44145’s Norman Osborn, who has spider powers of his own, betrayed them and destroyed the Web of Life, thus trapping the Inheritors on Earth-616.

While the Inheritors revived Solus, Jennix struggled to get his cloning technology running properly and struck a deal with Octavius. The terms saw the Inheritors agreeing to spare Earth-616 in exchange for Ben Reilly, whose time as the Jackal gave him major insights into the cloning process. The idea was actually part of Octavius’ plan to stop the Inheritors, as attempting to absorb Reilly’s life force destroyed Jennix’s mind due to the clone’s traumatic memories.

The Spider-Army then launched its attack against the Inheritors. Morales ended up gaining temporary control of the Enigma Force, but its power was not, on its own, enough to take down the Inheritors. Luckily, Earth-18119’s Spiderling, AKA Annie Parker, arrived alongside Earth-982’s Anya Corazon and Spider-Woman. Spiderling was revealed to be the Pattern-Maker, a new Spider-Totem, and she played a key role in defeating the Inheritors using her new abilities, which gave her an unprecedented connection to the Web of Life. 

In the aftermath, Octavius cloned the Inheritors, but left them as babies. He also stripped out the hunger for life force that Solus had instilled in them and their memories. They were then entrusted to Spider-Ma’am, the May Parker of Earth-3123, in hopes of giving them a better life. Spiderling, for her part, used her newfound powers to begin restoring the Web of Life.

End of Spider-Verse

“The End of Spider-Verse” sees the ancient and powerful Shathra, who controls spider-warps, looking to replace the Web of Life with her own equivalent, the Great Nest. In the pages of EDGE OF SPIDER-VERSE (2022), she has succeeded at turning several key heroes to her side. To stand against the villain, Julia Carpenter’s Madame Web has begun recruiting Spider-Heroes to her side, including Anya Corazon’s Araña and Zarina Zahari’s Spider-UK.

SPIDER-MAN (2022) #1, which kicks off “The End of the Spider-Verse,” sees Shathra launch her attack on Earth-616. In the process, Marvel’s main Parker will discover that those he thought were his allies are now his enemies, and those he thought were his enemies might just be the Spider-Verse’s last hope.

EDGE OF SPIDER-VERSE (2022) #5 and SPIDER-MAN (2022) #1 go on sale tomorrow, October 5.

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