Alright so Across the Spider Verse is exactly
1 year old now and I still can’t stop watching it because it’s a masterpiece and
the more I’ve dug into this film, the more one particular prediction about
Beyond the Spider-Verse has just become… very silly to me. And that is the assertion
that Gwen will probably die in the next film. Now I’ve seen a lot of conversation, debate
if you will, on this topic. People who think she will die point to the obvious fact that it is
Spider-Man tradition for Gwen Stacy or a similar love interest to die in an act of fridging in
order to push Spider-Man’s development further. And people who think she won’t die tend
to combat that reading of the text by pointing out that in her universe, she is
Spider-Woman and her love interest died, which means that the boxes for staying faithful
to the source material have already been checked. And what I find interesting is that both
of these arguments miss the point of Across the Spider-Verse, in different ways, and in ways
that are directly challenged by the film itself. So, first of all, both Spider-Verse
films that have come out so far, but especially Across the Spider-Verse,
are obviously and indisputably aware of the conventional rules that a
Spider-Man story must follow. They show character introductions and movie act
transitions using these comic book cuts. “I was bitten by a radioactive spider and I’m pretty
sure you know the rest”. Hell, the pre-established rules for what a Spider-Man story is supposed to
be are literally physically embodied in the movie itself in the form of the Spider-Verse.
I really do not need to explain this. And the central point of conflict between our
protagonist and antagonist hinges on whether or not those conventional rules are breakable. Our
protagonist, Miles Morales, believes they are, while our antagonist, Miguel o’hara does not. So
off the bat, we should be expecting our hero to be proven right. The cannon says his dad is supposed
to die and for Miles to realize his philosophy, that things can change, that you can make your
own destiny, that you don’t have to be constrained by the boxes others try to put you in, he has
to actually save his dad, defying the cannon. But it’s not just because Miles is the
good guy and Miguel is the bad guy that makes me say this. There is textual evidence
which indicates to the audience that Miles’ belief system is correct. First of all,
Miguel O'Hara would have us believe that cannon events are unavoidable and
breaking them destroys universes, but it’s worth noting that he is not
necessarily a reliable source of information. He has experienced personal trauma from
the results of him breaking cannon, and has developed a sense of self worth out of
his ability to keep others from doing the same. If cannon events aren’t unavoidable, Miguel has
incentive to not let that information go public. Moreover, there are multiple points in the film
where the plausibility of the Spider-Verse being wrong are hinted at, mostly but not exclusively
from Miles. Obviously Miles is an anomaly. His entire existence breaks cannon, but then
there are more subtle moments like how when Miles asks when does his dad die, Miguel
responds with a statement of fact. He says… But then Lyla cuts in adding… There’s also this moment where Gwen
asks if Miguel knows what will happen if Miles breaks cannon and rather
than actually answering her question, he resorts to intimidation… and immediately,
in front of all the other Spider-People I might add, banishes Gwen back to her
dimension for stepping out of line. So based on all this, it should be really
clear that Miguel doesn’t have the strongest, most infallible argument for why
breaking cannon is impossible. Or at least that there are plenty of characters
who are not nearly as confident as him in that belief. The examples I just pointed out imply that
Miguel has gained the cooperation of the other Spider-People in no small part through fear
and the power of pure assertion in his claims. And Gwen being the last person who
challenges Miguel like this in the film, I believe is very meaningful, particularly as
it applies to the discussion surrounding her fate in Beyond the Spider-Verse. If you hadn’t
picked up on it yet, the argument that Gwen must die because Gwen Stacey has to die in a Spider-Man
story is exactly the same as saying that Miles’ dad must die because a police captain close
to Spider-Man dying is a cannon event. But that’s kinda obvious, and moreover,
it doesn’t prove the other side of this argument correct either. Gwen won’t die, not
because her death isn’t actually a cannon event. Gwen won’t die because cannon events are
stupid. Gwen won’t die because Miles is right. If you fixate on proving that Gwen won’t die
by arguing that this particular cannon event just doesn’t apply to her, you are reinforcing
the false credibility of cannon events. You are implicitly accepting the belief system of
the Miguel O'Haras of the world. You are engaging with them on their terms, and you
shouldn’t do that because they are wrong. And that specific understanding of how to properly
oppose systems like the one Miguel constructs is what Across the Spider-Verse communicates to the
audience through Gwen which is why it baffles me so much that anyone can miss this in conversations
about whether or not she will die. Gwen, herself is heavily implied to be concerned about
the possibility of her own death if she allows her relationship with Miles to become romantic, and
it is all too easy to see how Miles’ existence, his utter defiance of the rules she
thought the multiverse played by, acts a source of hope for her. Miles is a
signal to her that she can survive. More than just survive, she can live. She can
exist in this world the way she wants to. And do I even need to point out how obviously well
this maps onto the experience of trans people? Look, the whole “is Gwen trans?” “debate” that
took over a sizable chunk of the public reaction to this film when it came out was always just a
big meme to me because everyone who was against interpreting her character as trans pretended
to be some kind of high intellectual of how storytelling and authorial intent by pointing out
that “Gwen isn’t canonically confirmed as trans. You can read her as a trans allegory but that’s
just your interpretation.” Like, congratulations you figured out how all of art consumption
works. People observe elements of a creative work and come up with their own interpretations
of said creative work based on those observations. It should also come as no surprise how
ironic I think it is that such a huge part of the discussion surrounding this film
was about weather or not one of its characters is *canonically* trans when the whole point of
the movie, and *in particular* the whole point of this specific character is about dismantling
the mindset that “canonicity” holds any value. And for what it’s worth. There absolutely is
enough evidence in this movie to reasonably interpret Gwen as a trans woman. If you think
that the creative staff didn’t know that the film would be read this way and intend for it
to be read this way at least by trans people, you are operating on an astonishing level
of intentional misunderstanding of the text. So ok, knowing that the creators expected and
wanted Gwen to be read as trans at least by trans people, how awful of a decision would
it be to kill her off? Not just because she’s fucking awesome. Not just because it would
be burying your gays. Both of those, yes, but also because that runs completely
contrary to the belief system of Gwen by the end of the film, of the film
itself, and of the trans audience. Killing Gwen off would mean telling
trans people, and really anyone who connects with the things she struggles with,
that the lessons we learned throughout this movie are wrong. That there is no world that
will ever accept you for who you really are, and if you try to exist in the world as you really
are, it’ll destroy you, or the world, or both. The people making this film are smarter
than that. They know what kind of story they’re telling. It is no coincidence
that this film is by a landslide the most socially inclusive mainstream Spider-Man
media property to date. The themes it is just intrinsically about are simply really
applicable to socially minorities. And I don’t mean to paint all minorities
as a monolith. Different intersectional identities will experience different
types and degrees of stigmatization, and that’s something this film also appears to
be aware of. Reading Gwen as trans is meaningful, but what adds an extra layer to that meaning is
reading her a white trans person specifically. Gwen, like many white trans people feels
the pressure society puts on her to not be honest about who she really is,
but she has a tendency to act as if existing systems of oppression
are something to be navigated, rather than dismantled. “If I go through the
struggle to fit myself into an accepted box, even if it’s not the box I was told to fit into
at birth, everything will go back to normal.” A lot of white trans people get fooled by
the dream of integrating into the world as it exists now, or y'know a few years ago
before our existence became a political wedge issue. Partially because we struggle to
see how our race has an impact on our lives but also because we are so often vulnerable and
in need of a support system. Thematically then, it makes sense why Gwen clings so hard onto
the Spider-Society and the belief system which Miguel imposes on it even though it’s
exploiting her to do things that are not in her or Miles’ best interests. People like her…
people like us, always don’t have hope that a better alternative to this system exists until we
come into contact with… well, people like Miles. People who, rather than trying to find a
set of rules they can tolerate following, break the rules and forge their own new path. Spider-Man Across the Spider-Verse is about
breaking out of the boxes imposed on you by wider society so for it to do anything other than
radically break the conventions of a traditional Spider-Man story would be antithetical
to what it stands for as an art piece. That’s why Gwen won’t just not die in
Beyond the Spider-Verse. Gwen will live. Finally, I should point out that while I applied
this discussion of Across the Spider-Verse’s philosophy to the question of “will Gwen die in
the next film?”, hopefully it should be clear how for the same reason that I believe she will
live, I also believe it is totally possible for any number of traditional Spider-Man story rules
to be broken. So Miles saving his dad, or Gwen and Miles becoming a couple, which is actually
another implied concern of Gwen’s in this quote. It’s all possible. Anything, truly anything is
possible, and that has just got me so, so excited. I’ll be honest, this script started out as a
reddit post from months ago that I felt I had to expand upon because like I said, I can’t
stop watching this movie and I can’t stop thinking about it. It’s been so long since a film
resonated with me the way Across the Spider-Verse does and you can bet that I will be eager to talk
about Beyond the Spider-Verse when it comes out. Anyway I got a big list of other videos
to make in the meantime so see ya later.
