Jackal (Marvel)
The Jackal is a male comic supervillain who features in Marvel Comics.
Contents |
Biography
Origin
Miles Warren
He had a brother by the name of Raymond Warren. (Untold Tales of Spider-Man v1 #25) At some point, he met and fell in love with blonde haired Monica where she came to be his wife. From their relationship, he had two children that included an older daughter. During these years, Warren became consumed by his research that replaced his old passions to the point that it strained his marriage. This ranged to the point that Monica had left her husband with the children but whilst in the car she had an accident leading to the death of all three of them. Upon hearing the news, Miles experienced intense grief as he had lost everything in his life with teaching being the only solace he had found. (Web of Spider-Man v1 #125)
Afterwards, he sought out the High Evolutionary with Miles Warren serving as his new assistant whose dedicated efforts led to a number of New Men developing more human features. Whilst the High Evolutionary sought to create a new race of gods, Warren intended to play god himself and wanted to make a race of perfect humans. In this time, he came to use the technology without the High Evolutionary's consent to evolve a jackal to a near-human appearance. However, the hybrid came to manifest a savage Jekyll and Hyde-like personality where despite its new high IQ it would regularly sneak out to prey on animals in nearby farms during the night. As a result, he was banished from Wundagore by the High Evolutionary and the New Men were taught that Warren's was ultimately a destructive individual. However, a number of New Men came to believe that Warren's path offered them freedom whereas their master wanted to keep them domesticated. Thus, these New Men departed with the human scientist out of Wundagore and made a new settlement. Meanwhile, Warren would marry a local woman and had two lovely children but his passion for his family came to be clouded by his desire to continue his research. Unknown to him, the Jackal-Man he evolved had escaped the High Evolutionary's laboratory and began to stalk the Warren family. The New Man came to grow jealous of the new life and family which Miles Warren had made for himself. In response, the creature attacked Warren's wife and children when they were travelling in a car with them being attacked and killed before they ever reached their destination. Afterwards, the authorities would contact Warren informing him that his family had died in an accident where they believe they had been killed by a wild animal. However, Warren was aware of the truth with him returning to Wundagore with him blaming the High Evolutionary for his family's death. He would challenge the High Evolutionary's authority over the New Men and promised to turn the animal people fully human thus leading a faction out of Wundagore. Miles Warren then departed shortly afterwards but returned every summer to conduct experiments to turn these New Men into humans so that they could join him into man's world. He created a serum from human donor DNA that converted a select number of New Men into humans but they quickly degraded to become living corpses after succumbing to a prototype version of the Carrion virus. Warren grew despondent afterwards and sought a solution in cloning to create a body that could hold the mind of the New Men and departed to develop this theory. (Scarlet Spider Unlimited v1 #1)
In the ensuing years, Warren became a professor at Empire State University in New York City, and returned to the New Wundagore settlement every summer, attempting to bring them closer to humanity. One year, he tried injecting them with a DNA serum which did succeed in making them human - until it ravaged their bodies, transforming them into living corpses before mercifully killing them. He eventually decided that cloning was the solution, and left New Wundagore for years while he worked on the problem. (Scarlet Spider Unlimited v1 #1) Despite not being a medical doctor, Warren was called in to the short-staffed Mt. Sinai Hospital when Dr. Treaks called in sick. He was displeased, especially since the hospital was full of police officers and surrounded by reporters, thanks to the hospital's newest patient: war hero Frank Castle, who had been injured in a botched Mafia hit that also killed his entire family. He discussed the case with Detective John Laviano, and informed him that another witness to the incident, Forrest Hunt, was still alive. (Punisher: Year One v1 #1) Miles' brother Raymond wrote a recommendation for one of his high school students, Peter Parker, to Miles. Miles read it with interest. Raymond introduced Miles to Parker during a tour of the ESU campus. He told Parker that ESU would be lucky to have him as a student, and dismissed Parker's money concerns, telling him that a smart man never gives up...until he was distracted as he caught a glimpse of Gwen Stacy walking by outside. (Untold Tales of Spider-Man v1 #25) Warren fell in love with Gwen Stacy, a new student in his class, from the moment he saw her. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #149) Warren scolded Parker, who had enrolled in his class, when his experiment exploded. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #31)
Noticing that Parker looked unwell in class, Warren sent him home. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #48) After an exam, Warren talked to Parker after class. He told Parker that his grades had been slipping; Parker promised to buckle down. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #50) Running into Parker at the school gym, Warren invited him and a guest to a science exposition that evening. That night, Warren drove Parker and his plus-one, Gwen Stacy, to the exposition, where a new missile defense system, the Nullifier, was being displayed. Before long, Dr. Octopus attacked, hoping to steal the device. As the panicked crowd fled, Warren got Gwen to safety, but lost track of Parker. He drove the duo to the Coffee Bean, and mused on what a fascinating psychological subject Spider-Man would be. He dropped them off, and headed home to grade term papers. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #53) Warren tried to pry an oral report out of a distracted Parker. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #63) Warren asked Peter to see him, and told him that his constant absences were affecting his grades. He asked Parker if he was having any problems he could help with, but Peter insisted that there was nothing he could talk about. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #88) After assigning his class genetics homework, Warren had the late-arriving Peter stay after; noting his recent history of missed classes and failing grades, he told Parker that his scholarship was in jeopardy. He gave Parker a few more days to finish his work, and also gave him his card, in case he ever needed to talk. Later, Peter, still suffering from trauma after the death of George Stacy, called Warren. (Spider-Man: Death & Destiny v1 #1) Despite it being the middle of the night, Warren awoke, and took Parker's call. Despite Parker telling Warren he was at his aunt's house, Warren's Caller ID let him know that he was really calling from an auto body shop; as soon as Parker realized his mistake, he hung up. Later, Parker handed in his paper, which Warren told him was one of the best papers he'd ever read. (Spider-Man: Death & Destiny v1 #2) Warren stopped Gwen on campus, asking after Peter, who he had not seen in a week. She told him that it was due to his Aunt May's disappearance, and that Gwen blamed herself for driving her away. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #114)
In his guise as the Jackal, he returned to the New Men settlement that had revered him and told them of his success in cloning. After taking necessary equipment, he departed once more and commanded this settlement of New Men to continue with his experiments. At this point, the High Evolutionary had returned and had grown angry that some of his creations had revered Warren. Thus, he outlawed their faith and actively sought to destroy it with the survivors forming the Cult of the Jackal as an underground rebellion. (Scarlet Spider Unlimited v1 #1)
Jackal
He later learnt that Gwen Stacy had died with Professor Warren having cried on that day as he felt something in him similarly die. Miles felt lost afterwards until Anthony Serba remarked about their successes in cloning. It was then that Miles decided on cloning Gwen where he used tissue samples that he gave Serba and tricking him into cultivating them by claiming it was those of a rat. During their development, Serba was horrified at seeing humans being clone and suggested destroying them but this made Warren furious who wanted to stop the man. This caused him to inadvertently killing Serba with Warren incapable of accepting that he had committed the murder. He disposed of the body and later in the day whilst denying his involvement in the death when he heard a lecture about jackals. It was then that he invented the persona of the Jackal who he blamed for the death. For months afterwards, he trained himself and created equipment for his Jackal guise whilst he awaited the completion of his clone of Gwen Stacy. Upon maturation, Gwen emerged without the last memories of her death where he promised to avenge her by killing Spider-Man. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #149) Hating Peter for having Gwen's love, Warren followed after Peter one night and witnessed him into changing into Spider-Man. This cemented Warren's hatred toward Parker and he became determined to destroy Peter. (Spectacular Spider-Man v1 #149)
During one snowy January, he came to return to Wundagore where his followers among the New Men quickly rallied under him. They came to believe that as the Jackal he had adopted a guise so that he could be more like them. Warren revealed that he had successfully created two perfect clones namely of Gwen Stacy and Peter Parker. However, he said that he would need to depart to continue his experiments where he collected some much needed equipment and promising to one day return. Following his departure, the High Evolutionary returned where he took his vengeance on the New Men for straying from his worship an looked to destroy the religion that formed around Miles Warren. Though scattered, the New Men adherents came to form an underground rebellion known as the Cult of the Jackal who maintained their reverence of Miles Warren. (Scarlet Spider Unlimited v1 #1)
Around this time, the Jackal approached the infamous vigilante known as the Punisher where he began to claim that Spider-Man was a notorious criminal who was terrorising New York City. He came to convince the man that they had a similar goal in destroying crime in New York and suggested that they work together to eliminate the Wall-Crawler. Thus, he was able to trick the Punisher into staging an ambush of Spider-Man on a rooftop. However, the vigilante came to underestimate his quarry nearly resulting in his defeat. This forced the Jackal to intervene where he struck at the hero from behind but Spider-Man managed to escape the scene. The intervention came to anger the Punisher though who disagreed with the Jackal's methods as he did not agree with such underhanded tactics. He would then depart to replace his equipment with the Jackal deciding to kill the Punisher's supplier in order to frame him as he deemed him of no further use. At first, the Punisher believed Spider-Man had been responsible for the death but the Wall-Crawler managed to convince the vigilante that the Jackal intended for Castle to be arrested by the authorities for the murder. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #129)
At some point, he captured Kaine and transformed him into a hybrid spider-monster who he called the Tarantula. This allowed him to fall under the telepathic control of the Queen and she made him the Jackal's enforcer. During the Spider-Island epidemic, Horizon Labs were developed a cure for the spider-flu. To stop them, Warren dispatched Tarantula to poison the cure by using his DNA to bypass the security into the laboratory. Despite his strengths, Tarantula was defeated and returned back to normal by Spider-Man whose Spider-Sense had been amplified by the efforts of Max Modell. For his failure, the Queen took out her rage on the Jackal with an amplified psychic scream that killed Miles Warren. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #671) In reality, the slain Warren was a clone whilst the real one stayed in the distance to observe. He had his crews be part of the clean up crew that was sent to remove the dead remains of the Spider Queen's gigantic monstrous form. Warren intended to harvest some of the genetic samples for his experiments with this being a back-up plan in case the Queen was ever defeated. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #673) When Andy Macguire gained superpowers as Alpha, the Jackal captured him with the intention of harvesting the powerful Alpha-energy within his body but was stopped by Spider-Man. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #693)
Clone Conspiracy
Under the guise of Professor Guarinus, he came to establish a civilian identity back at Empire State University. It was then he saw a young student who was the spitting image of Gwen Stacy and decided to learn more about her. In addition, he was attempting to ensure he could remain in his human form as the Jackal DNA within him was assertive and kept reverting to his superhuman form. (Ghost-Spider v1 #2)
He came to follow the Ghost-Spider through a dimensional portal and ended up on Earth-95. Whilst there, he was captured by a criminal gang that belonged to the crime boss known as the Man-Wolf. Once there, he encountered that reality's Miles Warren where they two formed an alliance to take down Ghost-Spider. However, the Earth-616 wanted to possess that world's Gwen Stacy for himself as part of his obsession over her whilst the Earth-95 was disgusted by this behaviour. They managed to use a formula that rendered the Ghost-Spider powerless after which the Jackal killed that world's Miles Warren. The Earth-95 Gwen Stacy's friends who were looking for her came to find her captive with the Jackal attempting to kill them but Ghost-Spider managed to capture him. Whilst with her friends, she failed to notice though that the Jackal managed to free himself and escape where he remained on the run. (Ghost-Spider v1 #5)
Overview
Personality and attributes
The name the Jackal was an invention of Warren's disturbed mind when he sought to blame the murder of Anthony Serba on someone else. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #149) At one point, he came to operate under the name of Professor Guarinus when he wanted to hide his true identity. (Ghost-Spider v1 #2)
It was claimed that earlier in his life that Miles Warren had once been a completely selfless individual. (Scarlet Spider Unlimited v1 #1)
According to the High Evolutionary, it was the death of his family caused by the Jackal-Man he had created along with the murder of Anthony Serba that caused Warren to experience guilt that pushed him over the edge resulting in he creation of the Jackal persona upon whom he projected heinous acts. (Scarlet Spider Unlimited v1 #1) Warren admitted that he was a sick man but initially claimed that he was not a murderer. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #149)
He claimed that he excelled in the use of back-up plans. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #673)
He was shown to be a manipulative person capable of using lies in order to enlist the aid of others to help him achieve his goals. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #129)
From the day he first saw her, he came to admire Gwen Stacy where Miles said that she perhaps reminded him of a daughter he never had in his life. She was said to had been a good student who was bright and attentive. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #149) At some point, Gwen Stacy became more than his favoured student within his own mind. (Web of Spider-Man v1 #125) Warren did not know the reason for the attraction to her but he felt drawn to her in a protective fatherly way. The day she died was the day something died within him where he cried on that day. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #149)
Miles was fixated on the concept of revenge against Spider-Man and to prove himself to be superior to the Wall-Crawler. He claimed that he had hated Peter Parker for being young and for being in love with Gwen Stacy. Warren also said that he had hated Parker for letting Gwen die. This led to him seeking revenge on him and wanting to kill him. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #149) Learning that Parker was Spider-Man only cemented his hatred of the young man. (Spectacular Spider-Man v1 #149)
At Wundagore, he apprenticed himself to the High Evolutionary where without his teacher's consent he used the technology to evolve a particular jackal into a Jackal-Man New Man. (Scarlet Spider Unlimited v1 #1) This individual also took the name of the Jackal who claimed to be Warren's son. He would state that after the death of his mother that Miles had locked him away from the world and kept a prisoner his whole life. As a result, he was deprived a childhood with his whole life being sculpted according to his father's twisted image. (Alpha Flight v1 #114)
Powers and abilities
Originally, Miles Warren was an ordinary human being with no special abilities that he was born with at the time. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #149) As a scientist, it was said that his expertise was in genetics. (Scarlet Spider Unlimited v1 #1)
This changed when he began to adopt the guise of the Jackal where he began to train himself athletically. Despite seemingly being human, he actually showed a surprising amount of agility that could match superpowered individuals. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #149)
As the Jackal, he designed special equipment for his costumed persona that included special claws capable of slashing at his enemies. Among the skills known to him was the art of hypnosis allowing him to draw out buried memories and even make commands that forced a person to obey him. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #149)
It was shown that he was skilled in the art of cloning and able to create biological duplicates of living organisms. Such was his skill that he could alter their cellular memory and imprint the biological donors memories. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #149) He made use of a number of clones of himself that appeared as his ordinary human self. These copies served as assistants and were given number designations in addition to their name to distinguish them from one another. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #666)
Whilst working with the New Men, he created a serum derived from human donors able to turn animal hybrid into human beings. However, the serum came to quickly ravage their new bodies and transformed them into living corpses until they eventually died with this being a prototype of what would become known as the Carrion Virus. (Scarlet Spider Unlimited v1 #1) It was a biochemical virus that was created from recombinant DNA with this genetic virus capable of changing a person's DNA. (Spectacular Spider-Man v1 #149)
Another of his creations were the Genetrix that were overgrown viruses mutated into various forms that were programmed with a particular function and a limited lifespan. (The Spectacular Spider-Man v1 #222) He later came to use genetic copies of the Spider-Queen with the half-arachnid female creatures being sent on various tasks for him. (Amazing Spider-Man v1 #693)
He was a source of worship by some among the New Men who formed the Cult of the Jackal in honor of him. (Scarlet Spider Unlimited v1 #1)
Notes
- Miles Warren was created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko where he made his first appearance in The Amazing Spider-Man v1 #31 (December 1965) but appeared as the Jackal by Gerry Conway and Ross Andru in The Amazing Spider-Man v1 #129 (February 1974).
Alternate Versions
- In Spider-Island (2015), a version of the Jackal was shown to had survived in one of the territories on Battleworld. This version supported the Queen when she infected the area with the spider-plague. After he had served her purpose, she had him killed and replaced him with other scientists.
In other media
Television
- In Spider-Man: The Animated series, the character of Miles Warren made an appearance in the two-part episode "The Return of Hydro-Man" where he was voiced by actor Jonathan Harris. He was shown as being a scientist who conducted cloning experiments that were banned by the government. Warren continued his experiments through the anonymous support of the crime lord Silvermane where he operated in an underwater laboratory. His clones were largely unsuccessful as their cells could not hold together and they disintegrated into nothing. Warren's attention was drawn to Hydro-Man who had the ability to change his molecules into water and thus he sought a sample of his DNA from the scene of his battle with Spider-Man where he evaporated in the fight. From that sample, he managed to create a clone of Hydro-Man that retained the original's memories that included his obsessive love over Mary Jane Watson. In anger, Hydro-Man demanded that Miles Warren create a clone of Mary Jane for him that the scientist succeeds in accomplishing after her disappearance by claiming hair samples from a brush whilst Anna Watson was grieving over her niece. The clone of Mary Jane Watson was created to be similar to Hydro-Man with the ability to turn her body into water but she rejected him and went on the run where she sought out Peter Parker. Ultimately, both clones of Hydro-Man and Mary Jane Watson suffered from the degeneration where they died. In the resulting skirmish, his laboratory was destroyed but Warren was able to steal a sample of Spider-Man's DNA from a piece of his costume where he expressed an interest in cloning the hero as well. Warren later contacted Alistair Smythe to get Silvermane's men to repair his laboratory so he could continue his research. In an alternate reality, it was shown that Miles Warren succeeded in his cloning experiments and made a clone of Spider-Man. However, the subject escaped from his captivity and assumed the civilian identity of Ben Reilly. The existence of Reilly led to that reality's Peter Parker to question his own existence and whether he was a clone leading to him going insane. This chain of events saw him willingly marge with the Carnage Symbiote in order to become Spider-Carnage where he was unaware that he was the original and that Reilly was the clone.
- In The Spectacular Spider-Man, Miles Warren appeared in the animated television series starting in the episode "Blueprints" where he was voiced by actor Brian George.
- In Spider-Man, the Jackal appeared in the 2017 animated television series where he was voiced by actor John DiMaggio. This version was Raymond Warren who was an uncle to Gwen Stacy and inspired her to become a scientist with him working secretly in hybridization research. This involved the creation of eight genetically engineered spiders such as the Electrolis Arachnatis that could impart superhuman abilities on people they bit in order to create supersoldiers. Warren's work created the genetically engineered spider that bit Peter Parker but the dangers of it caused Oscorp to destroy the specimen. He continued his work on himself allowing him to transform into the green-skinned animalistic Jackal that operated as a super-villain in secret. His work caused some uproar at his workplace in Empire State University though no proof of bad practice was done with Raymond attempting to gain employment first at Horizon Labs then at the Osborn Academy. He decided to showcase his work for Norman Osborn where he accidently infected Horizon High student Aleksei Sytsevich turning him into the Rhino. Gwen Stacy discovered this after she examined Aleksei's DNA as she was a genetics expert and confronted Raymond who turned into the Jackal and battled Spider-Man at his home residence. Whilst distracted, Gwen developed a serum that reversed his genetic changes turning him back human whereupon he was arrested for his actions.
Video games
- In Spider-Man: Web of Shadows, the Jackal appeared in the PlayStation 2 ad PSP version of the game where he was voiced by actor Greg Baldwin. He was shown to be allied with Spencer Smythe who placed him as a double agent on the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier with the goal of recovering the symbiotic suit. After being defeated, he provided a serum to Spider-Man to allow him to enhance the Symbiote before he escaped. Afterwards, he stole the Sonic Emitter at the top of Fisk Tower whereupon he escapes whilst Smythe used it to unleash a mind controlled Black Cat on Spider-Man. Spider-Man later encountered the Jackal at Central Park where he made modifications to the Sonic Emitter allowing him to control the Symbiotes. Following his defeat, he programmed the Sonic Emitter in a manner that allowed it to destroy the Symbiotes.
Appearances
- Amazing Spider-Man v1: (1965)
- Untold Tales of Spider-Man v1:
- Scarlet Spider v2:
- Clone Conspiracy v1:
- Ghost Spider v1:
External Links
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