Stinger: A Case For Cassie Lang's Codename in the MCU

 

While I’ve been particularly busy and going through a lot of personal turbulence, I felt an odd impulse to just throw this together. It’s something I’ve been thinking about since Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania was announced and has grown into a bit of a personal obsession. This is my case for why Cassie Lang should be called Stinger in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

 

Let’s start with a little background: Officially Marvel Studios hasn’t assigned a codename to their interpretation of Cassie Lang in the MCU. However, there is precedent for official sources to refer to and, as a result, canonize information gleaned from fan-produced sites. An example of this would be the Across the Spider-Verse animated movie from Sony legitimizing the designation of their Venom films as ‘Earth-688’ after the Marvel Fandom wiki used the place-holder designation ‘Earth-TRN688’ (TRN referring to Temporary Reality Number) to refer to it in lieu of any officially provided designation. This itself had a knock-on effect that presents further issues which are beyond what I want to discuss today. Needless to say, sometimes widely accessed fan-curated content, well-meaning though it may can end up creating unintentional ‘Ascended Fanon’.

 

 This brings me to the well-considered Marvel Cinematic Universe wiki, a fantastic resource on anything related to Marvel Studios. While I have the utmost respect for the many contributors to the site, I can’t help but notice they have elected to assign Cassie Lang the codename ‘Stature’ despite the character never being referred to by any superhero title in any official MCU-related material. A look at the character’s talk page revealed the matter has been closed, with the only cited source I can see for the name ‘Stature’ being an early Deadline article that refers to the comic character’s origin and codename. Nothing else.

 

 My main concern, if you can call it that, is that an unassuming and well-meaning Marvel Studios employee will do a brief online search, encounter this wiki entry first and take it at face value, thereby making it official. Not that I dislike fanon being elevated or embraced per se, but it does rather bias the odds of the MCU Cassie being known as Stature rather than Stinger.

 

Here are some examples that reinforce a lack of official codename for the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Cassie Lang at this point. Here is the Funko Pop figure, exclusive to the Marvel Collectors Corps, titled ‘Cassie Lang’.

 

Here are some official designs seen on shirts, socks and various other merchandise, again referring to the character as ‘Cassie’ or ‘Cassie Lang’.

 

The Marvel Legends action figure line released a series of 8 figures in its ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania Build-A-Figure Cassie Lang’ line which came packaged with various parts which combined to make the character as depicted in Quantumania.

 

Another tie-in to the Quantumania movie, Cassie was introduced to the Marvel’s Contest of Champions mobile game under the title ‘Cassie Lang’. The same is true of this adaption of the character in another mobile game, Marvel’s Future Fight.

 

 

All this to say, clearly the powers that be at Marvel Studios haven’t settled on the character’s codename just yet.

 

Now I’d like to make the case for using the superhero moniker ‘Stinger’ rather than ‘Stature’. Firstly, Cassie adopting Stinger as a superhero title pre-dates Stature, with the MC2 comics A-Next #1 being published in 1998 well before her Main Marvel Universe comic counterpart became a hero and took the name Stature in Young Avengers #6. Yes, the MC2 comics originated the concept of Cassie as a superhero.

 

Secondly, the costume. Cassie debuts her Pym Particle suit in Quantumania and it is primarily purple. The colour purple was first associated with Cassie Lang as Stinger in the MC2 but also inspired her Main Marvel Universe counterpart years later in the pages of Astonishing Ant-Man #6.  In addition, Cassie would ditch Stature too, also adopting Stinger as her codename. Both costumes are nearly identical, and both sport a insect inspired helmet, another element the movie would adapt albeit a full-face mask in keeping with their established rules for shrinking.

 

Additionally, the MCU’s Cassie demonstrates a gifted intellect, another character trait first and most closely associated with the MC2’s version of Cassie. Correct me if I’m wrong, but the Young Avengers Cassie isn’t known for her scientific ability.

 

I’ve talked about all this before and I’m sure I’ll probably bring it up again some time. I’m also aware there are elements of Cassie in Quantumania that are more aligned with the Stature name, such as her ability to grow to giant size, but I think it’s important to make the argument all the same. I’d personally love to see ‘Stinger’ make the jump to the big-screen and see Tom Defalco and Ron Frenz’s creation get more recognition.

 

Until I stop questioning how they are growing and shrinking at subatomic size, I remain

 

frogoat

Spider-Symmetry: Spider-Girl 31 and Spider-Girl 45

 

For today’s post we have a brief entry in the occasional series where I endeavour to highlight the visual or narrative symmetry between the Spider-Man and Spider-Girl comics. For this entry of Spider-Symmetry, we are taking a look at just the MC2 comics. For this installement, we must credit the amazing penciller Pat Olliffe and as you’ll note soon enough, MC2 co-creator, artist extraordinaire and friendly fella, Ron Frenz.

 

Spider-Girl #31 gives us this delightful cover from Pat Olliffe, first published in February 2001, of May ‘Mayday’ Parker as Spider-Girl surrounded by floating heads of guilt.

 

Now, here is Pat Olliffe’s gorgeous cover to Spider-Girl #45 which was first published in March 2002. In a direct reference to his earlier cover, we now have May ‘Mayday’ Parker in her civilian attire surrounded by Spider-Girl costume design concepts from the in-universe clothing store, the Spider-Shoppe.

 

And with the Spider-Shoppe connection, lets segue to the cover of Spider-Girl #91 by the rambunctious rascal Ron Frenz, which was first published in October 2005. This cover continues the Spider-Girl costume designs concept from the cover of Spider-Girl #45 by continuing the theme. There are even some repeated designs both here and within the story itself.

 

Okay, that is a wrap for this entry!

 

Until I find myself surrounded by cosplay costume variations or floating heads of guilt, I remain

 

frogoat

 

 

Death in the MC2

 

Hopefully you’ve been watching and enjoying the WandaVision spin-off series Agatha All Along on Disney+ as much as I have! In the spirit of the spooky season, lets take a look at the deadly deity Death in the MC2.

 

But first, we need to gain some context by looking at the personification of Death in the Main Marvel Universe. Following a debatable appearance in the main image of a text story in Marvel Mystery Comics #10 from 1940, Death officially first appearing in Captain Marvel #26 in 1973. Death is an abstract being embodying the concept of mortality, acting as one of the great cosmic forces of existence alongside Eternity, Infinity and Oblivion.

 

Often depicted in the form of a purple cloaked skeleton or pale woman, in modern times Death has had direct interactions and relationships with notable characters such as Wade Wilson aka Deadpool and Thanos, the Mad Titan who gathered the Infinity Gems and snapped away half of all life in the Universe in an attempt to win Death’s favour (Deadpool/Death Annual ’98, Thanos Quest #1-#2, Infinity Gauntlet #1-#6).

 

With the bare bones backstory out of the way, lets look at Mistress Death as she briefly brushed against the MC2. During the events of Last Planet Standing, with Galactus poised to destroy the entire universe in an attempt to rid himself of his never-ending hunger, a gathering of the Great Powers of the Universe took place to discuss the threat posed to reality. The cosmic forces in attendance included Master Order, Lord Chaos, The In-Betweener, The Shaper of Worlds, The Stranger, The Gardener, The Collector and of course The Living Tribunal (Last Planet Standing #2).

The Great Powers of the Universe’s attempt to reason with the World-Eater one last time fails. Ultimately deciding they must destroy Galactus using a combined destructive bolt strong enough to wipe out the Earth and the entire Milky Way Galaxy, the Great Powers are halted in their attempt when Reed Richards is forced to use his Transdimensional Cannon's single shot on the cosmic beings (Last Planet Standing #3).

With Galactus enacting his final solution on Earth, the combined forces of the super hero community work to penetrate his force field and combat his doomsday weapon’s launch. When Spider-Girl, Stinger and American Dream manage to reverse the polarity of the device’s flow, the resulting backlash causes Galactus to be overloaded with enough energy to kill him and destroy the entire galaxy. As his end approaches, Galactus perceives the presence of Death coming to embrace him. However, at the last moment, Galactus’ former Herald, the Silver Surfer encases them both within an indestructible ethereal force cocoon.  Soon after the assembled heroes of Earth witness the birth of a new gestalt entity composed of the Silver Surfer and Galactus which could harness a new form of energy known as The Power Essential (Last Planet Standing #5).

 

While it’s a brief appearance, it’s at least one in the flesh…so to speak. Death personified remains in some ways connected to Galactus which is fitting given their status as higher beings. That said, this is one character I don’t mind not seeing more often!

 

Until my live-action (no pun intended) counterpart is portrayed by Aubrey Plaza, I remain

 

frogoat

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Addendums and Errata (May 2024)

 To err is human and so, despite rampant rumours I’m robotic, I can prove my humanity every now and then! Today will be a collection of quick corrections or elaborations on previous posts, in no particular order.

 

Rhino in the MC2

 

This first correction is actually really embarrassing. Growing up I pawed over my copy of 2003’s Marvel Encyclopedia Vol. 4: Spider-Man so much many of the pages have come out. So, I have no excuse for misattributed the reveal of the Rhino’s real name of Aleksei Mikhailovich Sytsevich to The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe: Hulk 2004! This name was likely conceived by members of the www.spiderfan.org who contributed profiles, with my best guess being Mike Fichera who worked on the Rhino’s profile for that website and gets a mention in the ‘thanks’ for the Encyclopedia.

 

Aunt May in the MC2

 

Another slightly humiliating error on my part as it’s another I should have caught relatively easily. I spent the entirety of my post about Aunt May trying to differentiate between the various ‘May’s’ present in some stories when I could have simply called Peter’s aunt by her full first name ‘Maybelle,’ which we learned back in 1997 in Amazing Spider-Man #-1 written by none other than MC2 co-creator Tom Defalco himself!

 

Hank Pym in the MC2

 

In Hank Pym’s profile post I stated he was first referenced and seen in flashback in A-Next #2. While he does make his first on-panel appearance in A-Next #2, he’s mentioned first briefly in A-Next #1 in an exchange between Scott and Cassie Lang.

 

As I re-visit previous posts or discover new information, I’ll likely put together another ‘Oops’ post. Let me know if you have come across any mistakes I’ve made!

 

Until I attain my perfect form after absorbing two sibling cyborgs, I remain

 

frogoat