Spider-Man 2099 might be the most badass Spidey Variant

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Spider-Man 2099 plays a big role in Across the Spider-Verse, and he's a total comic book badass

Spider-Man 2099 in Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
(Image credit: Sony Animation)

Spider-Man 2099 has been shown as one of the main antagonists of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, chasing Miles Morales down and trying to stop him from venturing, well, across the Spider-Verse. It's hard to call him a villain - the character is traditionally a hero on the same level of Peter Parker with the best of intentions. But Spider-Man 2099 isn't exactly like Peter, or Miles for that matter. 

With Across the Spider-Verse about to hit theaters this summer, and a Spider-Man 2099 skin in the movie's animation style coming to Fortnite, you may be wonder who Oscar Isaac's brooding, badass Spider-Man 2099 is, as well as what his connection to the larger Marvel Universe, and to the Spider-Verse is, specifically 

As it happens, Spider-Man 2099 isn't just a character with over 30 years of comic history, he's also the gateway to a whole separate Marvel reality - the future world of 2099. And he's one of the earliest examples of a Spider-Man Variant meeting his core reality counterpart.

(Image credit: Marvel Comics)

Created in 1992 by writer Peter David and artist Rick Leonardi, Spider-Man 2099 was the first title in a whole line set in the alternate future year of 2099. Spidey 2099 is Miguel O'Hara, a geneticist working for the secretly sinister corporation Alchemax to recreate the abilities of Peter Parker, the original Spider-Man.

When O'Hara attempts to resign after a human test subject dies in the course of his experiments, Alchemax's evil CEO Tyler Stone subjects O'Hara to his own unstable treatment. O'Hara's own DNA is spliced with that of a spider, giving him most of the powers of Peter Parker, and a few of his own - including toxin-laced talons and fangs as well as enhanced senses to make up for his lack of Peter's vaunted Spider-Sense. He also has organic web-shooters rather than relying on mechanical ones - though O'Hara's own genius intellect does allow him to create a super-scientific Spider-Man costume of his own.

Spider-Man 2099 was only the first of a whole line of 2099 versions of popular Marvel heroes, which eventually grew to include Hulk 2099, Punisher 2099, Doom 2099, Ghost Rider 2099, X-Men 2099, and more. And in 1995, Spider-Man 2099 had his first crossover with Peter Parker, with the pair traveling to each others' times, and even into the timelines of other far-flung future Spider-Men - something like the Spider-Verse 20 years before the term was coined.

But that wouldn't be the last time Peter Parker and Miguel O'Hara would cross paths, with O'Hara returning to the present in 2014 during the time when the consciousness of Otto Octavius/Doctor Octopus had taken over Peter's body as the Superior Spider-Man.

(Image credit: Marvel Comics)

Miguel stuck around in the present for a while, leading up to 2015's Spider-Verse event with two volumes of his own revived series - and even remained in the modern day Marvel Universe after Peter Parker returned to his own body. Most recently, Marvel celebrated the 30th anniversary of Spider-Man 2099 in 2022 with a limited series titled Spider-Man: Exodus.

Unlike the happy-go-lucky Peter, Miguel is a bit more hardcore and brutal, even sometimes biting people with his fangs and poisoning them with his talons, and he has a more dour, less joke-y personality as Spider-Man to go with his tougher methods.

That difference in personality has been on display in the trailers for Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, in which the brooding Spider-Man 2099 has been shown frantically pursuing Miles Morales to keep him out of the Multiverse.

It's not exactly yet clear how Spider-Man 2099 and his aggression toward Miles will fit into the larger plot of Across the Spider-Verse, but if comics are any indication, Spider-Man 2099 and his modern Marvel Universe counterpart have always found a way to overcome their differences and work together in the past.

Spider-Man 2099 is totally tame compared to the weirdest Spider-Man Variants from comic books.

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George Marston
George Marston

I've been Newsarama's resident Marvel Comics expert and general comic book historian since 2011. I've also been the on-site reporter at most major comic conventions such as Comic-Con International: San Diego, New York Comic Con, and C2E2. Outside of comic journalism, I am the artist of many weird pictures, and the guitarist of many heavy riffs. (They/Them)