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Madame Web (Cassandra Webb) is a character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. She is usually depicted as a supporting character in the Spider-Man comic book series, where she appears as an elderly woman with myasthenia gravis, connected to a life support system resembling a spiderweb. Spider-Man find a kidnapping victim. She is not one of the mutants who lost their power during the "Decimation" storyline. In "Grim Hunt", she is attacked by Ana Kravinoff and her mother Sasha, who kills her, but before she dies she is able to pass her powers of precognition as well as her blindness on to Julia Carpenter, who becomes the next Madame Web. Webb is subsequently resurrected by Ben Reilly before succumbing to the Carrion Virus. Webb is the grandmother of the fourth Spider-Woman, Charlotte Witter. Madame Web has appeared in or served as inspiration for several Spider-Man related media. Rachel Dratch voices "C. Weber", a character loosely based on Madame Web, in Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023), while Dakota Johnson portrayed Cassie Webb in the eponymous 2024 film.
Cassandra Webb was born in Salem, Oregon. She was stricken with myasthenia gravis and was connected to a life support system designed by her husband Jonathan Webb, which included a series of tubes shaped like a spider-web. When Spider-Man approached her to help find kidnapped Daily Globe publisher K.J. Clayton (actually an impersonator fronting for Clayton's circulation manager Rupert Dockery, the kidnapping's mastermind), Madame Web used her powers to help him locate and rescue both the real and the fake Clayton but disclosed to him that she already knew his secret identity. In the "Nothing Can Stop the Juggernaut!" story arc, she contacts Spider-Man for assistance when Black Tom Cassidy dispatches the Juggernaut to capture her hoping to exploit her psychic abilities against the X-Men, only for her to then nearly die after Juggernaut separates her from her life-support system. This triggered a vicious fight between Spider-Man and the Juggernaut, who was subsequently trapped in a construction site's wet cement foundation.
The resulting mental trauma, however, meant that Madame Web apparently lost her memory of Spider-Man's secret identity. Webb is the grandmother of the fourth Spider-Woman, Charlotte Witter. She participates in an arcane ritual known as the "Gathering of the Five" to gain both immortality and eternal youth. Restored to her physical prime, Webb then serves as a mentor of sorts to the third Spider-Woman, the young Mattie Franklin. Madame Web resurfaced, with her psychic powers intact, after Decimation. However, since House of M (in which she did appear young) she seemingly loses her mystical enhancements and reverts to her aged self, though her myasthenia gravis remains gone. Madame Web again returns in a back-up feature in The Amazing Spider-Man No. 600. She looks into the future, showing what are apparently quick looks into Spider-Man's future, only to see someone "unravelling the web of fate", and fearfully exclaiming "They're hunting spiders." After that, she is attacked by Ana Kravinoff and her mother Sasha.
The pair incapacitate her and then claim "we now have our eyes". She is seen still held captive by Ana and her mother, as they inspect their new quarry, Mattie Franklin. Sasha Kravinoff as part of a sacrificial ritual that revived Grim Hunter. At the conclusion of "Grim Hunt", Madame Web has her throat slashed by Sasha Kravinoff in retaliation, as Sasha believed that Madame Web was deceiving her and knew the outcome of the events that transpired. Before dying, she reveals she is no longer blind, and passes her psychic powers over to Julia Carpenter. During the Dead No More: The Clone Conspiracy storyline, Madame Web was resurrected by Ben Reilly (posing as the Jackal), inserting her soul into a cloned body. She tipped off Prowler about a bank robbery vision she had which he managed to stop the bank robbery. When Prowler goes to get more information on the hacker from Madame Web, she tells him that she sees buildings filled with agony that cannot escape.
When the villains at New U Technologies are getting out of control, Jackal sends Electro to find Prowler to put them under check again. Electro goes to Madame Web's room and tortures the telepath into giving her Prowler's location with the intent to kill him. Julia Carpenter senses that Madame Web is alive from telepathic feedback resulting from Electro's attack. Julia infiltrates New U Technologies and uses the opportunity to investigate the near-abandoned facility. During this time, Julia is led to Madame Web who refuses to take her medication to aid her in healing from Electro's attack. Madame Web has seen the future and refuses to be a part of it. Before dying from clone degeneration, Madame Web tells Julia to save Prowler. Madame Web is a mutant who possesses several psychic abilities. She can use telepathy to read the minds of others. She has the ability to see the future.
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