Cindy Moon: My Favorite Spider

The Spectacular Spinning Jenny.

Cindy Moon, AKA Silk, is my favorite Spider-Man related character that isn't the Wall Crawler himself. To a lot of people, this is probably surprising. For one, they're probably wondering who the hell she is - and, if you haven't been following Spider-Man in the last few years, it's understandable that you wouldn't know who she is. Secondly, if you do know who she is, you're probably even more perplexed. Cindy Moon? You mean Silk, that crappy "Spider Bride" character from that overly convoluted and incredibly confusing crossover story Spider-Verse whose sole existence seemed to have been to give Peter an even more complicated love life? And who, on more than one occasion, acted like a total bitch and complete idiot throughout her appearances in Amazing Spider-Man, Spider-Verse, and Spider-Woman? That's your favorite character? She's almost as bad - maybe even worse - than Mattie Franklin, if you even remember who that character is! And you're picking her over Spider-Gwen and Jessica Drew, much better characters?

Yes. Silk is my favorite Spider character. And I'll explain why. This is an opinion piece, mind you, and so will be drawn from my entirely subjective experience, hence the less-than-scholarly prose that I'm using right now. Feel free to disagree with me.

Let me start this off by acknowledging that Silk had a pretty bad start. As written by Dan Slott, Cindy was... less than great. She had too many attributes common to Mary Sue-type characters. Power set similar to the main hero but is also more powerful/sensitive than him, has a special connection to him that no one else possesses, has a lot of sex with him because of an incredibly contrived reason, everyone treats her as special despite her relative inexperience and acting like a total idiot a lot of the time, and - worst of all - she can be incredibly annoying and grating because of all of the above. So, Cindy was basically a cocktail of "worst character traits ever" that managed to pool together into a single character, the sort of character that one could conceivably see abandoned after the story arc featuring her as a principal player. Yes, she was bad.

But it turns out that, once she escaped the clutches of Dan Slott, Cindy managed to flourish as a character. In fact, it turned out that her solo series - penned by Robbie Thompson and featuring an iconic art style by Stacey Lee - was one of the best Spider-Man books out there, maybe even better than the floundering Amazing and the meandering (though still profitable because of fan favoritism) Spider-Gwen. It did away with the cosmic otherworldliness that defined her stint in Amazing and brought her down to a much more manageable street level storyline that allowed Cindy's more grounded traits to surface.

Because, once removed from the Spider-Verse story, Cindy turned into a much more "back to basics" superhero that harkened back to 60's Amazing but with a fresh coat of paint and modern touches. The series managed to explore Cindy's social awkwardness, pulled some great humor from her fish-out-of-water origin, created a compelling goal in her missing family, and - of course - Cindy's decision to distance herself from Peter in an attempt to escape Spider-Man's shadow, an incredibly metatextual decision that benefited the character greatly. What was great about this, too, is that Silk managed to be more than just "girl Spider-Man" (of which we've had many) because much of her supporting cast actually knows she's a superhero, which can't be said of Spidey - whose supporting cast regularly has to have their memories changed or what not in order to maintain the status quo - and so allows a lot more involvement in her stories. Silk's motivations allow her to be much more of a rule-breaking, responsibility-skirting superhero who has much more personal motivations aside from the whole "great power" shtick - which is a dangerous balance to tread, but Thompson does it well. I also want to mention that she goes to therapy, which is great because not too many superheroes actually go there, for her trauma. She also has a really cool boyfriend who's a ghost.

Have I mentioned that she's also really cute?

Once Silk was independent of Spider-Man, we got to see some of the best parts about her - but my favorite part, and this is where the subjectivity really comes in, is her comic's portrayal of an Asian-American main character. See, Cindy is Korean - and while that's not the most revolutionary thing in the world - I like her stories much more than, say, fellow Asian character Amadeus Cho whose whole "super genius" thing makes him both unrelatable and more than a little stereotypical. While Cindy is smart, she is hardly a genius, and she's more dorky than she is nerdy - often making very dated references to things from the 90's - which is a very endearing quality to me. Cindy's also very far removed from the whole "submissive" Asian stereotype, since - as we've established - she skirts rules and doesn't really care if she breaks them. Also, she's a journalist! When was the last time we saw an Asian journalist? And sporty! The portrayal of her family life is also very true-to-life. While tough, her parents are never overbearingly so, deftly avoiding the whole "strict Asian parents" stereotype that is too often shown in fiction. Her relationship with her little brother is also incredibly heartwarming, and his falling into criminality shows a side of Asian American struggles that are hardly ever seen.

So, yes. I'm biased in this regard. I love Cindy because she's not just another Spider-Girl. She's different, in a very good way. She adds onto the diversity slate that Marvel's been steadily building ever since Miles Morales came onto the scene without fritzing out like, say, Riri Williams. She deserves to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Kamala Khan and Miles. And, yeah, she's my favorite Spider. I just love her so much. Ain't no two ways about it.

Stinger: But I love Kaine, too (but only as Scarlet Spider).