Who the Clix? is a series of articles featuring information on comic book characters that have been made into figures for the popular tabletop game Heroclix. These articles are meant to help Heroclix players learn more about the characters behind their favorite pieces.
The age old story of a girl and her mech: SP//dr
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Appearances in Heroclix: Spider-Man: Beyond Amazing, Wizkids Marvel, Spider-Man and Venom Absolute Carnage
First Appearance: Edge of Spider-Verse #5 (October 2014)
Team Affiliations: Web-Warriors
Powers/Abilities: Spider-Sense; Genius intellect; Psychic connection with SP//dr; SP//dr: Superhuman strength
Created by: Gerard Way – Jake Wyatt
Peni’s father Peter is the original pilot of the SP//dr mecha, protecting New York from crime and super-villainy. After he mysteriously dies, his handlers “Aunt May” and “Uncle Ben” approach Peni and force her to become the new pilot of the mecha. They achieve this by releasing the sentient spider that is bonded with the mecha into a room to bite and bond with nine-year old Peni, a process that is incredibly painful.
After five years of defending the New York City on Earth-14512, the now 14 year old Peni Parker is depressed and feels tired constantly. While teaming up with D, her Earth’s Daredevil, the hero tells Peni that she’s too young to feel so tired. D does offer that he felt the mecha took something out of her father and may be doing the same to her. He also offers that piloting a mecha to fight crime is pretty cool. Soon after this, Peni is approached by Spider-Ham and Old Man Spider to join the Spider-Army in their war against the Inheritors. The Spider-Army is successful in their war and Peni returns home.
Three years later, a 17 year old Peni is approached by a girl named Addy Brock who asks about Peni’s experience as a mecha pilot. Peni is uncomfortable and tries to ignore Addy who claims Peni isn’t as special as she thinks. Later, while working on SP//dr in her base, she sees Addy walk up to a black mecha in the base that is powered by a “sym-engine” named VEN#m. Peni is enraged that May and Ben didn’t tell her about this but doesn’t have time to process it before a kaiju named M.O.R.B.I.U.S. attacks the city and drains its electrical power.
Peni tries to stop the kaiju but is defeated due to being distracted by Addy and VEN#m. VEN#m is deployed to stop M.O.R.B.I.U.S. but malfunctions, leading to the mecha becoming sentient and consuming Addy. May flies out to fix the issue manually but is also consumed. Just before she is completely absorbed, she curses Ben for never fixing the fatal flaw in VEN#m and reveals that’s how Peni’s father died; testing VEN#m. Peni is able to return to consciousness and defeat the VEN#m mecha but she is unable to save Addy or May, who have seemingly vanished from inside the suit.
Peni and Ben have a heart to heart after the battle that is interrupted by Spider-Ham arriving to again recruit Peni into a battle against the Inheritors.
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