Nine Lives

Published in cooperation with The Electric Company public television series, Spidey Super Stories teamed-up the web-slinger with other Marvel heroes each issue.

Created for young readers, these stories took place outside of the standard Marvel Universe and altered some of the characters in age-appropriate ways.

In standard Marvel Comics, the crimefighter originally known as Cat transformed into Tigra the were-woman in Giant-Size Creatures #1 (July 1974).

But that didn't prevent Cat, with her original yellow costume and black hair, from making a guest appearance in Spidey Super Stories #12 (Sept. 1975).

When Tigra did guest star in Spidey Super Stories #21 (Feb. 1977), she wore a full-piece costume, relatively conservative when compared with the two-piece outfit she wore in most of her other comic book appearances.

Don't be fooled by appearances. The heroine on the cover of Spidey Super Stories #39 (March 1979) had red hair that matched that of Patsy Walker (who as Hellcat was an active member of the Defenders by that time), but within that super story she still answered to the sanitized name of Cat.

Had the version of Cat from Spidey Super Stories #12 transformed into Tigra but then returned to human form? Or was the character in #39 a version of Patsy Walker who inherited the Cat costume and kept the "hell" out of her name?

Who had time to address such matters? After all, Thanos was overhead in a helicopter!

Spidey Super Stories. Vol. 1. No. 39. March 1979. "The Cat and the Cosmic Cube!" Nick Sullivan, Michael Siporin, Jim Salicrup (writers), Win Mortimer, Mike Esposito (artists), A. J. Hays, Deborah November (editors), Jim Shooter (Marvel consultant), Marie Severin (art director). The issue also included the story "Women's Day 1979," guest-starring Ms. Marvel, and "The Impossible Visitor from Outer Space," featuring the Impossible Man.