TESS BLACK

Real Name: Tess Black

Identity/Class: Human

Occupation: Stock trader

Group Membership: None

Affiliations: Loki, Spider-Man

Enemies: Morwen, Nameless Ones

Known Relatives: Loki (father), Hela (half-sister), Fenris Wolf, Midgard Serpent (half-brothers), Balder, Hermod, Thor, Tyr, Vidar (uncles), Odin (grandfather), Laufey (grandfather, deceased)

Aliases: Morwen (briefly)

Base of Operations: Unrevealed
formerly, Manhattan, New York

First Appearance: Amazing Spider-Man II#503 (March, 2004)

Powers/Abilities: Tess Black possesses the normal human strength level of a woman of her size, height and build who engages in extensive physical exercises. She has no known superhuman powers of her own, but she may have some undefined godly abilities as when Loki helped her to drive out Morwen from her body. She is also a successful stock trader.

History:(Amazing Spider-Man II#504 (fb, BTS))- Tess Black is the daughter of Loki and an unknown mortal woman. She grew to adulthood without any knowledge of her biological father and became a respectable stock trader. She even appeared in a few times in various newspaper articles.

(Amazing Spider-Man II#503)- One night on her walk home, Tess headed through Times Square as Doctor Strange and Spider-Man were battling The Nameless Ones. As Spider-Man's presence changed the dynamics of Strange's spell, one of the Faceless Ones escaped his spell and became attracted to Tess knocking her to the ground as a result. She came to consciousness eventually and wandered home. That night as she slept, she was attacked by intense pain as Morwen, the first sorceress of Chaos possessed her body. Morwen's presence on earth was sensed by the entities Death and Lord Chaos, the Elders known as the Collector and the Gardener and the Asgardians Heimdall and Loki. Among them, Loki looked upon Morwen with special interest since she had taken possession of his daughter. Loki turned to Spider-Man to save Tess as Morwen looked upon Spider-Man as her savior.

(Amazing Spider-Man II#504)- In battle with Morwen, Spider-Man realized that Morwen did not choose Tess for her godlike abilities and didn't realize them until after she possessed her. Realizing his daughter could drive Morwen out herself, Loki engaged Morwen in battle and psychically implored his daughter to tap into her anger as a defense against Morwen. Driving her out, Tess was restored to normal.

Still concealing his daughter's heritage from her, Loki found other lodgings for Tess elsewhere from Manhattan to protect her from his enemies. He then exacted a promise from Spider-Man to look after her after giving the wall-crawler her new address.

Comments: Created by Fional Avery, J. Michael Stracynski, John Romita Jr, and Scott Hanna.

    So far, Tess is the only known modern mortal with a god as a parent unless you consider Argos from Spider-Girl's alternate future. Since Loki mumbles to some extent its something that gods (immortals) do, it's reasonable to guess Tess is not the only one.

    Tess Black's likeness in Amazing Spider-Man II#503 seems to favor actress Shannen Doherty. While I'm sure this was unintentional, it actually seems very appropriate given the nature of the 90210 wild child. Of course, there are always stories about some comic book character being based on the likeness of an actor. For years, there was a rumor that Captain Marvel of Fawcett Comics (and now DC Comics) was based on Fred MacMurry of the TV series, My Three Sons.

by Will U

CLARIFICATIONS:
Tess Black should not be confused with:

• Tessa, aka Sage, member of the Hellfire club and X-Men, @ Uncanny X-Men I#198
• Tessa, vampire encountered by Cloak and Dagger, @ Marvel Comics Presents #132
• Tess-One, Anti-Super-soldier robot, @ Captain America Annual #8

Non-Marvel Copyright info
All other characters mentioned or pictured are ™  and © 1941-2099 Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved. If you like this stuff, you should check out the real thing!
Please visit The Marvel Official Site at: http://www.marvel.com

Special Thanks to www.g-mart.com for hosting the Appendix, Master List, etc.!

Back to Characters