Julia Cornwall was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. The daughter of Walter and Elizabeth Cornwall. She met and married her college sweetheart Larry Carpenter and together they had a daughter named Rachel.
A secretive government group called the Commission decided to create its own superhero. Val Cooper met college friend Julia Carpenter in Denver, and convinced her to be part in an "athletic study." She was unknowingly a test subject in their experiments. During the experiment, they "accidentally" injected Julia with a mix of spider venom and exotic plant extracts, which gave Julia powers very similar to those of Spider-Man.
Not long after she was given identity of Spider-Woman, she was drawn into the first Secret Wars. After returning to Earth, Julia joined Freedom Force, but much like her predecessor, found herself on the wrong side of the law. She left the team when she helped the Avengers escape the Vault.
She teamed up with Iron Man when she was stalked by a trio of high-tech bounty hunters known as the Seekers. They came to collect the bounty which had been placed on Julia's head. She was wanted by the US government after she helped the Avengers. Iron Man decided to help her with her daughter's situation. They battle the bounty hunters but it ends when she decided to surrender to the US government.
She teamed up with Spider-Man to battle the Wrecking Crew and eventually found herself as a freelance hero. When one of her assignments led her to California looking for a team of Asian super-villains, she met and assisted the West Coast Avengers several times.
Julia's main enemies were the arachnid-based team called Death-Web, which consisted of three super-villains who were created by the Commission, using a variation of the same serum that transformed Julia.
When Mike Clemson, founder of Death-Web, captured Spider-Woman's daughter Rachel, he blackmailed her into fighting Spider-Man, even though she nearly killed Spider-Man, she couldn't commit murder, and Spider-Man helped her rescue Rachel.
She then found her place with the West Coast Avengers and once they disbanded, joined their spin-off team Force Works.
Eventually, Julia walked away from the superhero business to concentrate on raising her daughter. Like Jessica Drew (the original Spider-Woman), Julia was also attacked by Charlotte Witter and had her powers stolen. After the loss of her superpowers, Julia returned to the life of a normal mother.
Julia was paralyzed for several months after she lost her powers, even though all of her other injuries had healed. The Shroud's company synthesized a duplicate of the serum that originally provided Julia with her powers, and these returned several days after it was administered to her. With the Shroud's help, Julia underwent intense physical therapy and was soon able to walk again. It was during this time that she and the Shroud fell in love.
Her powers now restored, Julia returned using the code name "Arachne" (which she originally intended to use). During the Superhuman Civil War, Julia registered under the Superhuman Registration Act, and she and Wonder Man aided Ms. Marvel in the training of novice superheroes.
However, Julia was actually a double agent; when she first responded to Iron Man's request, she thought they would be helping people escape registration. She tipped off several targeted superheroes who had refused to register with the government, such as the Prowler. She was by now romantically involved with the Shroud, an opponent of the Superhuman Registration Act.
Julia was found out when a captured Prowler revealed under interrogation that she had tipped him off. A government strike team led by Ms. Marvel, including Wonder Man and Ara�a, attacked Julia at her home just as she was about to flee the country with her daughter. Julia was captured and summarily incarcerated. However, Julia escaped captivity during the Negative Zone prison break, and returned to Colorado in search of Rachel. A S.H.I.E.L.D. Psy Ops team telepathically traced her to Brooklyn, where she furiously confronted Ara�a, demanding to know where her daughter had been taken.
She spent some time living in Canada and working with the Canadian government as part of Canada's new superhero team Omega Flight. She was given the option of having her outstanding charges dropped in exchange for her participation on the team.
After a battle against the Wrecking Crew, Julia decided to stay on the team. She helped the team expose Dr. Benning who was using her position with the Canadian government to force an addiction on the new Guardian, Michael Pointer, by feeding him the mutant energy of captured criminals. With the departure of most of Omega Flight's members, Julia eventually returned to America.
Julia was dragged into Sasha Kravinoff's Grim Hunt of Spider-Man as a means to resurrect her husband Kraven the Hunter. After the unsuccessful attempt at resurrection through the sacrifice of Mattie Franklin, the third woman to take the name Spider-Woman, Julia was captured by the Kravinoff family alongside Ara�a to be further sacrifices. As Spider-Man put a stop to their scheme, the Kravinoffs' most important prisoner, Madame Web was mortally wounded. In her final moments, Madame Web transferred her telepathic, precognitive, and astral projection powers into Julia - making her blind, the new Madame Web, and Weaver of the Spider family.
Julia's first action in this role was to prevent Peter from killing Kraven, explaining to Peter that he was the center of a moral web that would be destroyed if he killed Kraven and advising him that this murder, however justified, would turn him into a ruthless destroyer. After burying Kaine and Madame Web in a potter's field, she explained her new purpose to Spider-Man and Ara�a before teleporting away. Afterwards, Julia gave her Arachne costume to Anya so she could become the newly christened Spider-Girl.
When the population of Manhattan developed spider-powers, Julia observed the crisis with Shang-Chi, preventing him from intervening until Spider-Man was accidentally attacked by the New Avengers when he tried to help out.
Later, as Anti-Venom worked on curing the individuals affected of their spider-powers, she reflected on the need for both Venom and Anti-Venom to fix the Spider-Island problem. At the final battle of the Spider-Island, she soon realized that Kaine (who had been cured) was the one who was willing to kill, unlike Peter, thus seeing him as the last hope of killing the Spider-Queen.
After the Spider-Island events, Julia aided Spider-Man during a "race against time" mission to stop a catastrophe that could destroy the entire city. She warned him that he had to do this work by himself without the aid from either the Avengers or the Future Foundation. After the danger was averted, Julia congratulated Peter on his efforts.
Shortly before Doctor Octopus swapped his mind with Peter Parker's and temporarily became Spider-Man, Madame Web suffered an overload of her powers as a consequence of presaging the death of Spider-Man, witnessing every point in the future for a split second before falling into a coma. Luckily, she had previously foretold this event, for which she called for an ambulance before collapsing, and was taken to a hospital. Julia remained in a coma for more than a year. Shortly after the Spider-Army defeated the Inheritors and Otto Octavius started damaging the Web of Life and Destiny that connected all spiders, she woke up from her condition, claiming that her connection with the Web of Life and Destiny had been lost.
Not long afterwards, Julia became the victim of stalking from her ex-boyfriend the Shroud, who set up a gigantic surveillance system in Alcatraz Island in order to find her as part of an ill-conceived attempt to fix his life. The Shroud managed to intercept Julia at a local airport since she was on a layover in the middle of a flight to Denver. Daredevil managed to stop the Shroud, but during a subsequent scuffle, Julia was kidnapped by henchmen sent by the Kingpin. After Daredevil rescued Julia, she helped him set up a trap for the Shroud. On the pretense that she agreed to reunite with him, Julia met up with Max and kissed him. However, she had coated her lips with tranquilizer to knock him out so he could be apprehended by the authorities.
With the emergence of a mysterious new company called New U Technologies in San Francisco, Julia put the Shroud's surveillance system to use in order to investigate them. Her attempts to hack into the Jackal's company were trailed back to her, and a clone of the Prowler was sent after her. After shutting down Julia's network, the Prowler attempted to convince her to join the Jackal's cause, but she refused and escaped.
After escaping from an attack from the new Electro, the Prowler was rescued by Julia. He directed her to New U's headquarters so they could retrieve the special pills that Prowler needed to ingest regularly to stay alive. Julia took advantage of this visit to investigate the facility, and she stumbled into the original Madame Web, one of the many subjects New U had cloned back to life. Madam Web refused to take her pills to halt the degenerative process of her body, since she had seen the future and refused to be part of it. Before passing away, Madame Web told Julia to save the Prowler.
When all of New U's clones started degenerating as a consequence of a clone of Doctor Octopus sabotaging the Jackal's plans, the Prowler crossed paths with Julia and accused her of sabotaging the facility. After failing to convince the Prowler she was not at fault, Julia knocked him out. Not long afterwards, the dying Prowler was again attacked by Electro. Julia found him and managed to aid him in fending off Electro, while also informing the Prowler that Spider-Man had managed to figure out a way to stabilize the massive degeneration. When Electro attempted to attack Julia, the Prowler sacrificed himself to protect her and died in her arms. In the aftermath of the crisis, Julia found the real Hobie Brown in cryo-sleep, and informed him of his clone's actions.
Julia precognition attuned her to a shared vision of Peter Parker suffering and dying by way of a disfigured and bandaged demon with Miles, Cindy, Gwen, Jess, and Anya. After Julia gathered and warned them that an unknown force had brought Spider-Man into conflict with Sin-Eater, her petition to the other spider heroes reached a consensus and they founded the Order of the Web to save Peter from Norman.
Following Sin-Eater's momentary imprisonment, the group boarded his escape pod, but she witnessed Norman's antagonism with Peter over Gwen. As Peter uncharacteristically threw Norman out to be prey for Sin-Eater while they escaped, Julia foresaw this outcome, knowing the horror of what would come next. Like the others, Julia was possessed by a demon sent by Kindred to destroy Spider-Man, whose sacrifice of Norman was a deal sealed with Kindred. Before the complete possession, Julia told Peter there was no avoiding the events to come.
Under the control of Kindred, the Order began wrecking havoc across the city and even battling the New Warriors.[53] Arriving at the Brooklyn Bridge, they attacked innocent bystanders and were also harming themselves, forcing Peter to make a deal with the demon. Kindred accepted the deal and released the spider heroes from his control. The confused heroes were then met by Doctor Strange and Black Cat, as the sorcerer explained that they needed to collaborate in order to help Peter. Julia used her precognition to see the future idea Strange would have in order to expedite their plan of action, and they all ventured into the Astral Plane, leaving Black Cat behind to guard their way back.
After traversing Peter's traumatized dreamscape past a horde of demons to reach a portal to Kindred's cemetery, the group was no match for Sin-Eater augmented by Morlun's powers. Seeing a victory, Julia let the villain kill and take her powers, but went mad with seeing Kindred's truth and committed suicide, reviving Julia back to normal. However, Kindred captured them and forced them into being "dinner guests" for his party. Julia's and everyone's lives were saved by Mary Jane Watson's timely petition of self-sacrifice and Norman Osborn's arrival. With Fisk's successful entrapment of Kindred, Julia and the other were allowed to escape, concluding the ordeal by going home to recuperate. But with confusion on certain facts, Julia and the others voted to continue as a group and find out what else they could about Kindred while apprehending escaped inmates.
