Peter Parker has had several romantic interests in his time as Spider-Man. Though most modern fans know Mary Jane Watson as his romantic partner, but before that, there was Gwen Stacy. Stacy was killed in a story involving the Grene Goblin that still resonates throughout Spider-Man mythology today. Speaking at a Swedish convention, Marvel editor-in-chief CB Cebulski revealed that he still thinks of Gwen as Peter’s true love.

“Still to this day, I think the death of Gwen Stacy is the one that always rips my heart out,” You know, everyone knows that Peter loves Mary Jane, but Gwen was his real, true love in my opinion. I recently got to see the original artwork, literally the original drawings of her death, and it was just heartbreaking. I was at a museum and they had the original pages and I was almost crying because in black and white it was just even more bare and in your face.”

Gwen’s death was a shock for Marvel fans. Mexican publisher La Prensa was so taken aback by it that they developed its own alternate universe continuity where Gwen survived and she and Peter Parker were married. This alternate continuity ran for 44 issues and was never reprinted in English or any other language. The comics resurfaced on social media in February, leading Panini Mexico editor Alberto Calvo to explain in some more detail.

"That's mostly true," Calvo. "The real reason to have stories made in Mexico was that the translated comics from Marvel became so popular in the mid-sixties that they changed its periodicity to twice a month, so they were running out of material from the original series. The Mexican editor went to NY to ask Marvel for permission to create original material. He showed them samples from a handful of Mexican artists. Marvel selected one of them, José Luis Durán, and granted the permission. Durán and the writers had total creative freedom. Gwen was Durán's favorite character, so when she died he asked the writer to keep using her, and they did. Eventually the publisher ran into monetary problems and their line of comics, including Spider-Man were cancelled in 1973."

Gwen Stacy recently reemerged as the Spider-Woman of an alternate universe, better known as Spider-Gwen. She’s now known as Ghost Spider and there are plans to relocate the character ot the main Marvel-616 Universe in an upcoming series relaunch. She was voiced by Hailee Steinfeld in the Oscar-winning film Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.

Who do you think is Spider-Man’s true love? Let us know in the comments.