Magician Penn Jillette To Write Spider-Man/Deadpool

An upcoming Spider-Man/Deadpool story will be written by famed stage magician Penn Jilette, Marvel announced today.

Jilette will pen Spider-Man/Deadpool #11, which in addition to the title superheroes will also star himself and his longtime comedy/magic partner, Teller.

“Spider-Man/Deadpool are a team, but in this comic, the team is Spider-Man/Teller and Penn/Deadpool,” Jilette said on the This Week In Marvel Podcast. “Imagine what a magician could do with someone who heals that quickly!”

After he said that he wanted to run Deadpool through with a sword, Jilette acknowledged that he knew it hurt Deadpool when that kind of thing happened, even if he healed quickly. “That’s why it’s fun!” He joked.

Jordan White, the book’s editor, said that he had been a fan of Penn and Teller’s for years, and that he had thought of Jilette right away when trying to brainstorm ideas for a fill-in writer on the title.

“Spider-Man has the sensibility of everything wonderful and groovy from the ’80s and ’90s, and then you’ve got Deadpool who’s become a character of the 21st Century,” Jilette said. “There’s a new impetus there — breaking the fourth wall — there’s a lot of stuff that I’m interested in in theater and performance that the Deadpool character is playing around with. The idea of having something happen while you’re commenting on it is fascinating to me….I love to do magic tricks, talk about how magic tricks aredone, and still fool [people.]”

Ironically, Penn and Teller: Fool Us is currently running on The CW, where the pair share the airwaves with DC’s pantheon of costumed do-gooders, including Supergirl, The Flash, Arrow, and DC’s Legends of Tomorrow. A thinly-veiled pastiche of Penn and Teller also appeared in a Season One episode of iZombie, based on a DC/Vertigo property.

While this is Jilette’s first outing as a comic book writer, it’s far from his first time writing. He’s penned a number of best-sellers including Cruel Tricks For Dear Friends and his recent release Presto!: How I Made Over 100 Pounds Disappear and Other Magical Tales. Some of his books have been co-written with Teller but, in keeping with his silent stage persona, Teller apparently doesn’t maintain his own Amazon page, with Jilette’s name being a link and Teller’s being just text.

One has to wonder whether at some point he’ll get a Chasing Amy-style lengthy rant in the Spider-Man/Deadpool issue, although with Jilette writing that seems unlikely.

Spider-Man/Deadpool has been one of Marvel’s most irreverent releases since it launched last year, raising fan hackles back in June with an issue that mocked Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

You can see the full cover in the attached image gallery.