Calypso's History
Calypso was a voodoo priestess of Haitian descent. She was a psychopathic woman who was associated with
Sergei Kravinoff, aka Kraven the Hunter. Calypso seemed to enjoy driving
Kraven into fits of rage and furthering his hatred of Spider-Man, which ultimately led to
Kraven's suicide.
Calypso increased her powers via the sacrifice of her younger sister. She used her abilities to hold
Curt Connors, The Lizard, in her grasp, and the two nearly succeeded in murdering
Spider-Man. However, the web-slinger managed to best them both, and Calypso was apparently killed.
Calypso next emerged on the streets of Hell's Kitchen, kidnapping Haitian refugees and turning them into zombies, as practice for her plan to resurrect
Kraven. When
Daredevil confronted her, she managed to temporarily enslave him until
Brother Voodoo advised him on how to defeat her. As
Daredevil freed the enslaved souls she had accumulated, she deliberately crashed the building down upon herself.
In New Orleans, Calypso killed a voodoo priest and stole one of the Amulets of Damballah which allowed her to resurrect and control
Simon Garth, though she soon abandoned him to his own fate. This, too, seems to have been practice for a long-term plan of resurrecting
Kraven.
She next appeared in Colorado, seducing a guard at the Vault and then using her magic to break the
Lizard out of jail so that she could control him again. But the enraged
Lizard slashed her throat open and escaped.
However, Calypso cheated death once again. In her final seconds of life, she was able to transfer her spirit into the magical, voodoo-empowered Amulet of Damballah. Now, with her spirit able to control the actions of anyone possessing the amulet, Calypso began a long process of reuniting her soul with her body. First, she commanded some “mindless servants” to steal her body from the Vault's morgue and bury it in the supernaturally infused Cypress Hill cemetery outside New York. While buried, her body slowly healed and regenerated, awaiting her spirit's return. Then, housed inside the amulet which had been sent to her homeland in Haiti, Calypso's spirit first possessed an old Haitian refugee, then moved to Gloria Grant, a New Yorker working for the Daily Bugle who was on a Caribbean cruise. Once she was back in New York, Glory Grant began dressing as Calypso and enslaved Grant’s cousin Ramon to dig up her Calypso's body. She was set to perform the voodoo ceremony when
Simon Garth, who was also mystically bound to the amulet, attacked her and stole it. But
Spider-Man retrieved it and returned it to her, knowing that the only way to save Glory Grant was to allow Calypso to perform the ceremony that would reunite Calypso with her own body. After Gloria Grant was freed from Calypso's possesion,
Spider-Man returned the talisman to the rampaging
Zombie, finally placating him. Calypso, now reunited with her body, escaped.
It remained Calypso's goal to reunite with
Kraven and get revenge on
Spider-Man. Commanding a squad of savages, she attacked
Spider-Man and
Alexei Kravinoff, the son of the original
Kraven the Hunter, using her magic to force them to fight each other.
Spidey and
Alexei fought off her spell and shared a handshake.
Alexei said that he would hold Calypso at his mansion so the villainess could tell him about his long-lost father. However, once
Spider-Man had left,
Alexei killed her instead.
