Jessica Priest is a character from the

Spawn Spawn or spawning may refer to: * Spawning, the eggs and sperm of aquatic animals Arts, entertainment and media * Spawn (character), a fictional character in the comic series of the same name and in the associated franchise ** ''Spawn: Armageddon' ...

universe The universe is all of space and time and their contents. It comprises all of existence, any fundamental interaction, physical process and physical constant, and therefore all forms of matter and energy, and the structures they form, from s ...

. Created for the 1997 film ''

'' as a gender-swapped adaptation of

Chapel A chapel (from , a diminutive of ''cappa'', meaning "little cape") is a Christianity, Christian place of prayer and worship that is usually relatively small. The term has several meanings. First, smaller spaces inside a church that have their o ...

, Al Simmons's killer in the comic book, Priest was played by

Melinda Clarke Melinda Patrice Clarke (born April 24, 1969) is an American actress. She is known for portraying Faith Taylor on the soap opera ''Days of Our Lives'' (1989–1990), Julie Cooper on Fox's teen drama series '' The O.C.'' (2003–2007), Lady Heath ...

in the film, before being adapted to ''Spawn'' comics as a separate character from Chapel. She would later become the second She-Spawn (after

Nyx In Greek mythology, Nyx (; ) is the goddess and personification of the night. In Hesiod's ''Theogony'', she is the offspring of Chaos, and the mother of Aether and Hemera (Day) by Erebus (Darkness). By herself, she produces a brood of children ...

) and the leader of the team called the Scorched.

Publication history

The character of Chapel (originally from the comic book series '' Youngblood'') could not be used in the ''Spawn'' movie because the rights to the character were owned by

Rob Liefeld Robert Liefeld (; born October 3, 1967) is an American comic book creator. A prominent writer and artist in the 1990s, he is known for co-creating the character Cable (comics), Cable with writer Louise Simonson and the character Deadpool with wri ...

. McFarlane created Priest as a replacement for Chapel in the film and later had Priest

retcon Retroactive continuity, or retcon for short, is a literary device in fictional story telling whereby facts and events established through the narrative itself are adjusted, ignored, supplemented, or contradicted by a subsequently published work ...

ned to be Spawn's killer in the comic as well. Some of her background is revealed in ''

Curse of the Spawn ''Curse of the Spawn'' is a spin-off of the ''Spawn'' comic book. The comic book introduced other Hellspawn and characters into the Image Universe. It was published by Image Comics from September 1996 until March 1999 and has been collected into ...

'' #12–14. She would make her return in Spawn #300 where she becomes She-Spawn and becomes one of the main characters of ''The Scorched''.

Fictional history

Jessica Priest works as an assassin for Spawn's nemesis

Jason Wynn Jason Broderick Wynn is a supervillain in the Todd McFarlane Image Universe comic book series ''Spawn''. Wynn is the corrupt director of the United States Security Group. He is perhaps the most powerful man in the world, and has politicians throug ...

. Prior to shooting Simmons, she searches

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

for a

biogenetic A biogenic substance is a product made by or of life forms. While the term originally was specific to metabolite compounds that had toxic effects on other organisms, it has developed to encompass any constituents, secretions, and metabolites of p ...

weapon for her boss. She later appears in the Curse of Spawn series where she is revealed to have a husband and two stepchildren. She later returns in #298 where she is seen talking to Nyx about Al Simmons and the forces of Hell trying to hunt down. Later on she would become a hellspawn herself.

In other media

* Priest was portrayed by

in the 1997 film adaptation ''Spawn''. She was intended to return as another Spawn in a sequel; but the film had neither the time nor the budget so it was canceled, with this storyline being incorporated into the character's adaptation to comic books. * In the

HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American pay television service, which is the flagship property of namesake parent-subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is based a ...

animated series ''

Todd McFarlane's Spawn ''Todd McFarlane's Spawn'', also known as ''Spawn: The Animated Series'' or simply ''Spawn'', is an American adult animated superhero television series that aired on HBO from 1997 through 1999 and reran on Cartoon Network's Toonami programming b ...

'' (1997–1999),

(voiced by

Ruben Santiago-Hudson Ruben Santiago-Hudson (born Ruben Santiago Jr., November 24, 1956) is an American actor, playwright, and director who has won national awards for his work in all three categories. He is best known for his role of Captain Roy Montgomery from 2009 ...

) is given the full name " Jess Chapel" in reference to Priest, serving as a

composite character In a work of media adapted from a real or fictional narrative, a composite character is a character based on more than one individual from the story. It is an example of dramatic license. Examples Film *'' The Wizard of Oz'' (1939): Glinda, Goo ...

of the two characters, in Priest having been created to replace Chapel in-film. * Priest appears in the 1999 video game ''

'', voiced by Diana Salles. * Priest appears in the video game '' Spawn: In the Demon's Hand'', voiced by Erin McMurphy. *

McFarlane Toys McFarlane Toys is an American company founded by comic book creator Todd McFarlane which makes highly detailed model action figures of characters from films, comics, popular music, video games and various sporting genres. The company, a subsidia ...

has made several action figures of Priest.

References

Fictional mercenaries in comics Fictional assassins in comics Fictional female assassins Characters created by Todd McFarlane Spawn characters Image Comics female superheroes Image Comics female supervillains Comics characters introduced in 1997 Female characters in comics Demon characters in comics {{Image-char-stub