Spider-Man Day: Indian Spiderman Pavitr Prabhakar co-creator Sharad Devarajan on bringing desi flavour to the iconic Marvel character

For comic book lovers and superhero movie buffs, it would be impossible to imagine a life without deep-diving into the life of Spiderman. In the last two decades, the popular Marvel character has been more popularly immortalised by Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield, Tom Holland and the voice of Shameik Moore. The character has found its way into the homes of people around the world including India, ever since its comic book debut in 1962, owing to the popularity of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) on screen.

Interestingly, when the Marvel character was becoming popular in India, there was another version of him that came to life in the country, as three graphic artists brought their desi flavour to recreate Spiderman. In 2003, Sharad Devarajan, Suresh Seetharaman and Jeevan J. Kang co-created the character and its original comic series, Spider-Man: India, which made its debut in 2004. Almost 20 years later, the Indian Spider-Man made an appearance in a movie.

Every year since 2014, August 1 is celebrated as Spider-Man Day to commemorate the iconic superhero. While his original birthday is said to be on August 10 and has even been mentioned in the most recent films, fans are divided. However, many have achieved a consensus to celebrate Spider-Man Day not only on the first day but throughout the month.

In time with the release of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse in June, which featured the Indian Spider-Man Pavitr Prabhakar, voiced by Indian-American actor Karan Soni, mid-day.com spoke to Devarajan, the co-creator of the Indian Spider-Man about the character. He also spoke about the inspiration, influence, and meeting Stan Lee since then.

Here are the edited excerpts:

Spiderman is a popular character that most of us have grown up with. What made you think of an Indian version?
Before forming Liquid Comics and Graphic India, I started my first company Gotham Comics (named after Gotham City) with my co-founder, Suresh Seetharaman and took on the regional publishing licenses for Marvel Comics. With that, I launched the first locally priced mass-market comic editions of these iconic characters in local languages for India introducing thousands of people in the country to the amazing potential of comic book storytelling.

The idea for doing an Indian version of Spider-Man was a concept I created in 2003 along with my co-creators, Suresh Seetharaman and the amazingly talented artist Jeevan J. Kang. Together, we came up with the story idea and Jeevan worked on some original concept illustrations that we shared with Marvel as part of a pitch to create one of the world's first reinventions of Spider-Man into a new culture and country - An "Indian Spider-Man". Fortunately, the leaders of Marvel's creative team at the time, Avi Arad, Dan Buckley and others, saw the value and creativity in exploring this and allowing us to make it a reality. While there has since been a multiverse of great Spider-Man reimaginings done recently, back then reimagining an icon such as Spider-Man was still a very rare occurrence and may have been a first of its kind in the comic industry. It is one thing to translate existing US comics, but this was the first trans-creation, where we reinvented the origin of a property like Spider-Man, so that he is an Indian boy growing up in Mumbai and dealing with local problems and challenges.

In 2004, my fellow creators and I launched the Indian version of Spider-Man in a comic series called ‘Spider-Man: India'. In it, we reimagined the character of Peter Parker, to Pavitr Prabhakar, an Indian boy growing up in Mumbai and dealing with local problems and challenges. Unlike the original origin, which is deeply rooted in science, our Indian version was more rooted in spirituality. Indian readers were able to see for the first time, Spider-Man bouncing off rickshaws, climbing the Gateway of India, and celebrating Diwali with his aunt Maya. Throughout we strived to remain true to the underlining core of Spider-Man, which is epitomised by the words Stan wrote, ‘With great power, there must also come, great responsibility!'

Ever since you created the character, how have you seen the popularity of Pavitr Prabhakar's character grow? With the popularity of the franchise, do you believe more Indians want to see the character grow?

Over the last 20 years, since we first created Pavitr Prabhakar, I have probably had thousands of people reach out, or speak to me at events, about the character and how impactful it was to see a Spider-Man that looked like them. It was humbling for me to see that we had done something so long ago that made such an impact and spoke to the diversity of the human spirit to inspire so many.

What potential do you see the character have in the global franchise today?

Well, it only took 20 years for Pavitr Prabhakar to jump from that comic we created and onto the big screen - hopefully, it won't take another 20 before we see the live-action version. Unfortunately, neither myself nor the other creators of Pavitr Prabhakar were involved in the new animated film but have great admiration for the creative team behind it who have done an amazing job bringing Pavitr to life and making him such an essential part of the story and film. Wherever Pavitr's new adventure takes him - you can bet I'll be first in line to buy my ticket.

In the past, you have closely worked with Stan Lee on 'Chakra the Invincible'. Share your experiences of working with him.

As a young child, Stan Lee's work shaped my life and spoke to me in a way that no other author or creator ever has, and probably ever will. As a first-generation Indian American growing up in the early 80s in a town where we were the only Indian family, I felt a kinship with the characters Stan brought to life so vividly in his work. Often his heroes were the underdog, the outcast and the person who didn't fit in - and yet, they were the ones that often helped make a difference. Stan's heroes taught me the value of being different. It made me realise my uniqueness was the true source of my strength.

I had the great honour of knowing Stan as a friend and mentor for two decades, and eventually work with him to create his first Indian superhero, ‘Chakra the Invincible'. At the time, we did the Spider-Man: India series, Stan Lee was not actively involved in the day-to-day operations of Marvel and was building his own company, so he did not have any involvement or interaction on that project.

However, Stan was a dear friend and mentor to me for most of my professional life and I remember meeting him shortly after the book was released and being incredibly nervous to discuss what we had done with one of his most iconic heroes. As I handed him the book and told him about the story, my heart raced as I saw him carefully flipping and gazing through the pages. When he finally looked up, he had a smile that warmed the room and instantly put me at ease. We talked about his characters and his belief that creators around the world could build on the foundations of those stories. As a show of graciousness, he even signed one of the copies to show his support for the project to me - a treasure I keep close to me on my desk.

Stan was everything you imagined him to be, from his numerous film cameos, animated voiceovers and editorial pages. A giant of a man, with a warm, funny, energetic, and joyful soul matched with a keenly sharp wit. Having such a legendary persona, it's hard to believe anyone could live up to such a myth, but Stan exceeded every one of those expectations in real life. Being around him made anyone feel like a kid again. Stan had a way of not only defying age but also making everyone around him instantly feel young as well. His genius as a creator was only surpassed by his kindness as a human being.

If you had the opportunity, which is the next superhero you would like to make an Indian version of?

BATMAN!!! That would be fun.

What are the typical Indian mannerisms you have brought to Spiderman that are not in the American version? What is the inspiration behind the name Pavitr Prabhakar?

I have been reading comics for as long back as I can remember. I am an avid reader and my library is in the thousands of comics and graphic novels. As a kid, I always dreamed of working in this medium and as an aspiring artist and creator, there was simply no better creative playground for the imagination. Comic books are akin to a movie with an unlimited budget, a place where you can destroy the entire universe on one page and recreate it on the next. I grew up in the States with the great stories of Marvel and DC superheroes but also with the stories of our gods and heroes of India which were taught to me through Amar Chitra Katha comics. I had the entire collection of those stories as a child and so much of my worldview was shaped through the histories, stories and comics from America and India. That synthesis was part of what I brought to a character like Spider-Man India when I created it with Jeevan and Suresh.

The team at Marvel worked closely with us on the editorial and creative process but allowed Jeevan, Suresh and me a lot of creative freedom to make sure the story was a unique take from our unique perspective. On the surface, we had fun with changing names to make them Indian - so Peter Parker became Pavitr Prabhakar - Mary Jane to Meera Jain - Uncle Ben to Uncle Bhim and so on. We also redesigned Spider-Man's suit to still be recognisable Spider-Man but infused with an Indian sense of unique style.

But the changes went beyond the superficial, just like in the Western version we wanted to make our Pavitr an outcast from the other kids at school. As most people know, in Western comics, Peter Parker was always made fun of because he studied too hard and was a "bookworm" - but in India studying hard is an admirable trait! So, we had to come up with something different.

We chose instead to play on the larger social allegory of having our Pavitr be a village boy who comes to Mumbai on a scholarship but feels out of touch with the high-paced lifestyles of Mumbai's city elite. He represents the more traditional and simple family values that a vast majority of India still admires. This was reflective of the direction we saw in 2004 when the big cities of India seemed to be moving at light speed while many of the people in rural India felt completely separated.

The project received interest around the world as people were surprised and excited to see this new interpretation of their beloved hero - it led to a larger discussion on the ideas of reverse globalisation and eventually led to the creation of our original heroes and stories from India.