Yuri Watanabe Underwent a Traumatizing Transformation in the 'Spider-Man' Games

Spoiler alert! This article contains plot details for the Insominac Spider-Man games.

Within many of Spider-Man's beloved adaptations throughout the Marvel multiverse, there's the "Insominac universe" that encompasses the acclaimed PlayStation games that currently consist of Marvel's Spider-Man, Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales, and Marvel's Spider-Man 2. In this universe, Peter Parker (Yuri Lowenthal) has assumed the mantle of Spider-Man for several years as he takes on all kinds of villains in order to keep New York City safe.

But while he's made plenty of enemies along the way, he's also kept some allies on speed dial. One of them includes Yuri Watanabe (Tara Platt). Originally introduced in the first Spider-Man game, she was one of the wall-crawler's most trusted allies in the New York Police Department. However, disturbing events throughout the course of the games place her in a very different alignment. But what happened to Yuri in Spider-Man to prompt these changes? Let's break it down.

Yuri was originally captain of the NYPD and often kept close contact with Spider-Man as. Though she wanted to keep the force as active as possible in keeping the streets safe, she recognized the need for someone like Spider-Man to work outside the law in order to keep the more dangerous villains at bay. She was a formidable captain, but wholeheartedly trusted people like Spider-Man to get results using their own methods. The two of them even became close friends over the course of their careers.

However, that willingness to bend the rules in Spider-Man's favor portended her stark transformation down the line. In the DLC side-story The City that Never Sleeps, Yuri enlists Spider-Man's help in taking on her longtime foes in the Maggia crime syndicate and family head Joseph Martello aka Hammerhead. During an operation, however, Yuri's forces are overwhelmed by Hammerhead, and most of them end up dead.

Traumatized by the incident, Yuri becomes increasingly aggressive and impatient as she and Spider-Man investigate the organization. She eventually resorts to violent and even murderous measures in order to bring the Maggia to justice. Throughout her bloody investigation, Yuri acquires both satisfaction and overt pleasure for murdering criminals when she feels law enforcement efforts are insufficient. As Spider-Man implores her to turn herself in for her killings, she disappears.

She later resurfaces during the events of Marvel's Spider-Man 2, now operating as a masked vigilante named Wraith. Though she still has citizens' safety in mind, her methods have become much more violent as she doles out justice. Almost as soon as she and Spider-Man reunite, they begin investigating a cult known as "Followers of the Flame". However, she fully intends to kill their leader (eventually revealed to be Cletus Kasady) as punishment for his heinous crimes.

Yuri and Spider-Man briefly come to blows, with Spider-Man urging her not to kill anymore. She insists that she would "rather lose sleep over the one person I killed than all of the ones I didn't save."

Fortunately, they manage to put aside their differences and work together to throw a wrench into the cult's criminal activities. In fact, Yuri even allows Cletus to escape to save Spider-Man's life.

Despite their contrasting opinions on crime-fighting, she and Spider-Man remain on good terms with each other. In fact, she will even sometimes pop in on Spider-Man's random fights throughout the city in order to lend a hand before disappearing again.

However, she vows to continue investigating Cletus Kasady in order to bring him to justice, no matter what she may have to do.