Jessica Priest is a fictional character from the

Spawn Spawn or spawning may refer to: * Spawn (biology), 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: Ar ...

universe The universe is all of space and time and their contents, including planets, stars, galaxies, and all other forms of matter and energy. The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological description of the development of the universe. Acc ...

. Specifically, Priest serves as a substitute in the ''

'' film for

Chapel A chapel is a Christian place of prayer and worship that is usually relatively small. The term has several meanings. Firstly, smaller spaces inside a church that have their own altar are often called chapels; the Lady chapel is a common ty ...

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

Melinda Clarke Melinda Patrice "Mindy" Clarke (born April 24, 1969) is an American actress. Clarke 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), ...

in the film. She would later become the second She-Spawn and leader of the team called 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 which established diegetic facts in the plot of a fictional work (those established through the narrative itself) are adjusted, ignored, supplemented, or contradicted by a subse ...

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 Todd McFarlane's popular ''Spawn'' comic book series. The book introduced other Hellspawns and characters in the " Spawniverse". It was published by Image Comics from September 1996–March 1999 and has bee ...

'' #12-14.

Fictional history

Jessica Priest works as an assassin for Spawn's nemesis

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

. 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 relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southe ...

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; but the film had neither the time nor the budget so it was canceled. * 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 Superhero film characters Female characters in comics Female characters in film Fictional women soldiers and warriors {{Image-char-stub