Who Is Sara Grey? The Spider-Man: Brand New Day Character Explained

Contains spoilers for "Spider-Man: Brand New Day"

Even though there were plenty of clues that Sadie Sink plays Jean Grey in "Spider-Man: Brand New Day," it's still a monumental revelation that "Spider-Man: Brand New Day" features one mutant from the Grey family. What may have come as more of a surprise to viewers is that she also has a sister.

As it transpires, Jean's older sister Sara Grey (Olivia Booth-Ford) has the same powers as her, and her fate provides the younger mutant's entire motivation. After Sara is caught by the Department of Damage Control, she mind-controls Jean into escaping the scene so they both won't get caught. From that moment on, Jean wages war on Damage Control, seeking to find and free her sibling with just one clue to go on: a mysterious telepathic message that Sara sent about something called "V-Max."

In the end, Jean's quest comes to a tragic conclusion. We find out that V-Max is simply the brand label of an air vent above a Damage Control holding cell chair, which is the last thing Sara sees before her death during a cruel brain experiment. It's a grim fate, and her comic book counterpart unfortunately isn't much luckier.

"Spider-Man: Brand New Day" isn't just inventing random siblings for major characters by introducing Sara Grey. There's a version of the character in Marvel comics, though she's cut from a pretty different cloth than Olivia Booth-Ford's live action version.

In the comics, Sara is an adult with a family of her own. While this implies that her life is at least somewhat more well-adjusted than that of her MCU version — who's dumped into the foster system with Jean once their mutant powers manifest — her comic book tenure is hardly happy. Her major story arcs include getting kidnapped by the Atlantean villain Attuma, and being abducted and killed by anti-mutant fanatics for her pro-mutant beliefs. 

However, the comics version of Sara eventually returns in "Phoenix" #12, courtesy of a psychic message she sends to Jean. This time, she's a mutant who can unlock people's full potential, including latent powers. It turns out that this version of Sara is actually an energy copy of the original, and eventually becomes a divine guide known as Beacon. This incarnation of Sara seems to have influenced the MCU one: The telepathic message that Beacon-Sara sends resembles the V-Max one from "Brand New Day," and Beacon's ability to help people engage with their powers resembles the MCU Sara's role in teaching Jean how to unlock hers. This makes for a memorable character whose memory no doubt motivates Jean along her path at the end of "Spider-Man: Brand New Day."  

Remember to watch Looper's Jean Grey explainer before seeing "Spider-Man: Brand New Day" in a theater near you.