Warning: The following contains spoilers for Gwenpool Strikes Back #4, by Leah Williams, Christopher Hastings, David Baldeon, Jesus Aburtov, VC's Joe Caramagna, on sale now.
The miniseries Gwenpool Strikes Back just keeps raising the stakes for the self-aware Marvel hero. After the titular character kidnapped Marvel's biggest heroes, sent them on a desert island of her own design, and pit them against one another in a gladiatorial tournament, she found herself matched up against the Immortal Hulk. If that wasn't enough, her c0creator popped in for a page to drop an absolute bombshell on her.
Writer Christopher Hastings, who co-created the hero along with Chris Bachalo, Jordan D. White and Heather Antos, pops into the the miniseries to speak to Gwenpool directly, even if he's not still writing her adventures. After taking the Mufasa-esque shape of a face in the clouds (because, as he explains, comics are a visual medium) Hastings urgently tells Gwenpool that he has important information for her. With only a page to convey it, Gwenpool pays as much attention as she can while being chased by an unkillable rage monster.
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Never having spoken to Gwenpool directly before, Hastings gets over his bashfulness to point her in the direction of a secret he built into her origins. He says in as dramatic a fashion as possible that Gwenpool's father's name is Ted Poole, which he points out sounds an awful lot "like Dead Pool." He also tells her that her mother's name is Martha, just like Batman and Superman's mothers.
The details seem like easily dismissable Easter eggs, and Gwenpool brushes them off to focus on the crisis at hand, but just before Hasting leaves he points out their grand significance. If Gwenpool is supposed to be from the "real" world, how could Hastings have control over such details as Gwenpool's parents names? The entire setup to Gwenpool's original stories was that she was a real world comic nerd transported to the Marvel Universe, which she was capable of manipulating to great affect with her understanding of comics mythology and story conventions. But if she was truly from a real world she should not have a writer as a "creator" at all, and indeed her biological parents' names should not contain Easter eggs that a Marvel writer built into them.
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The hints that Hastings drops could point in the direction of a deeper layer to Gwenpool's origins. As Gwenpool heads into the future, this could set up a metafictional new mystery for her to solve. Indeed, with the main plot of the current series involving Gwenpool's desire to continue publication (since not appearing anymore would be tantamount to "death" for a character with metafictional awareness), this could be exactly what she's been looking for this whole time.
With only one issue left in the miniseries to wrap it up, and her Hulk problem solved for the time being, Gwenpool may have a little more time to think about it. However, Gwenpool finds herself facing off against Ms. Marvel for her final match, so it remains to be seen whether she can juggle yet another fight with the details of her overarching plot.