I know that MJ is Peter's main squeeze...

[Agent Z]

But Miles, isn't it the writer's job to write said characters so that their stock doesn't diminish (whatever that means)? That's your argument for why we should get another 30 years of Peter and MJ right, it's funny how it only applies to one character you like and no one else though...?



Yes, I would honestly rather get 10 years of Betty.





It's comics baby, anyone can get magically aged up if they think the sales will be there!




Exactly. You got 32 years, and yet the MJ defense force is regularly and aggressively in people's grills for anyone ever daring to have a preference for anything different, like some dog growling as if their well worn chew toy is about to be taken away. Y'all need to take a chill pill and let people express what they like without trying to shout them down 24/7.






Not what I was saying, and not what he was either. You read Spider-Man for Spider-Man characters. No one sees Black Cat on a page of an issue and goes "oh, I'll go read Catwoman". That's a silly argument.

I believe Miles to go's argument is that Felicia's similarities to Selina might be a detriment to her either as a love interest or solo character.

[Miles To Go]

Tony Stark/Pepper Potts?

Can't speak for him, but I was always more a Happy/Pepper guy.

[Zeitgeist]

Do you feel this way about Superman/Lois? Batman/Catwoman? Hal Jordan/Carol Ferris? Barry Allen/Iris West? Ben Grimm/Alicia Masters? Tony Stark/Pepper Potts?

Why are you reading super hero comics if you feel this way?

If I feel what way? That I don't irrationally demand permanence from a storytelling medium designed not to have an end? I feel like I'm using basic rationality but you're making me feel like I'm looking into the Matrix or something here. If you don't agree with that then I'd be asking you why you read them.
Out of all those couples you mentioned, I know for sure Superman/Lois, Batman/Catwoman and Barry Allen/Iris West have never been 24/7 attached at the hip, destined to be 5eva. Superman was with Wonder Woman recently, Batman has been with Talia al Ghul, Flash with Patty Spivot and didn't he have a date with Jessica Cruz very recently? I don't know or care much about the others, soz.

(There will come a time when they aren't the focus again. And then a time when they will. Because comics.)

Exactly.

I believe Miles to go's argument is that Felicia's similarities to Selina might be a detriment to her either as a love interest or solo character.

Surface similarities never hurt Hawkeye, or Thanos. Or whichever you think came first out of Swamp/Man-Thing.

[emmafrosting]

Exactly. You got 32 years, and yet the MJ defense force is regularly and aggressively in people's grills for anyone ever daring to have a preference for anything different, like some dog growling as if their well worn chew toy is about to be taken away. Y'all need to take a chill pill and let people express what they like without trying to shout them down 24/7.

Don't know why you're being this dramatic. This is an internet forum, everybody's always going to be mad about somebody's opinion somewhere here. People fighting about fictional relationships isn't new. MJ was in the title and OP compared Peter/MJ and Peter/Felicia, so. Lol

[Revolutionary_Jack]

You give any other female character as much time in the sun - 20 years ball and chained, right? Not counting other universes and publications? - and they're guaranteed to have the same success. Gwen, Felicia, Betty, anyone.

A claim with zero evidence in favor of it. One entirely in ignorance of the actual publication history.

Numbers aren't arguable. The fact is Mary Jane has consistently been far more popular and has made more appearances than any and demand for her endured multiple attempts to write her out of the books. Stan Lee himself wrote her out of ASM for 17 issues (i.e. a year and five months) between ASM#65 and ASM#82 precisely so Gwen Stacy could have her time in the sun. And that didn't work in Gwen's favor.

If we want to compare MJ and Felicia. There's actually a pretty interesting example because there was a real fair fight between them. Marv Wolfman wrote Mary Jane out of the books for fairly sexist reasons in ASM#193. She was gone from ASM until returning in ASM#238 in Roger Stern's run. Felicia Hardy made her debut in ASM #194, i.e. the issue right after MJ was written out although Wolfman certainly didn't intend Felicia at the time as a replacement for MJ or any such thing and it was Stern and Mantlo years later who developed Felicia into that kind of character. Felicia Hardy disappeared from the Spider-Man titles after the editorial decision to marry Peter with MJ. Appearing in ASM #289 and reappearing in ASM#306 after that. A gap of 17 issues.

So head to head, Between ASM#193- ASM#293, exactly 100 issues, who made more appearances across all Spider-Man titles (ASM, SSM, WoS, MTU, and other Marvel Titles)? Since the decision to get Peter and MJ married was late in the day, this period is also essentially free of external manipulation and thumbs to the scales (well except for Wolfman's hatchet job on MJ but as a new character, Felicia definitely deserves a head start). The answer is Mary Jane who made 61 appearances, while Felicia comes close with 59. But even then MJ's appearances is remarkable considering that Felicia had a huge head start with MJ out of the titles for 40 plus issues. In other words, Mary Jane Watson despite being written out, came back and recouped her popularity with writers and fan demand with astounding alacrity. So in a fair fight, Felicia Hardy lost to Mary Jane.

The fact is the reason Mary Jane's stood the test of time is because she always was popular, she regained her popularity multiple times and she steadily became the most complex and developed supporting character. Remember that fans asked Lee and Shooter at a convention for Peter to marry MJ specifically. Not Peter to be married in general.

The idea that literally anybody else could command that or achieve that acclaim is unsupported by the evidence and is kind of disgraceful and misogynistic in its implications. It ignores the realities of character design, storyline alignments, good writing, and reader interest. Characters can't be easily replaced or altered or changed.

Hell, I'll call it now: watch Spider-Gwen. With enough sustained time and continued momentum, she'll be the new Spider queen bee.

I don't get the logic. People are aware that Spider-Gwen is like super-young...far younger than 616 Peter right? That she is specifically not a love interest for Peter right? Do people seriously think that Spider-Gwen is a love interest for Peter? Right now Spider-Gwen is a love interest for Miles as in ITSV.

And so far Ghost Spider hasn't sold as much as Spider-Girl, i.e. Mayday Parker.

[Kevinroc]

If I feel what way? That I don't irrationally demand permanence from a storytelling medium designed not to have an end? I feel like I'm using basic rationality but you're making me feel like I'm looking into the Matrix or something here. If you don't agree with that then I'd be asking you why you read them.
Out of all those couples you mentioned, I know for sure Superman/Lois, Batman/Catwoman and Barry Allen/Iris West have never been 24/7 attached at the hip, destined to be 5eva. Superman was with Wonder Woman recently, Batman has been with Talia al Ghul, Flash with Patty Spivot and didn't he have a date with Jessica Cruz very recently? I don't know or care much about the others, soz.

I never said I expected the current round of Peter/MJ to last forever (in fact, I distinctly said immediately afterwards that it wouldn't.)

My point was these characters have continued their on-again/off-again with their, for lack of a better term, "main squeeze." Super hero comics are soap operas, and that kind of on-again/off-again are a big part of that soap opera. If that's not really your thing, why are you reading serialized super hero comics?

Exactly.

I think the reason so many people are so defensive about Peter/MJ is because of the lengths some will go to. I mean, The Clone Saga exists. OMD exists. (This is definitely not a healthy fanbase, lol.)

Surface similarities never hurt Hawkeye, or Thanos. Or whichever you think came first out of Swamp/Man-Thing.

Maybe if Stan had (co-)created Felicia she'd be a more prominent figure. But he didn't.

The problem there really is that being someone who puts on a costume is really kind of a deal breaker with Spider-Man romantic relationships. The drama comes from the push and pull nature of Peter Parker and Spider-Man's lives. Spidey having a relationship with Black Cat or Mockingbird (or Kitty Pryde over in Ultimate) really kind of throws that dynamic out of whack. (Not that it can't be fun for a little while, of course. But people expecting it to be on par with Peter/MJ are kidding themselves.)

[Snoop Dogg]

maybe it would be better for the fanbase if petey just came out as bi and married sir jonathan of tempest

[Miles To Go]

Don't know why you're being this dramatic

From his posting history, he was a big advocate of the Post-OMD era "moving Peter forward", away from established relationships and status quos. I don't think he's enjoying Peter being back with MJ one bit, or that Peter is struggling without a career or steady employment again, and feels Marvel have caved in to nostalgia

[WebSlingWonder]

Jesus. I leave for a few minutes and the thread grew into two extra pages!!

[Inversed]

I've been someone who is always open to exploring new relationships and pairings with characters, as long as they actually go all the way with it and actually develop it in a meaningful way.

Like during Slott's tenure on the book, I was on board with seeing new love interests and how it would impact their connections, the problem was that they never actually went anywhere and were dismissed just as quickly, so brings up the question of what was the point. I feel like if you're not gonna use your time to make the new relationships more compelling, than it'd be better to use the time to develop the connection between one of the previous interests, to grow some development in some way.

[PCN24454]

I've been someone who is always open to exploring new relationships and pairings with characters, as long as they actually go all the way with it and actually develop it in a meaningful way.

Like during Slott's tenure on the book, I was on board with seeing new love interests and how it would impact their connections, the problem was that they never actually went anywhere and were dismissed just as quickly, so brings up the question of what was the point. I feel like if you're not gonna use your time to make the new relationships more compelling, than it'd be better to use the time to develop the connection between one of the previous interests, to grow some development in some way.

That’s exactly how I felt!!!

I actually liked that he didn’t automatically go back to MJ since that would just be the writers chickening out of their decision.

The problem is, having lots of love interests just implies that Peter isn’t ready to settle down which creates the opposite effect that they’re looking for.

That’s why I was disappointed by post-Superior romance.

[Kevinroc]

I've been someone who is always open to exploring new relationships and pairings with characters, as long as they actually go all the way with it and actually develop it in a meaningful way.

Like during Slott's tenure on the book, I was on board with seeing new love interests and how it would impact their connections, the problem was that they never actually went anywhere and were dismissed just as quickly, so brings up the question of what was the point. I feel like if you're not gonna use your time to make the new relationships more compelling, than it'd be better to use the time to develop the connection between one of the previous interests, to grow some development in some way.

I think the problem is that creators, by and large, don't care about the characters created by the team that preceded them. (This is more of a comics-wide problem. It is not exclusive to Spider-Man.)

You're probably not going to see too many brand new romantic relationships that last from creative team to creative team.

[PCN24454]

I think the problem is that creators, by and large, don't care about the characters created by the team that preceded them. (This is more of a comics-wide problem. It is not exclusive to Spider-Man.)

You're probably not going to see too many brand new romantic relationships that last from creative team to creative team.

Forget “romantic”.

Writers don’t care about previous relationships period. That’s why supporting casts change so often.

It makes people non-commital in general.

[Kevinroc]

Forget “romantic”.

Writers don’t care about previous relationships period. That’s why supporting casts change so often.

It makes people non-commital in general.

The characters Stan (co-)created tend to wander back into and out of the book. Some more often than others.

[Inversed]

That’s exactly how I felt!!!

I actually liked that he didn’t automatically go back to MJ since that would just be the writers chickening out of their decision.

The problem is, having lots of love interests just implies that Peter isn’t ready to settle down which creates the opposite effect that they’re looking for.

That’s why I was disappointed by post-Superior romance.

I remember when it was first revealed that Peter and Bobbi were gonna date, and I was all for it because I liked their chemistry in his run and it was a fun pairing I thought could be cool to see. Only for it then to turn out to last for literally 7 issues.

I think what also didn't help it was Slott's general disinterest in writing Spider-Man in relationships, Carlie wasn't his decision so he had to work with it based how BND ended, and supposedly he only put Peter and Bobbi together because he loved how Stuart Immonen drew them. It is disappointing because contrast this with his other recent series (Superior, Silver Surfer, Iron Man, Fantastic Four) where one of the first things he does is create a romantic pairing for his book, not to mention RYV, showing that when he does care he can write great relationships.