Mary Jane Watson-Parker Appreciation 2023

[Spider-Tiger]

I'm not a DC guy, but I wonder if in terms of official artwork (ie: variant covers, poster books, etc.) if Lois gets the same treatment as Mary Jane? (Granted, Lois is a journalist and MJ's best known career choices are either actress or fashion model. So Mary Jane cover art just seems more natural.)

Honestly, does Lois really have a popular house-style character design? With MJ most artists reference the Romita look (dimples, bangs, red hair) which I think is pretty recognizable to a comic book audience. If not that, they go for the J Scott Campbell design. And I think the recognizability helps with something like a variant cover. I can't think of one universal defining look for Lois (other than brunette in business attire in a Superman comic.) She's had so many different styles and looks over the years. But MJ is still rocking her 60s 'do.

[Frontier]

Honestly, does Lois really have a popular house-style character design? With MJ most artists reference the Romita look (dimples, bangs, red hair) which I think is pretty recognizable to a comic book audience. If not that, they go for the J Scott Campbell design. And I think the recognizability helps with something like a variant cover. I can't think of one universal defining look for Lois (other than brunette in business attire in a Superman comic.) She's had so many different styles and looks over the years. But MJ is still rocking her 60s 'do.

Lois' recognizable features are raven-dark hair, purple eyes, and generally purple outfits and you can see that across multiple interpretations over the years.

[Spider-Tiger]

Lois' recognizable features are raven-dark hair, purple eyes, and generally purple outfits and you can see that across multiple interpretations over the years.

Hmmm. Kinda like Liz Taylor? I can dig it.

Remember that from the DCAU, but not quite as consistently in the comics. But I'm officially headcanoning Liz Taylor's face for Lois to go along with Ann Margret's face for MJ.

[Johnny]

[CaptainUniverse]

I miss Mike Wieringo and his artwork...

[Johnny]

I miss Mike Wieringo and his artwork...

Same here. The man drew Peter in baggy pants, he's a legend for that alone.

[Huntsman Spider]

Don't forget having been targeted by mad scientists who specialize in cloning, having dated women that have been both heroes and villains, and frequently having their previous love interest get killed off or turned into a worse person so they can get with a new one.

Remember when Marvel tried to kill off MJ and then undid that decision due to how unpopular it was? They did the same thing with Jean Grey, except it was arguably more successful that time since it took 13 years for her to come back.

I used to feel bad for Gwen Stacy fans. Now I envy them.

In the words of Stephen King from Pet Sematary: "Sometimes, dead is better." That said, being targeted by obsessed and obsessive mad geneticists and mad roboticists (as well as the occasional mad cyborg) is indeed another thing Spider-Man and Cyclops have in common.

It's called web-slinging!

[Rzerox21xx]

https://twitter.com/levidu99/status/1639040009205432320

Fiti Vidal who does great fanart on twitter drew MJ in a bikini.

[Lukmendes]

Don't forget having been targeted by mad scientists who specialize in cloning, having dated women that have been both heroes and villains, and frequently having their previous love interest get killed off or turned into a worse person so they can get with a new one.

Remember when Marvel tried to kill off MJ and then undid that decision due to how unpopular it was? They did the same thing with Jean Grey, except it was arguably more successful that time since it took 13 years for her to come back.

Well, it was Quesada who did the Jean killing, and his decisions are harder to remove, considering he's the guy who did OMD and all.

Hell, in his tenure we had OMD happening, Jean being killed, and Janet being killed, and I hear all three of them were done to make the male character "more interesting" (Though I also did hear that Jean was killed off because she was too powerful), and the earliest one to be undone is Janet's death lol.

I used to feel bad for Gwen Stacy fans. Now I envy them.

Because they never have to deal with all of this nonsense? Lol.

In that sense that is enviable, Gwen escaped all of this by having death's sweet release... And even that didn't stop her from being written by Wells anyways :P.

I did say "maybe," lol.

We're beyond "maybe" at this point, it's either "most likely" or "probably" lol.

It's just a thought on how they can make MJ's actions actually sympathetic in all of this. This is probably the simplest way to do so given everything that has happened to this point. But it's clear they didn't plot anything out and this is all going to be thrown together at the last minute. Maybe I'll be way off-base with all of this.

I mean, this is Wells, if he makes MJ look sympathetic, there's a high chance it'll be an accident.

At least if it is an accident, it'll be another situation where MJ looks better than she should be accident lol.

(We really had two stories involving MJ and the X-Men in one year and nothing ties them together.)

Honestly, that's a good thing, because while MJ is being treated like **** now, I don't see the X-Men treating her that well if she got to show up there, specially if we remember how Duggan wrote as pretty much a crying coward:



(X-Men: Hellfire Gala).

Keep in mind that just a few months earlier, this happened:





(ASM#89 vol 5).

Most superhero love interests are other superheroes. How many superheroes have civilian love interests? Superman, The Flash, and Spider-Man sometimes seem like the only ones.

And Iris and Linda are definitely not that known names outside of the comics.

Hell, Wally's most iconic love interests are probably Fire (DCAU Justice League), Jinx (Teen Titans), and Artemis (Young Justice).

Batman had a few civilian love interests, and while a few show up in adaptations, it's Catwoman who's the most known one, and I'm not sure how many people know, remember, or even care, about even the ones who showed up in the movies.

Lois' recognizable features are raven-dark hair, purple eyes, and generally purple outfits and you can see that across multiple interpretations over the years.

Y'know, her liking purple so much, kinda surprising she didn't wear some green with it and became a super villain too :P.

In the words of Stephen King from Pet Sematary: "Sometimes, dead is better."

In Gwen's case, being dead is likely the best thing that could happen with her, she was really unremarkable as a character, and the relationship she had with Spidey was just a repeat of Betty's, only more annoying.

But then again who knows, if Conway's original idea of just breaking up her and Spidey happened so he could write Spidey get with MJ, we could always have Gwen returning eventually and becoming an actual character, and maybe even being interesting to boot.

That said, being targeted by obsessed and obsessive mad geneticists and mad roboticists (as well as the occasional mad cyborg) is indeed another thing Spider-Man and Cyclops have in common.

It's also funny how despite how many things they have in common, they always contrast lol.

Jackal is just a pathetic man who had a creepy crush on a student, and he does all of that in a convoluted attempt at revenger, and it reached the point where sometimes it sounds like he doesn't even care about Gwen that much anymore and just wants to torment Spidey in some way just because he's been doing it for so long.

Sinister meanwhile, is more "pragmatic" so to say, he doesn't particularly care about either Cyke or Jean, it's just that their DNA combined can create overpowered mutants, and he wants that.

I find situations like this more interesting, when characters have plenty in common without the intention of having in common, that way it makes the contrasts and differences feel more natural instead of being clunky.

That kind of thing is also why I find MJ an interesting love interest for Spidey, they got more in common than you'd expect despite how different they are, and a lot of these things weren't intentional, that paradoxically helped in making her a more fitting love interest (And it helps her development wasn't done to get her closer to Spidey, MJ was developed for the sake of developing MJ), and, in some ways, made 'em getting close together more natural (Though obviously I find the marriage speedrun to be bad), 'cause in real life there's no script, people get close to each other at random at times.

(7000th post hype, woooh).

[Kevinroc]

We're beyond "maybe" at this point, it's either "most likely" or "probably" lol.

He wants this to be a "tragedy" so it's going to be revealed that MJ never lost faith in Peter and had to break his heart for reasons. That makes it more tragic, and also leaves the character without needing later writers to retcon the hell out of his run. He may claim he doesn't care about that, but no writer wants to see their run just absolutely gutted to hell and back.

I mean, this is Wells, if he makes MJ look sympathetic, there's a high chance it'll be an accident.

At least if it is an accident, it'll be another situation where MJ looks better than she should be accident lol.

Like I said, it's all about making this as "tragic" as possible without actually making it so later writers retcon the hell out of his run.

Honestly, that's a good thing, because while MJ is being treated like **** now, I don't see the X-Men treating her that well if she got to show up there, specially if we remember how Duggan wrote as pretty much a crying coward:

It just points to the lack of cohesion in this run. Things literally just happen because things need to happen. It feels sloppy.

And Iris and Linda are definitely not that known names outside of the comics.

Hell, Wally's most iconic love interests are probably Fire (DCAU Justice League), Jinx (Teen Titans), and Artemis (Young Justice).

Batman had a few civilian love interests, and while a few show up in adaptations, it's Catwoman who's the most known one, and I'm not sure how many people know, remember, or even care, about even the ones who showed up in the movies.

I think the CW Flash show has sort of cemented Barry x Iris for the Flash franchise. The Flash movie (I know, I know) also has Iris in it. (Iris will be played by Kiersey Clemons.)

Definitely not the case for Wally.

Most superhero love interests are actually superheroes themselves. And then there are people who ship superheroes together regardless of what their status actually is (whether that be Superman x Wonder Woman or Nightwing x Starfire or what have you.)

[Frontier]

I remember in the Flash show they had Linda date Barry. Yeah .

[dornwolf]

Every time I come into this thread and see some Carlos Gomez art, I smile.

You should check out the latest Superman run (and I mean that seriously, it's good stuff).

Oh I'm aware. Superman and Lois reigning horniest couple of the DCU by a good mile.

[Kevinroc]

I remember in the Flash show they had Linda date Barry. Yeah .

Yeah, that was weird.

[WebLurker]

[delete]

10char

[WebLurker]

Again, it wouldn't really work because of other media to begin with lol.

MJ is that kind of character who's a known name for the franchise even if adaptations about her are mostly half assed, so she can be written as a nothing character like Gwen Stacy, but she will be around just because Mary Jane is a known name.

Not that MJ getting half assed adaptations is a good thing (I'm even kinda annoyed Sam Raimi's version is so known when her character is pretty eh), but again, she's a known name to the point that her exclusion can be pretty noticeable lol.

Hell I even have a cousin who knows nothing of comic books, or even Spider-Man in general, and she refuses to call Michelle by her name, and calls her "Mary Jane".

Yeah, agreed that it's too ingrained to get rid of at this point; esp. since the adaptations are what shape most people's opinions on what the franchise is.

(I actually think that, while not an exact translation of the comic book version, that Raimi MJ is a stronger character than she's given credit for, but that's me.)

Honestly, at this point I don't even care that much about why they do it.

Like, only in a ridiculous case like aliens invaded Earth because they detested Spidey getting married and Quesada decided to sully his name by being known as the guy who caused OMD to happen, to stop this secret alien invasion, that I would actually care that much about the why, but since it's not the case, does it really matter why they do it? If it's a misguided attempt at improving ASM, or some higher up who hates redheads, or whatever else, the result is, getting runs like this.

Was thinking more if this was just Wells, the "toybox" will probably be reset as lot quicker, where if this was Marvel trying to write MJ out for good, it might be a longer stretch before they back down (if they do, given how OMD remains despite it's unpopularity since day one).

Right? On the super-hero setting, the only love interest who's possibly more popular than MJ is Lois Lane, and that's huge.

Now, also keep in mind that MJ is not just a love interest, but also a pretty good character on her own, I'm sure there are plenty of companies who would literally kill to have a character as iconic and interesting as MJ, and Marvel would rather throw this character in the garbage can.

Textbook example of fictional characters taking on a life of their own, in this case, no longer being what the (current) Powers That Be want and their attempts to force him to be what they want becoming more and more, well, forced, as the years go on.