Comics Speculation of Spider-Man Storyline for Summer 2007

[Eye Doc]

I'd rather she die from cancer or some disease. There's nothing Pete can do about that; he can't save her like he could from a villain. It's somewhat different from Gwen's death and yet it still has meaning. Sometimes Pete can't save people and he'd have to accept that. It would be overwhelmingly sad for a while, but I'd take that any day over having MJ be a cheater.

I think you're on to something here. MJ's death should have NOTHING to do with Spider-Man. I'd rather see her die via an illness or something sudden like an aneurysm. Peter's life has always been marked by tragedy.

If you chose to go another route, I'd have die in an accident. Since the plane crash angle has been used before, I'd try another tragedy. You could always have MJ die in a car wreck. Imagine her getting rave reviews for a new play. She decides to leave the theater to attend a cast party with plans to meet Peter later that night to "celebrate". She's killed in a car crash by a drunken driver on the way home.. She dies just as she is fulfilling her dream of stardom on the broadway.

Eye Doc

 

[Doc Destruction]

How about MJ acting as the devil's advocate on some of Spidey's tougher decisions? Like, maybe she might feel bad for Sandman on some level, or they both laugh at Stilt Man together or something.

Use her as OUR mouthpiece if we were in her shoes. Normal people trying to relate to superhuman crime-fighters.

Use your freaking brains, writers...jeez.

 

[Dragon]

I'm not really sure if MJ is all that essential. She's an important part of his life yes but I think someone like Aunt May is far more essential to have around for Peter due to their closer relation.

Question, in any of the other Marvel relationships, does anyone else constantly shown thinking just how much they love their wife or signifcant other and how lucky they are to have them? Peter seems, from recent issues I've read, does that a lot for some reason. As if the writers are trying to hammer the point that Peter loves MJ.

As if they can't show it, they have to tell readers?

Anyone know why this is?

Not really, and that's one of the most annoying aspects to the writing for me. It gets tiring to keep reading how much Peter loves her. And you're right. It's mostly padding to force the issue, because they can't think of anything to do with them.

But then Peter is one of the few who have SERIOUS relationships with non-super women. Most other relationships are between superhumans. So the writers have little trouble thinking up how to keep the girlfriend interesting since she's slugging it out with the villains along with her SO.

 

[Doc Destruction]

I'm not really sure if MJ is all that essential. She's an important part of his life yes but I think someone like Aunt May is far more essential to have around for Peter due to their closer relation.

Question, in any of the other Marvel relationships, does anyone else constantly shown thinking just how much they love their wife or signifcant other and how lucky they are to have them? Peter seems, from recent issues I've read, does that a lot for some reason. As if the writers are trying to hammer the point that Peter loves MJ.

As if they can't show it, they have to tell readers?

Anyone know why this is?

Because their lonely-never-get-a-freaking-date-loser asses have NO clue how to write a REAL marriage.

 

[Dragon]

i can't tell if you're being serious or not....

Still, I just think that little things like that really bring out the true nature of the individuals involved in a relationship. Alot of couples do nothing but fight, yet they are incredibly happy with each other when it gets down to it. Some couples are completely miserable, yet they put on a mask for everyone else.

Then you have the young couples who can't do anything but laugh. They sit around and do the important stuff, but when they sit down together, they just laugh at everything and how minuscule it is in comparison to the big picture. That's what Peter and MJ should be. They've seen people who wear living suits and people who can turnt into sand, and they've even had dinner with Captain America....thet should sweat the small suff, and then laugh about how petty it all is. Just my thoughts.

I was being serious.

 

[shinlyle]

I was being serious.

Cool. I thought you were... you are quite a fellow of discerning taste, after all.

 

[shinlyle]

Because their lonely-never-get-a-freaking-date-loser asses have NO clue how to write a REAL marriage.

Hehheh....Here's a brief translation of that post....

"SLAP!!!"

 

[LarryLegend]

So lets think ahead to 2008. Let's assume Marvel has ended the marriage and the books still aren't selling. What would they do next?

 

[Abaddon]

Bring back Gwen Stacy.

 

[LarryLegend]

Bring back Gwen Stacy.

Probally. But maybe thats who MJ will have the affair with.

 

[SpideyInATree]

Aw, man. I thought this was going to be speculation about the Jeph Loeb/J. Scott Campbell ongoing.

And, besides, I thought that miniseries that JMS/Quesada was doing was supposed to come out in the winter, of this year, not the summer of next year. Ok, I'm confused.

And, once again, another subject about Mary Jane dying...the marriage breaking up.

Do I think its going to happen? Yeah. Why? Because Mary Jane is probably going to die in the Spider-Man 3 movie. Thus, causing her to bite the big one in the comic. Spider-Man 1 has the organics. Pete got the organics in the comic. Spider-Man 2 had the bad ass sunglass, leather trenchcoat wearing Dr. Octopus...and we all saw what happened to our comic version of Doc Ock. He got muscular, and got a fashion sense. What the hell?

But they may not.

But I won't be shedding any tears over her death or removal from the comic. Is her character interesting? Depends on who is writing her. Personally the two best writers of Mary Jane have been J.M. DeMatteis and JMS, in my opinion. Everyone else usually wrote the same crap over and over again. And I still don't believe that the two should have been married in the first place. They didn't seem to mix very well during that time period. Yes, MJ was there for him while Gwen died...but I saw Pete/MJ relationship as a friendship, and nothing more. Guess Pete was too horny. God knows I'd be constantly fighting super villains.

 

[Dragon]

Bring back Gwen Stacy.

Honestly, I think that's the plan anyway.

 

[spideylover89]

While some of you have brought up decent points about why the marriage isn't essential, I still think Marvel will have major problems if they let MJ go. Once MJ is gone, the books will still suck...hell, they'll probably be worse. We will have lost over 20 years of build up so Joe Q could finally get rid of his little scapegoat. The marriage may be written poorly right now, but it's a hell of a lot better than the other crap they've been feeding us, and it's the only thing keeping a lot of people on the book.

Also with the way everything has been handled lately, does anyone here actually think that Marvel would handle this break up well anyway? We've seen Marvel's idea of ground-breaking writing and it ain't pretty.

 

[Dragon]

Aw, man. I thought this was going to be speculation about the Jeph Loeb/J. Scott Campbell ongoing.

And, besides, I thought that miniseries that JMS/Quesada was doing was supposed to come out in the winter, of this year, not the summer of next year. Ok, I'm confused.

And, once again, another subject about Mary Jane dying...the marriage breaking up.

Do I think its going to happen? Yeah. Why? Because Mary Jane is probably going to die in the Spider-Man 3 movie. Thus, causing her to bite the big one in the comic. Spider-Man 1 has the organics. Pete got the organics in the comic. Spider-Man 2 had the bad ass sunglass, leather trenchcoat wearing Dr. Octopus...and we all saw what happened to our comic version of Doc Ock. He got muscular, and got a fashion sense. What the hell?

But they may not.

But I won't be shedding any tears over her death or removal from the comic. Is her character interesting? Depends on who is writing her. Personally the two best writers of Mary Jane have been J.M. DeMatteis and JMS, in my opinion. Everyone else usually wrote the same crap over and over again. And I still don't believe that the two should have been married in the first place. They didn't seem to mix very well during that time period. Yes, MJ was there for him while Gwen died...but I saw Pete/MJ relationship as a friendship, and nothing more. Guess Pete was too horny. God knows I'd be constantly fighting super villains.

I agree that because of the movie, and possibly because it appears that Joe Q likes Gwen better (Which might be the one thing he and I agree on) they're planning on bringing her back.

But I have to say that even though it's going to suck, and I'm sure that Gwen will be terribly mishandled, on a certain level it makes sense.

Personally, I've never bought into Peter and MJ's relationship. And not because I prefer Gwen. Because of how they've been handled over these past few decades. It always appeared that they were being forced together, rahter than the writers hadling it naturally. The only writer I feel connected them well was Gerry Conway, and that was the first time they got together.

Because immediately after their-ahem- "consumation" in ASM #149, their relationship gradually faded out. If you read the issues of ASM between #151 & 183, they're barely freiends, let alone dating. I recently re-read the Hamilton-Goblin arc- and whenever Peter and MJ saw each other, it was like friendship- nothing like two people in love. Peter seemed to think of her as an afterthought. Peter's proposal to her was definitely more about wanting a stable life, and not because he realy needed to be with her specifically.

And the same happened after MJ's return. The marriage proposal was just kind of thrown out there. The writers on the book up to that point did next to nothing to build an actual relationship between them. And now you have all of this contrived - "I love the way her eyes sparkle when she looks at booze" writing. Something is just missing in the relationship.

 

[SpideyInATree]

I think the marriage is all right, NOW. JMS does a good job with the marriage and both the characters of Peter Parker and Mary Jane.

It's the years before JMS' run that made MJ into such an annoying character, at least with me. Most of the time it was her sitting around the house worried about Peter. "Oh my God, he may not come home!"

THEN WHY THE HELL DID YOU MARRY HIM!!!!!!!

It's not like on the honeymoon Peter went, "Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you before you said 'I do'. I'm Spider-Man!"

She knew and Peter let her know what she was getting herself into. So basically we've had about 20 years of Mary Jane going, "Oh my God, my husband is Spider-Man, what do I do?" and in between that we had some good character moments. But, seriously...besides MJ being a staple in the Spidey mythos now...what the hell has she contributed? Not a whole lot, in my opinion.

 

[Dragon]

While some of you have brought up decent points about why the marriage isn't essential, I still think Marvel will have major problems if they let MJ go. Once MJ is gone, the books will still suck...hell, they'll probably be worse. We will have lost over 20 years of build up so Joe Q could finally get rid of his little scapegoat. The marriage may be written poorly right now, but it's a hell of a lot better than the other crap they've been feeding us, and it's the only thing keeping a lot of people on the book.

Also with the way everything has been handled lately, does anyone here actually think that Marvel would handle this break up well anyway? We've seen Marvel's idea of ground-breaking writing and it ain't pretty.

Well, the writing might improve from this perspective: If they bring Gwen back- or have Peter embark on another relationship, the writing might pick up. Only because pursuit of a relationship is easier to write than an actual ongoing one. The whole "Will They -Won't They" thing makes for greater sparks than when they're actually together and you have to struggle through keeping things interesting once the relationship has smoothed out.

 

[SpideyInATree]

Probably one of the reasons why they'll kill MJ in the movie. We had Spider-Man 2 as that whole build up and Pete and MJ hooking up. And they did, finally, at the end.

So, what's the third movie going to be like? Lets hope there isn't any of that, "But, honey, you could DIE OUT THERE!"

 

[spideylover89]

Well, the writing might improve from this perspective: If they bring Gwen back- or have Peter embark on another relationship, the writing might pick up. Only because pursuit of a relationship is easier to write than an actual ongoing one. The whole "Will They -Won't They" thing makes for greater sparks than when they're actually together and you have to struggle through keeping things interesting once the relationship has smoothed out.

Yeah, but you just wind up at square one AGAIN. Sure Pete pursues someone else, but that gets old so they hook up permanently and once again the writers are stuck. This all just a temporary solution to something that is much bigger. How about instead of killing the wife, you get people who can handle a relationship, get the Parkers out of their very comfortable situation, and start writing about real world problems again.

 

[stillanerd]

Well, the writing might improve from this perspective: If they bring Gwen back- or have Peter embark on another relationship, the writing might pick up. Only because pursuit of a relationship is easier to write than an actual ongoing one. The whole "Will They -Won't They" thing makes for greater sparks than when they're actually together and you have to struggle through keeping things interesting once the relationship has smoothed out.

Actually, Gwen's clone is more likely to come back that Gwen herself...and it would still undermine "The Night Gwen Stacy Died" even more than it already has been. Besides, even if they do seperate Peter and MJ, wouldn't that provide a whole "will they or won't they get back together" as well? And remember, when MJ left the titles under Marv Wolfman's run, Marvel was pretty hard pressed to find a "girlfriend" for Peter, even going back to Betty Brant. If they tried it this time around, it's likely they could always go for a triangle between Betty (now a widow) and Liz (a widow and a single mother) who Flash (now a jerk once again) likes but is jealous that she fancies Peter in an attempt to recapture the original love triangle from the Stan Lee/Steve Ditko days.

Very true. The sad thing is, they look at the marriage as the "ending". This is where Peter's story should "end". I've only been married for 2 years now, but dammit, I'd hate to think of my marriage being the end of anything.....aside from the pain in the ass of dating the most backwards women on the planet.

I mean, anyone who is married can tell you that there are layers upon layers of things that happen to you once you begin sharing your life with another person. Hell, just handling a joint checking account is more interesting than what Marvel has doen witht he marriage thus far. They could show them having to deal with finances, housing, job security, pizza delivery guys running late, etc. So long as they actually featured them working together as a team on some issue, it would be an improvement!!!

Show them at odds on little things. You want to see a married moment, have Peter come in from web-slinging, eat some supper, and then argue with MJ over whose turn it is to do the dishes. Petty little arguments and the like are always a part of a marriage. Have Peter deal with Mj leaving lights on in a room after she leaves, have MJ talking about how Peter doesn't listen to her ramble on, and then have it be because Peter had a pumpkin bomb go off three inches from his face! These little things would provide with some simple entertainment, and would really flesh out the marriage, as well as MJ's character....hell, have her going out to the club one night when Peter's out fighting, he gets his ass kicked, barely beats the baddie, then goes home to MJ, who had been waiting in some slinky lingerie for her man, who feels nothing like making love, seeing as how he's just been slammed through a building!

It's not hard to write a marriage! Marvel just makes it harder than it had to be. Dragon's right about one thing: If they haven't gotten it right after 20 years, they aren't going to get it right.

All very good ideas. And why not have MJ quit acting, realizing that she can't get by on her looks forever and decides to be more than a pretty face, thus Peter can no longer rely on her bringing in most of the income. After all, there was a time when she went back to school, but that was dropped in favor of her becoming a successful supermodel again, which is the number one complaint people have with Peter being married to MJ to begin with. The sad thing is, Marvel is afraid to write about Peter being married because they can't stand the idea that he is no longer a teenager, even though the whole comic is basically about him learning to grow up and become a man. Marriage is a process of growing up as well and just as challenging, despite Joe Q's claims that it makes Peter's life "comfortable."

 

[spideylover89]

Wow, nothings better than a hot and heavy love triangle between a widow, widow/single mom, and a school teacher.
I get the feeling once this is all said and done, spider-man will be finished for me. Nothing matters anymore because it just destroyed or retconned. It's all so pointless.

 

[stillanerd]

Wow, nothings better than a hot and heavy love triangle between a widow, widow/single mom, and a school teacher.

Someone ought to use that as their signature.

I get the feeling once this is all said and done, spider-man will be finished for me. Nothing matters anymore because it just destroyed or retconned. It's all so pointless.

Now you understand why I'm so cynical and sarcastic towards the current crop of comics. Although I still try to be a little optimistic that, one day, somebody will get Spider-Man back on track, and not just scrap the "Iron Spidey suit," the new age mystical spider-totems, his role as Iron Man's brown noser and the Avenger's "foot-in-mouth" comic relief, and those Wolverine-esque bone spears.

 

[LarryLegend]

Wow, nothings better than a hot and heavy love triangle between a widow, widow/single mom, and a school teacher.
I get the feeling once this is all said and done, spider-man will be finished for me. Nothing matters anymore because it just destroyed or retconned. It's all so pointless.

stillanerd, sad thing is I can see Marvel doing this. It would be bad but they would do it and then complain it doesn't work.

 

[spideylover89]

Now you understand why I'm so cynical and sarcastic towards the current crop of comics. Although I still try to be a little optimistic that, one day, somebody will get Spider-Man back on track, and not just scrap the "Iron Spidey suit," the new age mystical spider-totems, his role as Iron Man's brown noser and the Avenger's "foot-in-mouth" comic relief, and those Wolverine-esque bone spears.

I feel ya, it's hard to optimistic about anything in the spidey-verse anymore.

 

[Abaddon]

Probally. But maybe thats who MJ will have the affair with.

BUt it'll have to be in flashback,since theyre so obsessed with chaning the past.

"By the way,honey.I ****ed Gwen too.Sorry about that."

Honestly, I think that's the plan anyway.

God help us.

 

[Dragon]

Actually, Gwen's clone is more likely to come back that Gwen herself...and it would still undermine "The Night Gwen Stacy Died" even more than it already has been. Besides, even if they do seperate Peter and MJ, wouldn't that provide a whole "will they or won't they get back together" as well? And remember, when MJ left the titles under Marv Wolfman's run, Marvel was pretty hard pressed to find a "girlfriend" for Peter, even going back to Betty Brant. If they tried it this time around, it's likely they could always go for a triangle between Betty (now a widow) and Liz (a widow and a single mother) who Flash (now a jerk once again) likes but is jealous that she fancies Peter in an attempt to recapture the original love triangle from the Stan Lee/Steve Ditko days.

Well, first we need to face the fact that ASM #121-122 are long past being trashed. They'll simply have to remain classic reads but have no bearing on present continuity. It's significance was destroyed when Osborn returned, and Peter did nothing to bring the man who murdered Gwen Stacy to justice.

And as for the Wolfman run, it was pretty clear that Betty was meant to be nothing more than a brief fling. If it was meant to be more, it would have been easy enough to end her marriage and re-unite her with Peter.

Going back to Gwen's resurrection- actually it's pretty simple at this point. And, sorry to say, but ugliness like Sins Past open the door even more to her return, by involving conspiracies, foreign countries and "hyper-aging children". A creative writer can pretty easily find a way to explain how Gwen didn't die.

And honestly, at this point, I'm more hoping they do bring her back. Frankly, all of this "Peter can't go on without MJ" stuff is wearing thin. If anything, Spidey really started to go dry after he married her. MJ has had her shot. 23 years is a good amount of time to give a character to become interesting. Gwen only got 8 and they whacked her. The only downside is that they'll likely drop the ball with Gwen as well. Hopefully Jeph Loeb will handle her return. PAD let me down, maybe Loeb will get it right.