mary jane – Comicsgirl https://www.comicsgirl.com Wed, 12 Jan 2011 00:29:37 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.5.3 https://www.comicsgirl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/cropped-EdenMiller2017-1-32x32.jpg mary jane – Comicsgirl https://www.comicsgirl.com 32 32 59683043 Do we care about Mary Jane? https://www.comicsgirl.com/2011/01/11/do-we-care-about-mary-jane/ https://www.comicsgirl.com/2011/01/11/do-we-care-about-mary-jane/#comments Wed, 12 Jan 2011 00:29:37 +0000 http://www.comicsgirl.com/?p=2345 Should we? These are honest questions.

I was never really a Spider-Man fan so I don’t know that much about Mary Jane. She has, however, always struck me as your basic pretty girl character — she only has a personality when it suits the comic. And as you know, she’s been ditched in favor of Gwen Stacy as the love interest in the upcoming reboot of the Spider-Man film franchise.

But that brings me to Mary Jane: Homecoming and Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane: Sophomore Jinx. These, if Wikipedia is to be believed, are more or less part of the same series although they don’t feel all that connected to me, honestly (granted, though, these two parts aren’t directly continuous, so I have missed some things in between the two).


Mary Jane: Homecoming

Buy on Amazon.com

In Mary Jane: Homecoming, Mary Jane is dealing with her relationship with Harry Osbourn as well as Flash’s crush on her and troubles with her friend Liz. It’s all pretty typical high school stuff — Harry is aimlessly angry and he and Mary Jane just seem to be together because they are. Liz and MJ have a conflicted friendship — they like each other, sure, mostly because they’ve been friends forever, but they’re competitive with each other, too. Oh, and Spider-Man shows up and fights some bad guys a couple of times, but that’s pretty inconsequential (except MJ does feel a growing connection to him — and to Peter Parker).

In writer Sean McKeever‘s hands, the story’s twists have the right amount of drama without ever becoming over-the-top. These kids are just trying to figure themselves out as well as each other. The shifting alliances and confusing relationships feel natural. He has a wonderful grasp of how teenagers behave without being condescending. Takeshi Miyazawa‘s art is cute and soft and is just manga-like enough to make it distinctive from a superhero title. I love the eye for detail he has, from MJ and Liz’s updos for the homecoming dance to the emotional glances characters give each other.


Spider-Man Loves
Mary Jane:
Sophomore Jinx

Buy on Amazon.com

Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane: Sophomore Jinx feels a bit different. It has another creative team of Terry Moore and Craig Rousseau and everything feels a bit bigger — more drama, more action, more conflict. Here, MJ is just starting her sophomore year of high school (hence the title) and struggles to find her place after someone starts some cruel rumors about her.

I don’t think anyone would accuse Moore of not being able to write women well. Even when Strangers in Paradise began getting more and more convoluted, it was always clear his female characters were fully realized. He does less well with teenage girls, though. This isn’t particularly bad, but he doesn’t seem to quite grasp the intricacies of teenage relationships (and maybe I’m wrong, but I’m almost sure no teenager was appending “not” to the end of a sentence to make it a negative in 2008). Rousseau’s art is stylized and has an exaggerated, animated feel to it, but also comes across as a bit more generic. I don’t think he gets to shine here.

Neither of these books are bad. I liked Homecoming more than Sophomore Jinx, but I liked both. But I was left with one major question: Who was this title for?

Now, I ended up with them because I am interested in this sort of thing (you know, comics aimed at girls). Homecoming was a dollar at a comic con and a friend gave me Sophomore Jinx because he ended up with it and figured it had a better home with me.

But other than me, who was this intended for? I can’t really picture the audience for this title.

Mary Jane is presented as likeable, sweet and smart, but she’s also one of the popular kids. She has some problems at home, sure, but a lot of that just feels thrown in to keep her from seeming too perfect.

I can only use myself as an example, but as a teen — even as a preteen — I wouldn’t have been interested in Mary Jane. I was a misfit and I didn’t hang out with cheerleaders or football players. I wasn’t interested in reading about them. And I’d guess that a lot of teen girls that are into comics wouldn’t really either.

(I did see some girls excited by Archie comics, so maybe I’m wrong.)

While I was critical of a lot the Minx titles for feeling too young for their intended audience, they were mostly about girls I would’ve wanted to read about at that age. I could see a 12-year-old enjoying Homecoming that her loving father (or even older brother) bought for her, but I do think Sophomore Jinx, while still pretty innocent, is probably too old for her. I don’t think any older teen girls who like comics would’ve sought this out on their own. It’s possible I’m wrong there, though.

I think Marvel has done some interesting things aimed at women (even before last year’s push, and even when they’ve put stupid covers on them) but I’m not sure why they felt like Mary Jane needed to be its go-to teen girl character, other than the company thought she was (or would be) “popular” following the Spider-Man movies.

Which I guess means we can look forward to some comics starring Gwen Stacy.

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Baltimore Comic-Con is how you do a comic con https://www.comicsgirl.com/2010/08/29/baltimore-comic-con-is-how-you-do-a-comic-con/ https://www.comicsgirl.com/2010/08/29/baltimore-comic-con-is-how-you-do-a-comic-con/#comments Sun, 29 Aug 2010 21:30:59 +0000 http://www.comicsgirl.com/?p=1879 After a false start yesterday (I didn’t wake up in time, OK? And I was meeting a friend at 5 so it would’ve been too tight), I did make it to Baltimore today for Baltimore Comic-Con. (I didn’t get lost or anything! I drove around the block a few times trying to pick a parking garage, but that was it! I am always much too impressed with myself when I don’t get lost.)

My press badge was easily and quickly acquired (I do have to compliment the staff and volunteers — all very nice and helpful) and I went to say hi to my friend Timothy Lantz (who said the show had been good to him) and I picked up his beautiful postcard set (you should too!) and saw a sneak preview of his secret project.

No sooner had I turned from Tim’s table, I immediately ran into my friends Joe and Rusty of Full Sanction so I spent the rest of the time hanging out with them.

We talked to a few people, dug through some $1 comic boxes and $5 graphic novel boxes. From the former, I picked up the second Mary Jane volume (I don’t have the first one, but it was a $1! A dollar! Here is where I point out that after parking, buying Tim’s postcard set, I had exactly $9 left to spend) and from the latter, I bought The Essential Dazzler. As Joe said, “That’s a lot of Dazzler.” But I like Dazzler — she’s utterly ridiculous and was a character made a couple years too late by committee, but I think that’s what makes her fun. And hey, $5.

That pretty much took the majority of my money, so we wandered and looked at overpriced action figures and lamented the lack of light-up swords. All three of us purchased a copy of Adam Dembicki’s (as in, son of Matt) Ant Army! I am already very much for adorable children making comics, but Adam told us he was going to use his money to buy more Legos. That’s a completely worthy cause.

The overall vibe of the show was fun and relaxed. All the exhibitors seemed very happy to be there and happy to welcome fans, old and new. The artist alley/small press section drew a lot of interest and I did see plenty of original stuff and much less of the “I will draw Joker for you” sort. Even the sellers of the comics/action figures/etc. seemed to be enjoying themselves and doing well. I’ve always been much less interested in that side of cons before, but this time, it just felt right to me.

People have been making comparisons between the Baltimore and San Diego cons (notably in this Washington Post article). I had fun at San Diego and I look forward to the New York con in October, and while it’s neither good nor bad, I just know they’re different sorts of cons — comics is just the jumping off point and not the focus.

Baltimore is a true comic con. It’s about comics. There’s no big media companies vying for your attention, no loud obnoxious movie clips playing, nothing that falls too far outside “comics” (T-shirts and action figures, sure, but not much beyond that). And that’s great. It makes it a show to go to and hang out and have fun. It doesn’t feel like I am being sold to as much. It’s a place to go and hang out with like-minded people. People go to Baltimore because they like comics. It feels like it’s put on by people who like comics. And that’s a really cool thing.

If I had more money, I would’ve stayed longer (and I was somewhat saving some purchases for Small Press Expo in a couple of weeks) but I had plenty of fun while I was there.

If you haven’t been to Baltimore Comic-Con, you need to go.

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