Mary Jane Watson
Mary Jane Watson is a character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character was created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko, making her first appearance in The Amazing Spider-Man #25, and subsequently designed by John Romita Sr. in #42. Since then, she has gone on to become Spider-Man's main love interest and later his wife. Mary Jane Watson has also served as a supporting character to Iron Man and Venom.
Although she made a brief first appearance in The Amazing Spider-Man #25 with a plant obscuring her face, as part of a then-long-running recurring gag about Aunt May attempting to set Peter up with her friend's "nice girl" niece, Mary Jane's first official face reveal was a cameo appearance in The Amazing Spider-Man #42. Designed and drawn by John Romita Sr., her entrance is regarded as one of the most iconic introductions in comic history, owing to its build-up, her hyper-vibrant red hair and beauty, and her introductory line, "Face it, Tiger… you just hit the jackpot!". Since then, 'Tiger' has been her most recognizable nickname for Peter, spanning comics and media adaptations.
Throughout her initial appearances, Mary Jane was written as a foil to Peter's initially intended soulmate, Gwen Stacy, with her extroverted, fun-loving personality contrasting with Gwen being more like Peter in demeanor and intellect. Nonetheless, following Gwen's death in "The Night Gwen Stacy Died" story arc, the heartbroken Mary Jane became more caring and empathetic, and eventually one of the few people to consistently know Peter's secret identity. This would result in the two falling deeply in love and eventually getting married, before their marriage was undone in the storyline "One More Day" due to the timeline manipulations by Mephisto. Unbeknownst to them, they are further destined to have a daughter who will end Mephisto's eventual reign over the Earth, whom Mephisto seeks to erase from reality. In Spider-Man/Red Sonja, she becomes Red Sonja, in Armed and Dangerous, she becomes the third Jackpot, while in All-New Venom, she becomes the new host of Venom. In the alternate universes of the Marvel Multiverse, Mary Jane is depicted as the superheroines Spider-Woman in Exiles and Marvel Mangaverse, and Spinneret in Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows, as well as Carnage in Spider-Gwen.
Since her debut, Mary Jane Watson has been described as one of Marvel's most notable non-powered female characters. In film, Kirsten Dunst portrayed the character in Sam Raimi's Spider-Man trilogy, while Shailene Woodley had an uncredited silent cameo appearance as the character in the 2014 film The Amazing Spider-Man 2; Zoë Kravitz voiced Mary Jane in the 2018 animated film Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, with Nicole Delaney and Melissa Sturm voicing other versions of the character in its 2023 sequel Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.
Publication history
Mary Jane Watson is mentioned in The Amazing Spider-Man #15, and is initially used as a running joke of the series, as Peter Parker's Aunt May repeatedly attempts to set her unwilling nephew up on a date with her. Parker consistently worms his way out of meeting Mary Jane who, aside from a brief appearance in #25 with her face obscured, is never actually seen until The Amazing Spider-Man #42. Peter David wrote in 2010 that artist John Romita Sr. "made the definitive statement of his arrival by pulling Mary Jane out from behind the oversized potted plant and placing her on panel in what would instantly become an iconic moment". Romita has stated that in designing Mary Jane, he "used Ann-Margret from the movie Bye Bye Birdie as a guide, using her coloring, the shape of her face, her red hair and her form-fitting short skirts".According to co-creator Stan Lee, he and Romita had intended for Gwen Stacy to be Spider-Man's one true love, and introduced Mary Jane "just for fun", but that "somehow, Mary Jane seemed to have all the personality, and much as we tried to make Gwen more attractive, we couldn't! We, ourselves, felt that Mary Jane ended up being not only more beautiful but more fun and more interesting, and we finally decided to let Peter end up with her, but it was… as though the characters had taken over!".
Mary Jane Watson's unexpected popularity with readers after her debut changed the course of the plan for Gwen Stacy's character, who was intended to be the true love for Peter and was characterized as a sweet Daddy's girl in contrast to Mary Jane's '60s counterculture, vampy and liberated personality. Fans surprisingly liked Mary Jane more and demanded for her to replace Gwen's role as Peter Parker's main love interest as readers found Mary Jane more exciting and that "no matter how we wrote it, Mary Jane always seemed more interesting!". Mary Jane's flamboyance and 'life of the party' personality were written as a contrast to Gwen, being more on Peter's intellectual and emotional wavelength. However, following Gwen's death in "The Night Gwen Stacy Died" story arc, the character was reworked to be more emotionally grounded and open-hearted.
The names "Mary Jane" and "MJ" are also common slang terms for marijuana. When asked about this, Stan Lee claimed it was purely coincidental, that he knew nothing about drugs and had never tried marijuana.
Gerry Conway succeeded Stan Lee as writer of The Amazing Spider-Man in 1972. Conway pushed Mary Jane to the forefront of the cast, and made her a serious love interest for Peter Parker. Like Lee, Conway found Mary Jane to be more compelling than Gwen: " hadn't lost the edge that made her an interesting character. Gwen didn't have an edge. She was just a nice person. I don't think she had a mean bone in her body, and wasn't likely to do something that was likely to screw things up for Peter, out of some misguided sense of self-aggrandizement, which Mary Jane was quite capable of doing—which makes her a much more interesting character".
In 1979, the character was revealed as the modern-day descendant/reincarnation of Red Sonja in Marvel Team-Up #79, able to become the warrior whenever holding her former self's sword. In 1987, the character was married to Spider-Man in The Amazing Spider-Man Annual #21. As a consequence, writer J. M. DeMatteis made Mary Jane and her marriage to Spider-Man one of the central themes of the critically acclaimed "Kraven's Last Hunt", published the same year as the wedding. DeMatteis commented that "'Kraven's Last Hunt' has a lot of darkness in it, but the story primarily is about Peter and his journey into the light and the power of simple human love. The reason Peter makes it out is because he has Mary Jane in his life, and that is his salvation". Mary Jane then returned as Red Sonja in the limited series Spider-Man/Red Sonja by Michael Avon Oeming and Mel Rubi.
Marvel editor-in-chief Joe Quesada said that he feels the marriage ages the characters, making them less appealing to young readers, and lessens the dramatic, "soap opera" possibilities, but also stated that "divorcing or widowing, or annulling the marriage… would only be worse". He has also pointed out that the marriage itself was editorially mandated; Stan Lee decided to marry the characters in his daily newspaper strip and, even though the two were not even dating at the time in the comic book series, it was decided to marry them in the regular Marvel Universe as well. In 2007, Quesada presided over the controversial "One More Day" storyline, which he also drew, in which Peter and Mary Jane's marriage is erased from history and everyone's memories by the devil Mephisto. Quesada states he is an avid fan of the Peter and MJ relationship, and in several interviews has claimed that the alternate MC2 universe, in which Peter and Mary Jane are happily married, is a "natural progression" of the characters.
The erasing of Peter and Mary Jane's marriage was initially adopted in the newspaper strip as well, but due to negative reader reaction Lee later revealed it to be a bad dream. Mary Jane remains Spider-Man's wife in the newspaper strip continuity.
Although the marriage stayed erased, Mary Jane and Peter Parker became a couple again during Nick Spencer's run in Amazing Spider-Man. She got a spin-off comic later, The Amazing Mary Jane, by Leah Williams, Carlos Gomez and Carlos López.
Mary Jane next starred with Black Cat in the limited series Mary Jane & Black Cat by Jed MacKay and Vincenzo Carratu and Jackpot & Black Cat by Celeste Bronfman and Emilio Laiso, and the ongoing series All-New Venom by Al Ewing and Carlos Gómez.
Fictional character biography
Early history
Of Scottish descent Mary Jane is depicted as an extremely beautiful, green-eyed redhead and was the primary romantic interest of Peter Parker for the majority of the forty years between her first full appearance in 1966 and the One More Day story in 2007. Initially, she competed with others for Peter's affection, most prominently with Gwen Stacy and the Black Cat. Mary Jane's relatively unknown early life was eventually explored in The Amazing Spider-Man #259.Early issues of The Amazing Spider-Man featured a running joke about Peter dodging his Aunt May's attempts to set him up with "that nice Watson girl next-door", whom Peter had not yet met and assumed would not be his type, since his aunt liked her. Mary Jane made her first actual appearance in The Amazing Spider-Man #25, although her face was obscured. However, she was seen by both Liz Allan and Betty Brant, who are both shocked by how attractive she is. It is not until The Amazing Spider-Man #42 that her face is actually seen. In that issue, on the last page, Peter finally meets her, and he is stunned by her beauty even as she speaks the now-famous line: "Face it, Tiger… you just hit the jackpot!"
Peter begins to date her, much to the annoyance of Gwen Stacy. However, they eventually become irritated with each other and Peter subsequently chooses to date Gwen. Mary Jane, who becomes Harry Osborn's former love interest and former girlfriend for about a year, remains a close friend to Peter and Gwen. Despite her enjoyment of life, her friendships, and dating, Mary Jane refuses to be tied down for too long. When her relationship with Harry Osborn comes to an end, it has significant impact on Harry, driving him to a drug overdose. This in turn creates a boomerang effect, driving his father Norman Osborn to the brink of insanity, temporarily restoring his memories as the Green Goblin.
After the Green Goblin murders Gwen in The Amazing Spider-Man #121, Mary Jane attempts to comfort Peter. Peter, who is distraught over the loss of Gwen Stacy, angrily confronts MJ about her seemingly flighty and carefree attitude. He questions her ability to ever care about people like him and Gwen, and states "You wouldn't be sorry if your own mother died," unaware that her mother had actually died. Mary Jane is hurt by Peter's comments. She attempts to leave, but hesitates as she approaches the door, and ultimately chooses to stay with him. This served as a turning point in their relationship, and over the next couple of years, she and Peter become very close friends. Eventually, upon realizing the feelings that they share for one another, they decide to take their relationship to the next level. Their relationship has a few initial hurdles, such as MJ's hot temper and Peter's always dashing off to be Spider-Man. Following the events of the original clone saga, Peter realizes that Mary Jane is the girl he has always loved, and the two begin dating again.
Despite loving Peter, MJ does not wish to be tied down. Yet, she allows the relationship to progress and is left with a difficult decision when Peter proposes to her. After taking a short time to consider, she turns him down. Following a series of traumatic experiences involving Peter's absences and his costumed alter ego endangering his Aunt May, a spiritually exhausted MJ leaves New York for several months. Peter meanwhile dates other women, most notably Felicia Hardy.
MJ returns, her behavior showing a marked change with her abandonment of her false front. Following an attack on Peter by Puma, she breaks down and admits her knowledge of Peter's secret identity in The Amazing Spider-Man #257. After learning of her own family history in The Amazing Spider-Man #259, Peter finds a new respect for her and begins to truly understand her. MJ makes it clear to Peter that knowing his identity changes nothing about her feelings, and that she only loves him as a friend, her best friend.
Despite the one-shot graphic novel Amazing Spider-Man: Parallel Lives and Untold Tales of Spider-Man #16 revealing that Mary Jane discovered Peter's secret when she noticed Spider-Man climbing out of Peter's bedroom window after his uncle's murder, many comics published before this revelation claimed that she had simply "figured it out", with the details of how and when left ambiguous to the reader.
After yet another period of reconsidering his priorities in life, Peter contemplates letting go of the Spider-Man mantle, with Mary Jane backing the decision, but his relationship with Felicia Hardy soon resumes. Feeling lost and guilty, Peter visits Mary Jane and apologizes with an awkward kiss before heading to Berlin with Ned Leeds.
Following Ned Leeds' murder at the hands of the Foreigner, a changed and bitter Peter returns to New York, where his lack of direction in life is not helped when Ned is framed as the Hobgoblin, and Felicia elects to leave Peter behind as she is tied to the Foreigner. Mary Jane returns to Peter, presumably to patch things up, but Peter surprises her with a second proposal of marriage, which MJ again turns down. She returns to her family to settle old debts with her father, with Peter following her. After aiding her sister in having her crooked father arrested, and aiding Peter against a Spider-Slayer, Mary Jane has an epiphany on marriage, and agrees to become Peter's wife.