Overly Devoted Archivist Uncategorized gwen stacy, I do like the Death Of Gwen Stacy storyline #but only because it had ramifications for everyone - MJ included - not just Peter #But at the same time I know it was sexist writing in that 'Stuck for a s, spiderman 0 Comments

draxisaprincess:

“Casting for a way to shake up The Amazing Spider-Man, [Roy] Thomas and [Gerry] Conway had discussed the idea of killing off a member of the supporting cast. Aunt May— elderly, generically kindly, and seemingly always at death’s door anyway— was the logical nominee. But when John Romita got wind of the plans, he suggested a different victim: Peter Parker’s girlfriend, the lovely Gwen Stacy. Conway thought it was a stroke of genius.

‘She was a nonentity, a pretty face,’ he said. ‘She brought nothing to the mix. It made no sense that Peter Parker would end up with a babe like that who had no problems. Only a damaged person would end up with a damaged guy like Peter Parker. And Gwen Stacy was perfect! …The amazing thing was that [Stan] created a character like Mary Jane Watson, who was probably the most interesting female character in comics, and he never used her to the extent that he could have. Instead of Peter Parker’s girlfriend, he made her Peter Parker’s best friend’s girlfriend. Which is so wrong, and so stupid, and such a waste. So killing Gwen was a totally logical if not inevitable choice.’

Conway, Romita, and Gil Kane worked out a story in which Green Goblin kidnapped Gwen Stacy and threw her off the top of the George Washington Bridge; in a perverse twist, someone added a “snap!” to the panel in which Spider-Man’s web catches Gwen, implying that it was not the fall but the whiplash from the catch that caused her neck to snap, that Spider-Man implicated the death” [pages 136-137]

“Conway was stuck with orders from Lee to bring back Gwen Stacy, somehow, if only for one issue.” [page 165]

—“Marvel Comics the Untold Story” by Sean Howe

1) This is why I don’t trust people who say so-and-so female character has ‘no personality’ or whatnot, especially as you never hear that about male characters.

2) Gwen absolutely wasn’t perfect. She had a bad temper, she could be naive, was often jealous (and occasionally attempted to make Peter jealous) and she would slap people!

3) No problems? She thought Spider-Man killed her father, and hated him while loving Peter, unaware they were the same person.

4) And they thought of killing her before they thought of exploring that?!