Mary Jane Watson and Peter Parker are both working-class characters in Spider-Man – and this is, as far as I know, always true across adaptations as well – but there is definitely a very gendered way in which the Spider-Man fandom expresses classism against them for that, which is especially evident when looking at how fans talk about them regarding their relationships with characters who are richer than they are.
I’ve seen many fans – both the usual douchebro fanboy types and a lot of women – call Mary Jane a ‘gold-digger’ for dating Harry Osborn, ESPECIALLY in the first ‘Spider-Man’ film directed by Sam Raimi. Many of these same fans will then cheer on Norman Osborn for basically calling her a slut who just wants Harry for his money, even though he’s the villain and it’s blatantly not true, re: why she’s dating him. And now with TASM2 coming out, people are bashing her for being a trashy working-class girl who’s going to ‘steal’ Peter from classy, fashionable Gwen.
Peter, on the other hand – I’ve NEVER seen anyone call him a ‘gold-digger’ for dating rich uptown girl Gwen Stacy. In both the 616-comics and TASM, Gwen is explicitly affluent – she lives in an expensive apartment in a rich part of town (courtesy of her big-shot lawyer mother, according to the TASM DVD commentary), her father in the comics belongs to the same rich man’s social club that JJJ and Norman go to, etc. Peter, on the other hand, is obviously working-class and is constantly in financial trouble.
Yet no one in fandom accuses him of being a gold-digger who’s only dating Gwen because he wants her money. If anything, he gets praised for dating well and having good taste in women. And likewise, no one calls him a gold-digger for being married to Mary Jane when she’s a successful model and actress in the comics, when she is presumably making more money than he does.
So basically, the classism in the Spider-Man fandom definitely comes out in gendered ways, and fans are constantly shitty about Mary Jane in really gross discriminatory ways based on her gender and working-class background.
mary jane watson
Spider-Man fanfic (Raimiverse): Masquerade
Title: Masquerade
Author: sarah531
Rating: R
Characters: Harry Osborn, Peter Parker, Mary Jane Watson
Warnings: Some non-con kissing, homophobia from various characters- and some quite dark stuff going on really, although most of it is just implied
Summary: It’s prom night. Someone spikes the punch.
Spider-Man 2.1 – MJ and Louise shoe shopping deleted scene
Here we learn how really emotionally abusive MJ’s home life was, and her motivations for marrying John. It’s a quiet little scene, so I can see why they cut it, but oh, poor MJ.
I don’t have this edition of the DVD, so I’d never seen this before — thanks for sharing it!
Yeah, as a whole, the scene doesn’t tell us anything we’re not already shown in other parts of the movie, so the decision not to include it was probably a good one. On the other hand, it would’ve been nice to see more of MJ’s social life, and it would have been really, really nice if only Raimi could’ve kept this exchange:
LOUISE: What about that perfect kiss you said you had once, that guy you believed in?
MARY JANE: That was a fantasy. That’s all he is.which makes it explicit that MJ knows her crush on Spider-Man was just that, a crush, and she’s moved on. Though she’s speaking from disillusionment, she’s not wrong, either: the Spider-Man she knows at this point is just a fantasy, and so for that matter is Peter, her endlessly flaky BFF. It’s a self-aware reflection of what’s going on at Peter’s end, too. Though he clearly cares about MJ as a person — that’s why they’re close friends in the first place — he persists in keeping her on a pedestal and at emotional arms’ length. They can’t work as a couple until he lets her see who he really is and make her own decision.
Now that I’ve put that down in words I’ve just realized Peter and MJ’s split in Spider-Man 3 makes a lot more sense than I’ve thought in the past, as it comes down to Peter having problems letting MJ off her pedestal and MJ having problems figuring out where the fantastic elements of Peter’s life fits into her reality. (There’s still waaaay too much plot-mandated lack of common sense going on in that movie, though.)
I feel sort of bad for continually reblogging people’s MJ posts with this much tl;dr lately…
Oh god, don’t feel bad, this is brilliant!
fuckyeahraimispiderman:
LEGO Spider-Man minifigures. (From Brickipedia.) Ain’t they cute?
I think the little Goblin is my favourite.
“Rating women on their attractiveness is wrong, but the internet is all about having fun so I’m going to do it anyway. Shailene Woodley is a 6, she’s not as pretty as Emma Stone, and Kristen Stewart doesn’t smile even though she’s rich, what’s with that.
Shailene Woodley, who hasn’t even appeared in costume yet, clearly isn’t suitable for this role no-one has seen her play.”
You know, the thing about the “Gwen fell in love with Peter while Mary Jane fell in love with Spider-Man” quote…It doesn’t make any sense! Because Peter is Spider-Man, they’re the same person!
So what I like to think it really means is, “Gwen loved everything about Peter but what she loved the most was his kind nature and intelligence. Mary Jane loved everything about Peter but what she loved the most was his selfless nature and bravery.”
In other words, they both loved him the exact same amount, for slightly different reasons that had nothing to do with how powerful/famous Peter was and everything to do with what sort of people Gwen and MJ were.