Andrew Garfield Wants Mary Jane to Be Male
http://au.ign.com/articles/2013/07/10/spider-mans-andrew-garfield-wants-mary-jane-to-be-male
There's been a lot of buzz going around lately about the role of Mary Jane Watson in the Amazing Spider-Man sequels. But Andrew Garfield recently pitched his own unique idea for the character: What if MJ was a guy?
While speaking with EW.com, the actor said he recently had a conversation with producer Matt Tolmach about Mary Jane and what he'd like to see. "I was kind of joking, but kind of not joking about MJ," Garfield said. "And I was like, 'What if MJ is a dude?' Why can't we discover that Peter is exploring his sexuality? It's hardly even groundbreaking! So why can't he be gay? Why can't he be into boys?"
I know that every new version of a property presents the opportunity for modification and improvement and playing to the strengths to a change in medium, but I have to admit admit to being the sort who on the whole likes reasonably faithful adaptions -- oh Star Trek, how I look accusingly at you, because way to miss the point on everything.
Of course, faithful doesn't mean exacting. The Ultimates verse is a really good - and relevant - example, where they've taken the core concepts and redone them in a way that strips off a lot of baggage while remaining faithful to what they were about. Changing a straight white dude from the original version into anything else is pretty much an expected part of that process.
But to lose a major female character to gain a gay male character, even if there is racebending involved. That’s arithmetic I can see people getting awfully conflicted over, and I'm honestly a little surprised not to see that being mentioned so far.
So what if we use a different calculus. What if MJ were trans? I’m thinking specifically MTF, because that way you get to keep a major female character female (doesn’t matter even if you cast cis male, if MJ is living and presenting as female, the character’s female) AND allow Peter to explore a non-cis so arguably still queer relationship.
Suddenly, the Peter/MJ dynamic isn’t just all about Peter’s secret. MJ would have one of her own, one that's about her, one that fits the franchise’s theme of transformations and what going through them does to you, one that Peter has to be responsible for instead of just the love interest always having the responsibility for his.
You could even take that further for the sake of melodrama and have the Amazing Spiderman franchise then raid the Ultimate!Spiderman clone saga to give us the fem!Peter version of Jessica Drew. How does MJ deal with Jessica being involuntarily given whe she’s always wanted/needed fherself even as she helps Jessica deal with a sudden and dramatic sense of disphoria. What does MJ do if she thinks - or some cunning opponent persuades her - cinematic superscience could give it to her too?
There's been a lot of buzz going around lately about the role of Mary Jane Watson in the Amazing Spider-Man sequels. But Andrew Garfield recently pitched his own unique idea for the character: What if MJ was a guy?
While speaking with EW.com, the actor said he recently had a conversation with producer Matt Tolmach about Mary Jane and what he'd like to see. "I was kind of joking, but kind of not joking about MJ," Garfield said. "And I was like, 'What if MJ is a dude?' Why can't we discover that Peter is exploring his sexuality? It's hardly even groundbreaking! So why can't he be gay? Why can't he be into boys?"
I know that every new version of a property presents the opportunity for modification and improvement and playing to the strengths to a change in medium, but I have to admit admit to being the sort who on the whole likes reasonably faithful adaptions -- oh Star Trek, how I look accusingly at you, because way to miss the point on everything.
Of course, faithful doesn't mean exacting. The Ultimates verse is a really good - and relevant - example, where they've taken the core concepts and redone them in a way that strips off a lot of baggage while remaining faithful to what they were about. Changing a straight white dude from the original version into anything else is pretty much an expected part of that process.
But to lose a major female character to gain a gay male character, even if there is racebending involved. That’s arithmetic I can see people getting awfully conflicted over, and I'm honestly a little surprised not to see that being mentioned so far.
So what if we use a different calculus. What if MJ were trans? I’m thinking specifically MTF, because that way you get to keep a major female character female (doesn’t matter even if you cast cis male, if MJ is living and presenting as female, the character’s female) AND allow Peter to explore a non-cis so arguably still queer relationship.
Suddenly, the Peter/MJ dynamic isn’t just all about Peter’s secret. MJ would have one of her own, one that's about her, one that fits the franchise’s theme of transformations and what going through them does to you, one that Peter has to be responsible for instead of just the love interest always having the responsibility for his.
You could even take that further for the sake of melodrama and have the Amazing Spiderman franchise then raid the Ultimate!Spiderman clone saga to give us the fem!Peter version of Jessica Drew. How does MJ deal with Jessica being involuntarily given whe she’s always wanted/needed fherself even as she helps Jessica deal with a sudden and dramatic sense of disphoria. What does MJ do if she thinks - or some cunning opponent persuades her - cinematic superscience could give it to her too?