I'm going to start out by saying what we're all thinking: This book is probably doomed, right? I mean, it's a Marvel comic in comic-book format aimed at teenage girls with a manga style. It seems impossible that it will find its place in the current market, and even more impossible that Marvel will give the book the time it needs to find an audience. Plenty of folks have made up their mind already about it, based on any number of personal prejudices they hold. And all of that is a damn shame, and I'm hoping that the wide expectations are wrong, because while Mary Jane #1 is not a home run, it's a solid triple at least. McKeever plays fast and loose with continuity, giving us a "movie style" Mary Jane who is a little vapid and yet likable, a believable popular girl with a bit of a weird aspect to her life in that her big crush is on a superhero, and Miyazawa and Lee's artwork, in addition to being just the kind of thing that's going to catch an otaku girl's eye, is just plain pretty to look at. Mary Jane has a tough road ahead of it, but this first issue makes me hope that readers, retailers and especially the publisher will give this one a chance to catch on.
One of my worries about this book was that it is essentially putting a supporting cast member front and center. Brian Bendis has recreated Mary Jane in the Ultimate universe as a little more brainy, and clued her into the secret identity, and she seems more able to support this kind of solo series. McKeever is working with the Mary Jane of the Marvel Universe, although he has tweaked her a bit to make her more modern. Her completely airhead party girl personality is gone, replaced with a slightly superficial popular teenager, and though we can't be sure yet, it looks like he may be tweaking her home life as well, ditching the somewhat cliched abusive father for a two parent household, at least as things start off. It's not a character that fits into anyone's continuity, but really, continuity should be the last worry for this kind of book. The worry is, is the character interesting enough to support a number of stories, and based on this issue I'd say, yep, she is.
My other worry, related to that one, was that McKeever was going to write a bunch of stories where Mary Jane essentially came off as kind of stupid or hapless because she didn't realize the truth about Spider-Man or she did nothing but sit and wait to be rescued. There is indeed a hostage situation where Mary Jane winds up calling for help, which is a little less strong than you like for your protagonist, but McKeever certainly doesn't play the character as brainless. Indeed, right after she is rescued, she comes back at Spidey with a question that is perceptive and gives way to the funniest exchange in the book, showing that while MJ is thinking of Spidey as her dream guy, he really does act like the high schooler we all know him to be.
That's one of the neat things about Mary Jane. We're all in on the secret. We know that she grows up and marries Peter Parker, the boy she hardly notices now. We know what happens with Liz and Flash and Harry and the rest. There's some fun here when Mary Jane is obsessing over Spider-Man while ignoring Peter, or in seeing Peter, his courage bolstered by rescuing MJ the night before in his alter-ego, comes to her table to say hello. It's a lovely subtext to the book, and it makes it a fun read for anyone who knows Spider-Man even a little bit. Although in all honesty, the target audience is girls who know Spidey only from the movie or general pop-cultural absorption, and the book is just as enjoyable if all you know about the characters is that Spider-Man is Peter Parker.
McKeever is joined on this unusual endeavor by Takeshi Miyazawa, probably best known for his work on Runaways and Oni Press's Sidekicks. Which is to say, he's still sort of an unknown talent for much of the mainstream, and this isn't likely to catapult him to superstardom yet either. However, I would think that anyone who encounters Miyzawa's artwork, wherever they find it, will become a fan, and indeed his work on Mary Jane is his best work yet, ably inked by Norman Lee and with some nice, bright modern style colors from coloring classicist Christina Strain. Miyazawa's work has a fun, light quality to it that is as hard to pin down as it is undeniably there, and I love the way he draws teenagers that look actually young, rather than like miniaturized adults. His style most obviously evokes comparisons to manga, but there's also a touch of Terry (Strangers in Paradise) Moore to be found in there.
I know that the easy reaction to Mary Jane from every camp, from manga enthusiasts to arthouse snobs to superhero fans, is going to be to either mock it or dismiss it. "Fakey manga." "Marvel trying to get the teenaged girl market, why do they even bother?" "Spider-Man's girlfriend gets a comic?" Get Over It. At least give the first issue a read. It's fun, exceptionally well-crafted and promising, and I hope that Marvel gives the book time to find an audience, and that the audience will prove more receptive than usual to a new idea.
