The real reason I haven’t blogged in a week is because I have been too busy playing through the new Spiderman game. My last post was entirely dedicated to my first impressions of the game which again, I can’t stop raving about how great this game is. One huge reason I’m enjoying the game is being able to play as Peter Parker, but also as Miles Morales and Mary Jane Watson. Mary Jane is an interesting addition to the game though some may not agree.

*Mild Spoilers for the upcoming Spiderman game. Personally, these aren’t major spoilers, but if you want to be completely surprised, I would stop reading*

Peter Parker and MJ < screenshot from Insomniac Games

Mary Jane Watson is notably known as the hyper-sexualized, super hot girlfriend to Peter Parker. Peter Parker is gawking over her in Sam Raimi’s trilogy which to me was boring to watch. I never liked Mary Jane’s character because she seemed too one dimensional for me. If we are comparing comic book love interests for Peter Parker, I’m a Gwen Stacy fan myself.  Mary Jane in this game is smart, driven and independent while her overall look is polished, professional and put together compared to her comic book counterpart. All of these characteristics shown in the game is what Peter Parker needs in a potential girlfriend.

Six months before the game begins, Peter Parker and Mary Jane have broken up. We later find out it’s because of Peter Parker’s obsessiveness with protecting Mary Jane. On the one hand, I understand Peter’s point because Mary Jane doesn’t have superpowers or any fighting skills to protect herself. However, why should Mary Jane watch Spiderman fly around and risk his life while she’s stuck behind a desk not investigating a potential story. I think a major flaw in Mary Jane’s character is how naive she can be. Many of her playable missions are her sneaking into a base with armed guards and trying not to get caught. In my opinion, that’s a foolish decision.

In fact, SyFy Wire wrote an article about how annoying Mary Jane is in the new game which was interesting to read. I personally liked her role, but I can respect where the writer is coming from. Again, she’s naive and that’s a serious character flaw for her. I’m glad that’s included though because it’s depicting Mary Jane as not being a perfect person which adds dimension to her character. In this article, a potential suggestion to make the new Spiderman game better would be to cut Mary Jane out entirely and include Gwen Stacy instead. Maybe even make a Spider Gwen reference? That would have been amazing.

Overall, I personally really enjoyed Mary Jane’s addition to the game. I like this portrayal of her and even though her decisions maybe awful, I think it gives me more of an understanding of her character and why she does the things she does. I’m interested to hear what any of you think about this. If you have played the Spiderman game, do you find her incredibly obnoxious? Or are you a fan of her too?