This tendancy almost reared its ugly head again this week after a new Spider-Man 2 trailer debuted at Comic-Con, as fans were convinced that Insomniac had done something drastic to change Mary Jane's face from the original game. No, they didn't. It's the same face, same model, same actress. Everyone calm down!
However, this is not the case. Stephanie Tyler Jones is the Face Model for Laura Bailey's Mary Jane. She returns for Marvel's Spider-Man 2 but with the enhanced power of the PlayStation 5 and a new hairstyle, she's going to look different.
It's unclear if she's been harassed for her MJ portrayal specifically, but certainly has been in the past for any other number of roles. The Stephanie Tyler harassment is even more disturbing as it involves tracking her down in real life and attempting to make contact with her.
Insomniac Games switched from John Bubniak to Ben Jordan as the face model. In the PlayStation Blog post, they said it was “to get a better match to Peter Parker/Spider-Man actor Yuri Lowenthal's facial capture.” Fans were not happy with this decision, including myself. I wasn't pissed but thrown off by the change.
Insomniac Games denies changing Mary Jane's face in Marvel's Spider-Man 2, clarifying that she has the same face model and voice actress as in the previous games. Laura Bailey will be reprising her role as the voice of Mary Jane in the upcoming game, expanding the list of casting choices revealed so far.
According to the commentary found in Spider-Man 2's DVD, the man is intended to be The Punisher, though Thomas Jane was unavailable, so Castle is played by Jane's stunt double instead.
Jackson was diagnosed with the skin disorder vitiligo, which results in white patches on the skin and sensitivity to sunlight. To treat the condition, he used fair-colored makeup and likely skin-bleaching prescription creams to cover up the uneven blotches of color caused by the illness.
Peter, who decides that for her protection they can't be together, gently rejects her and insists they can only be friends. As he leaves, a saddened Mary Jane realizes that her kiss with Peter reminds her of the one she shared with Spider-Man and suspects that he is the superhero.
After Harry is overwhelmed by the symbiote treating his life-threatening condition and transforms into the ravenous villain Venom, he infects MJ with a portion of the symbiote to turn her into Scream.
Her haircut is different in the sequel, and it's entirely possible that improved face scanning tech has made her model more accurate, but it's the same face.
Insomniac's community director James Stevenson confirmed that they used the same face model and actress in the sequel and the only real change is to her hair.
To the writers, the true villain of this story is not Kraven or Venom; it's whiteness. The reason this game gets such a high wokeness score is because it is fundamentally a story about decolonizing Spider-Man, and nearly every part of the narrative supports this though it isn't necessarily obvious while you're playing.
So, why did the devs recast the face model? Well, apparently, the older face was more difficult to use alongside Lowenthal's motion capture performance compared to the new one - especially as they moved into more powerful tech (the PS5).
According to co-creator Stan Lee, he and Romita had intended for Gwen Stacy to be Spider-Man's one true love, and introduced Mary Jane "just for fun", but that "somehow, Mary Jane seemed to have all the personality, and much as we tried to make Gwen more attractive, we couldn't!
A kiss between Peter Parker and Mary Jane in Amazing Spider-Man #143 transformed their relationship, reframing their entire history up to that point. The historic moment signifies that Peter and Mary Jane are now officially a couple, ahead of the complications caused by the return of Gwen Stacy.
Mary Jane, feeling alone and bewildered, calls Harry who recently lost his memory and hatred of Spider-Man after being defeated in an aerial battle as the New Goblin. They renew their bond and in a moment of joy, Mary Jane kisses Harry.
Even though Harris' Aunt May didn't have a big finding-out-scene as Tomai did in Spider-Man: Homecoming, Spider-Man 2 strongly hinted that she knew. One of the pivotal scenes in the 2004 installment was after Peter had told Aunt May what happened the night Uncle Ben died and he could have stopped it from happening.
