The Wedding! (Spider-Man)
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| Author | David Michelinie |
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| Cover artist | John Romita Sr. |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Comic, Romance |
| Publisher | Marvel Comics |
| Publication date | 1987 |
| Media type | Print (Comic) |
The Wedding! is the title of Amazing Spider-Man Annual (Vol. 1) #21 in which Mary Jane Watson and Peter Parker (a.k.a Spider-Man) get married. It was published in 1987 and written by David Michelinie, featuring cover art by John Romita Sr.
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[edit] Plot
Spider-Man is web slinging through town and runs into Electro. He defeats him and then returns home, to find Mary Jane in the process of moving in. MJ leaves for a photo shoot, leaving Peter to ponder how on earth he'll be able to provide for him and MJ.
Peter takes his photos of Spider-Man defeating Electro to the Daily Bugle and is surprised by the staff with a party in honor of his upcoming wedding to Mary Jane. J. Jonah Jameson arrives, clearly irritated, and starts to complain about why they are hosting a party when they're supposed to be working. As soon as Peter leaves, he states that he wants to cut the pay of everyone who didn't attend.
Peter is barely able to sleep that night, contemplating his impending wedding. The next day he meets Mary Jane. He leaps to the ceiling and goes down to one knee, asking her to marry him once again. "I hate cleaning footprints off the ceiling," she responds with a smile. They both eat, but can't help shake their worries about the wedding. Mary Jane leaves for a meeting, where her old boyfriend presents her with two tickets to Paris, that she can only take if she skips the wedding. Peter goes to Aunt May's house, and goes through a scrap book, remembering his most prominent times with Mary Jane. MJ and her aunt arrive, and they announce the upcoming marriage to their family. She leaves in a Ferrari with her ex boyfriend, and Peter takes the subway home. Both are starting to have second thoughts about their marriage. When they meet up again that night, Spidey takes MJ out web-slinging to clear their heads.
The next day, Peter's best man, Flash Thompson, and his best friend, Harry Osborn, take Peter out for a bachelor party, but he's beginning to show his true feelings about the wedding. They try to convince him that love conquers all. Meanwhile, Mary Jane is having a grand party across town. Peter finally decides to go home for the night, and has nightmares about all of his enemies trying to attack MJ, and being helpless to stop them. He wakes up in a sweat, wondering what he should do. Meanwhile, MJ is out with Liz Allan, wondering the same.
Later at City Hall, all of the guests are in attendance, but both Peter and Mary Jane are late, leaving everyone confused. At the last minute, they both appear and are married by Mary Jane's uncle, judge Spenser Watson.[1] MJ gives Peter the tickets to France with which her ex-boyfriend tried to tempt her, and they go off on their honeymoon to begin their life new together, as Mr. and Mrs. Peter Parker. The wedding occurred simultaneously in the Spider-Man comic and in the daily news strip.[1]
[edit] Spider-Man: One More Day
In an attempt to save Aunt May's life, the 2007 storyline, Spider-Man: One More Day erased the wedding from every memory, including Peter and Mary-Jane's memories. Both participants are single again. This move was criticized by some reviewers from major comic sites including IGN[2], Newsarama [3] and Wizard.[4]
[edit] Other versions
There have been several references, variants and adaptations of The Wedding!. Almost always Mary Jane has been replaced as the bride, most prominently with Peter's former girlfriend, Gwen Stacy.
[edit] MC2
In the MC2 timeline, Peter and Mary Jane remain happily married, and the annual remains part of it's continuity. Unlike the 616 version, May Parker died of natural causes in Amazing Spider-Man Issue 400, and Mary Jane's daughter Mayday Parker, survived a difficult delivery, alhough her death was initially faked by Norman Osborn, she was eventually returned to the Parkers
[edit] Newspaper comic
Spider-Man married in the newspaper strip the same time as he did in the comic book.
[edit] What If?
In What If? (Volume 2) #20 and #21, the reader is presented with a variant version of the classic issue, in which Peter had not married Mary Jane, but instead he married the Black Cat, the marriage ends in tragedy with the death of Black Cat and Peter and Mary Jane going separate ways, but at the end seemed to lead to a possible relationship between Silver Sable and Spider-Man. Another version was also seen in What If? (Volume 1) #24 - "What if Spider-Man had Rescued Gwen Stacy?". In this issue, Peter ends up marrying Gwen Stacy, but the wedding is interrupted by Jameson, who has been given evidence that proves that Peter is Spider-Man that was mailed to him by Norman Osborne, who ironically seemed to be reformed later.
[edit] Universe X
In the Universe X alternate timeline, Peter is shown (While under a hypnotic influence by Spiders-Man) marrying Gwen Stacy and not Mary Jane. Meanwhile, Mary Jane ends up marrying Harry Osborn.
[edit] Spider-Man: The Animated Series
In the first episode of Spider-Man Season 5, "The Wedding", Peter and Mary Jane (or rather, her clone) attend their wedding only to have it interrupted by the Green Goblin II, who attempts to get Mary Jane to marry him.
The list of attendees at the wedding were Peter, Mary Jane, Liz Allan, Flash Thompson, Debra Whitman, Felicia Hardy, Wilson Fisk, Robbie Robertson, J Jonah Jameson, Anna Watson, May Parker, Harry Osborn, Curt Connors, Mrs. Connors, the Scorpion and others who were not named. Unlike the comics version, their honeymoon was in Niagara Falls and not Paris. On an interesting note, in the series finale of the show, an alternate universe is seen, in which Spider-Man is engaged to Gwen Stacy.
[edit] Spider-Man 2
Mary-Jane is supposed to marry John Jameson, but leaves him at the altar for Peter.
[edit] Marvel Zombies
The Marvel Zombies #5 cover is a parody of The Wedding! It depicts a zombie variant of Spider-Man holding Mary Jane's half-eaten corpse, the heroes and villains in the background are decaying, and the Spider-Man shaped heart in the background has a bite taken out of it.
[edit] Ultimate Spider-Man
In Ultimate Spider-Man #68 while talking to Johnny Storm, she accidentally refers to herself as "Mary Jane Watson-Parker". A clear reference to Mary Jane's donning of Peter's last name in Earth 616.
[edit] Spider-Man 3
Peter Parker tells Aunt May that he is planning to propose to Mary Jane. Aunt May then gives Peter the ring that Uncle Ben gave her when he proposed to her. But later on, a black symbiote from a meteorite fuses with Parker's costume while he is asleep. The black suit transforms Peter's personality, making him more violent and spiteful, which is highlighted by stealing Peter's fellow photographer Eddie Brock, Jr.'s girlfriend, Gwen Stacy. Mary Jane seeks solace in Peter's best friend, Harry Osborn (who had short-term memory loss after a chase with Spider-Man, and can't remember anything before his father's death). Under the influence of the symbiote, Peter accidentally shoves Mary Jane to the floor and gets rid of the suit in a church tower. The symbiote then takes over Brock, Jr., who turns into Venom. Meanwhile, Harry recovers from his amnesia and uses Mary Jane to break up with Peter. Eventually, Venom and Sandman team up and capture Mary Jane, which lures Spider-Man to them. Spider-Man is nearly beaten to death by the Sandman, until Harry joins to help Spider-Man (after his butler informs him that his father's death had been caused by his own glider). The two eventually beat Venom and the Sandman, but not before Venom, ironically, impales Harry with his own glider. The movie ends with Peter and Mary Jane at Harry's funeral, though not together. The final scene of the movie has Peter going back to the club where Mary Jane works. The two look at each other, hold hands and dance: renewing their relationship.
[edit] Trade paperback
A trade paperback, The Amazing Spider-Man: The Wedding (ISBN 0-87135-770-4) was published in October 1991, collecting the comic book wedding storyline from The Amazing Spider-Man (Vol. 1) #290-292 (July-Sept. 1987), The Amazing Spider-Man Annual #21 (1987), and Not Brand Ecch #6 (Feb. 1968). It also reprinted the newspaper strip wedding, and the media tie-in live action wedding held at Shea Stadium, and also featured an introduction by Stan Lee.
[edit] References
- ^ a b Sanderson, Peter (2007). The Marvel Comics Guide to New York City. New York City: Pocket Books, 1-2. ISBN 1-14653-141-6.
- ^ Schedeen, Jesse; Bryan Joel and Richard George (2007-12-28). Amazing Spider-Man #545 Review. IGN. Retrieved on 2008-01-02.
- ^ Siegel, Lucas; J. Caleb Mozzocco, Keven Huxford, Richard Renteria, Troy Brownfield (2007-12-31). Best Shots: The One More Day Roundtable. Newsarama.com. Retrieved on 2008-01-02.
- ^ Book of the Week - Amazing Spider-Man #545. WizardUniverse.com (2008-01-04). Retrieved on 2008-01-09.
