The actor:	Kirsten Dunst
The character:	Mary Jane Watson
The film:	Spider-Man 2
The line:	“Go get ’em, tiger.”

John Romita, Sr. died a few days ago, and since then my timeline has, even now, paid tribute to one of the foundational voices in superhero comics. The panels I’ve seen most often of his are these, and you’ll be able to guess why:

No costumes here, no web-slingin’ nor hero work. Just a clean cut boy who cannot believe the knockout he’s been set up with, and after this, the imaginations of boys not quite as clean cut as Pete to conceive of what might go on between them.

There have been so many Spider-Man adaptations in my lifetime that Gwen Stacy has become nearly as popular, proportional to the number of movies she’s appeared in, as Mary Jane Watson. I suppose one can get bored of the girls Friday of superhero flicks and comics, especially if what appeals to you as a youngster is the rock ’em sock ’em aspect as opposed to, y’know, rock ’em sock ’em but after puberty. If that’s the case, then Mary Jane is as apt to get pushed aside as Lois Lane. She doesn’t have the tragic death that Gwen Stacy suffers which makes her interesting, or the cultlike modern-day fandom belonging to Candy Southern. And the movies which use Mary Jane have sidestepped her most compelling qualities. The Raimi Spider-Man movies can’t resist using her as a damsel in distress. Is she in the Webb Spider-Man movies? Would anyone remember if she had been? And the MCU Spider-Man movies write Mary Jane like she emerged from a TikTok video spoofing teenagers on Zoloft. None of these really get after what makes Mary Jane different from the other girls on superheroes’ arms. Mary Jane is hot. Not pretty, not comely, not beautiful.

She leans on the doorframe like she doesn’t care in the penultimate panel. And when her face is revealed, it’s far less important than what she says. “Face it, tiger” is cheeky, cocky, the kind of teasing which suggests that she’s willing to believe in his prowess, but that he’s still all potential, with no proof of kinetic energy. “You just hit the jackpot!” is even better. Ask a group of one hundred people to answer which is more important on a first impression, looks or confidence, and I’d bet that a healthy majority would answer that confidence is better. What’s sexy about Mary Jane (and a lot of real people too, for what it’s worth) isn’t her looks, but that knowledge that she’s a catch. Peter’s eyes aren’t bugging out in that last panel because she’s the prettiest girl in New York, but because she’s whatever the antithesis of a shrinking violet is.

There are two moments in movie Mary Jane appearances which live up to the promise of that panel. The first is the upside-down kiss, though on further reflection I’m not sure how much of that has to do with Mary Jane, Peter, Dunst, or Tobey Maguire so much as it is the novelty of that position. The second is the “Go get ’em, tiger” scene, where Mary Jane shows up at Peter’s apartment a little bit mussed, wearing her wedding dress and flushed with the thrill of doing something this bold. Peter tries to dissuade her a couple times from doing what he can tell she’s about to do, but it doesn’t matter to her. Her confidence in this moment radiates into the room, into the theater. She knows she’ll get what she wants when she makes it to his apartment. She knows that he can’t say not to him. And when the two of them, mid-smooch, hear the sirens, she knows that even if he has to leave, he’s going to come back to her.