Part two of our series where we recast some of your favorite comic book heroines, and sweep in like superheroes to rescue them from a lackluster performance. Today we will be recasting Spider-Man’s beloved… Mary Jane Watson

MJ, Fashion model, superhero wife, actress, and if the Spider-Man movies are to be believed, whiny self centered bitch….

Who is being replaced?

Kirsten Dunst:

Why they cast a blonde as a redhead and a redhead as a blonde we may never know. In fact, I’m going to go on record as saying Topher Grace as Peter Parker and Bryce Dallas Howard as MJ might have been the more logical casting choice, and let Toby and Kirsten play Eddie and Gwen. What we do know is that despite the fact that… well…she looks good in the rain, Kirsten’s Mary Jane came off as being snippy and selfish. He’s Spider-Man for God’s sake, so what if he missed your damned play? That you sucked at and got replaced in? Boo Hoo…people are getting mugged, buildings are burning down, AND PIZZAS DON’T DELIVER THEMSELVES!!! Maybe it was the fault of the script, but maybe it was the fault of the actress, so just in case let’s get recasting, shall we?

You may have noticed that some of your favorite redheads (Felica Day, Allyson Hannigan, Emmy Rossum, Kari from Mythbusters) Are noticeably absent from the list. That is because lovely as they are, I can’t picture any of them saying “Face it tiger, you just hit the Jackpot” without irony. But these ladies might just be able to pull it off…

Honorable Mentions:

Christina Hendricks.

She might be a touch too curvy (for the part, not for me, I’d like to make that clear) and projects a wisdom beyond her years but I think if a new film was set with a slightly older Peter Parker this could totally work. Works for me at any rate.

Emily Blunt

I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who was disappointed to hear she wasn’t playing the Black Widow, but I think she might lend a touch of class to MJ, especially a period piece 60’s style MJ

Amy Adams

She gets the honorable mention because I think she is quite a good actress, and certainly easy on the eyes…something is not quite right for MJ, maybe she’s a little too bright and sunshiney, but it would be interesting to see her take a crack at it.

Daneel Harris

I haven’t seen enough One Tree Hill to know if she’s really all that good, but I’m prepared to give her a shot based on how much she looks the part. Can you imagine your aunt setting you up with this girl? No wonder Peter is so devoted to Aunt May.

Hey, you know who I DON’T want to play the part?

Laura Prepon. Her entire acting range is “Eric!! What the hell? You Dillhole!” She specializes in various states of annoyance it seems. No thank you.

And the “If I Had a Time Machine” award goes to…

Angie Everhart.

Jackpot, Tiger. Jackpot.

And Now…The Top 3…

#3 Evan Rachel Wood

She’s a stunning, intelligent redhead, who can act, sing (Across the Universe) and likes to date freaks…how much more Mary Jane can you get than that? And speaking of unusual taste in men…

#2 Isla Fisher

I still can’t believe Borat makes sexy time with this woman. I think what would be interesting here is that she has a softer look, she’s still model quality, but still has that “Girl next door” approachability going for her. I could totally see Peter obsessing about this girl his whole life.

And My #1 choice for the recasting of Mary Jane Watson is…

#1 Alicia Witt.

Yes, Alia from Dune grew up rather strikingly. I think I actually read somewhere that she was even offered the part and turned it down, for whatever reason. Regardless of whether or not that is true, she pulls of the model look, while never coming across as vapid or empty. I think the spirit of MJ is every bit as important as the look, and I think she pulls off both masterfully.

So there you have it…Who did I miss? Any more suggestions? Join us next time when we have the temerity to suggest casting an actual Blonde who can ACT in the role of Sue Storm

See you then.

Superhero Smackdown!
Friday Night Fight!

Here at The Correctness SportsishNetwerkkz, we offer our be-all-end-all absolutely correct answers on which superheroes would win in a fight. Marvel? DC? Watchmen as distributed by DC? Spongebob Squarepants? We’re in the second of four quarterfinal matches to determine the winner! The playoffs continue this week in the Pengrowth Deathdrome. Our thirst for blood is growing like a daisy that grows on blood.





(Ed’s note: there is a lot of clarification in our article this week, due to high volumes of being called cum-eaters”)

Spider-Man versus The Flash

Dave

By this point in the smackdown, (this is the 10th week, if you’re keeping track), I’ve basically resigned myself to being called any number of things, regardless of whom I choose.

I thought I’d take a minute or two to clear up some misconceptions that many of you seem to have regarding the Smackdowns…

1) There is no pre-determined winner. Each of us write our piece separately, and then we post them together. One of us adds in the header and footer and some pictures, and declares the winner based on the majority. In fact, we don’t always agree on the winner.

2) We haven’t decided the ultimate winner of the bracket in advance (see 1 above, which would make that difficult).

3) The bracket was determined long before the Fark greenlights started happening, and long before anyone took a serious interest in the final outcome. So yes, we understand that the bracket could be better, but we can’t (apart from having substituted some players) very well change that now.

4) We don’t get paid for this. Apart from remuneration from ads, which I can assure you is fairly minimal, The Correctness is a labour of love, sucking up our time, energy, and cash (which mostly goes to pay for bandwidth used by people who call us morons). We’re thinking of instituting a pay-for-insult scheme, whereby the most acerbic of you can pay us a small fee to call us anything you wish. We’ll be rich!

5) Our opinions are just that. We claim to be comic book lovers, not experts. Tony reads the books he likes, I read the ones I like, Rob likes shiny objects.

6) There is no DC/Marvel bias that I know of. I grew up mostly Marvel, but in the last few years, Marvel has sucked a huge amount of ass, and I’ve found myself catching up on a lot of DC titles. Really Marvel? 47 Avengers titles? Ultimates? Civil War? Zombies? Apes? The only thing you’ve done that piques my interest lately is bring back Clairmont to write “X-Men Forever”, and even that’s been pretty bland. The Grant Morrison “Batman and Robin” alone, in it’s first 4 issues, is better than anything you guys did this decade.

7) It was Rob’s idea to add Kitty Pryde to the bracket, and as a laugh have her win the whole thing. This idea was quickly dismissed, apart from leaving her in the bracket.

8 ) We added the 2 days of preparation bit after hearing from readers that they wanted more setup. This happened at the beginning of the Quarterfinals. It gives the prep guys a bit of time to get ready, but not enough to build insane things and such. It’s a compromise that gives the thinkers a bit of a chance, but not enough to totally control things. It’s every bit as valid as a “chance meeting” setup.

whew… Okay ,so Spidey vs the Flash….

The only thing Spidey has going for him in this fight is his spidey sense. He gets a warning that someone or something is about to attack him. His amazing agility and speed allow him to react to this data very very quickly.

But The Flash can make about 35 of these attacks while Spidey is still dodging the first. The sad part about this is that it’s likely Barry Allen as the Flash, whom I find tedious at best. I’m not exactly sure why he’s being “Reborn”, as Wally West is about 346 times more interesting as a character. But Geoff Johns has his reasons, and most things he writes are really well done, so I’ll go with it for a while.

You’re probably asking yourself why i’m digressing with talk about rules and Barry Allen’s return, but rest assured it’s because this particular fight has been over since I typed the word “By”.

Winner: The Flash

Rob:

Well, this week, I have done some research. I pulled my Note-Tote binder of first series Marvel cards off the shelf, and I can give you some very current stats.

As of 1990, Spider-Man, who wears a black costume with a white spider on it,  stands 5′10″, weighs 165 pounds (seems a tad light to me) and has fought in 982 battles. He has had 620 wins, 328 losses, and 34 ties.  His black costume is totally innocuous and not at all an alien symbiote (check the timeline of this joke for bonus points).

These Marvel cards were released before series 2, in which Marvel made the fucktarded mistake of assigning a “power” and “strength” rating to all of their heroes and villains.  At least the DC universe had some ambiguity, and Marvel did too, at one point. Just how super strong was Spider-man? Could he beat the Hulk? Eventually, Marvel sucked all the fun out of it.

The Flash, obviously, is not in the Marvel universe, and is certainly not in one of my complete set of limited edition holograms.

Spider-Man got his powers from being bitten by a radioactive lantern, while the Flash got his powers from being bitten by a radioactive lantern, just like the Green Lantern.

Things I do not recall: I do not recall singing along to the Scarlet Speedster’s theme song. I do not recall seeing awesome Flash-based movies (except for a flawed hypothetical third film). I do not recall reading Flash comics. I do not recall owning Flash action figures. I do not recall desperately hoping a real-live girl would come over to my tree-fort, which I furnished with the finest garage sale back-issues of the Flash.

Standing by my previous comments, because the Flash can move crazy fast, faster perhaps than spider-sense, and he can, according to the intertubes, become incorporeal (just like my hero, Kitty Pryde),  and going entirely against every tender fibre of my childhood, my whole belief system, and my sense of faith in the Universe, I’m giving this one to the Flash.

Once again, The Flash just speeds up, drops a brick off inside of Spidey’s head whilst incorporeal, and it’s over. The classic brick-left-inside-yer-head gambit.

Winner: The Flash

Loser: My Childhood

Tony

SPIDEY: That’s a weird coincidence… I knew a guy named Flash once. He was kind of di-(Flash of scarlet) OW!!!

Well, that’s about all he’d get out. There have been several complaints about how DC universe keeps beating the pants off of Marvel universe characters, at least in our estimation. This boils down to the DC Universe being generally overpowered. Even the unpowered Batman is given such iconic status that writers find a way for him to beat even the most super powered foes (Guilty!) I love Marvel characters. There’s more Marvel on my office shelf than DC, by virtue of the fact that being somewhat more vulnerable makes for interesting characters. We aren’t debating quality here, we are working with what we know about the characters, and what I know about the Flash is, he will fuck you up before you have time to even spin a web of any size.

Allow me to justify myself a tad before you go throwing what we at the Correctness refer to as “The Green Lantern incident” at me. There were three things saving Spidey when he beat Green Lantern

1.We generally go with the classic silver age heroes we all grew up with, which meant the yellow issue was still very much in play. 2. Spider sense which allowed Spidey to react precious seconds before Hal, and most importantly 3. Hal’s enormous power came from something that could be taken off of him, and if anyone could find a way to do that, it was Spidey.

But he can’t stop the Flash from being the Flash. Sticky tar on the ground? He’d vibrate his way out of it.. Web trap? Spotted it, avoided it, speed read “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” blogged about it being over rated, and still landed a rabbit punch on ol web head before he finished his first overlong thought balloon.

Here’s a question, Can Spider-man stay up and out of the way and wait for Flash to wear himself out? After all, Parker is super strong and if he does manage to land one, it could be good night Irene. (See what I did there?) Well I think with enough speed, Flash can run up walls. So no, even heights won’t help him. And God help Peter if he DOES manage to stick a web on Barry, because I can’t imagine being dragged at the speed of light is fun.

Sorry Spider-Man. The Flash has got you beat.

Winner: The Flash

P.S. Do your worst, commenters, by the time you read this, I will be in Paris, nibbling on baguettes, and occasionally my wife’s earlobe. Eat it, bitches!

Decision: The Flash

So The Flash moves on to the Semi-Finals, taking on The Batman, while the other side of the Bracket is yet to be decided. Tune in next week for Shadowcat vs Wolverine. The part where you tell us how wrong we are is below!

In case you haven’t read it already, and began weeping openly, crying “Nooooooooo!!!” to the heavens ala Darth Vader in Episode 3, Disney bought Marvel Comics for 4 Billion Dollars. We here at the Correctness think there will be some changes on the horizon…and here, for no reason at all, are ten of them

10. She Hulk: The Movie starring Miley Cyrus

9.Namor will beat the living snot out of the Sea Witch in an upcoming direct to DVD Little Mermaid sequel

8.Spider-man will continue the emo/dance number direction he went in the third film, and he will merge with the High School Musical franchise.

7. Stan Lee will laugh at all of us on his private island. Satellite photos will show him drinking a Mai Tai and giving us the finger.

6.Adorable Baby Avenger Dolls will be added to the “It’s a Small World” ride. there will also be lyric changes
“It’s a world of “Hulk Smash”, a world of “Thwipp”, it’s a World of “Bamf”, it’s a World of “Snikt”

5. Donald Duck will be revealed to be a Skrull.

4. Mickey will be added to the Correctness Superhero Smackdown Bracket

3. One of our beloved characters will be turned into a gaudy , tourist friendly Broadway musical, with the music written by some self important pop star that…oh wait…that’s kind of already happening.

2. Wolverine will go back to Weapon X for de-clawing. And neutering

1. Tony Stark, depressed at the recent buyout, will go to a bar to get drunk. There, he’ll find Kermit slouched over his beer. He unsteadily looks up at Tony with bloodshot ping pong ball eyes and croaks…”You too huh?”

Superhero Smackdown!
Friday Night Fight!
Here at The Correctness SportsishNetwerkkz, we offer our be-all-end-all absolutely correct answers on which superheroes would win in a fight. Marvel? DC? Watchmen as distributed by DC? Spongebob Squarepants? It’s a 16 superhero smackdown to find one final winner! The playoffs continue this week in the Pengrowth Deathdrome

Green Lantern vs. Spider-Man

Rob: Well, I’m going to weigh in here ignorant. I never read the Green Lantern, and I used to be a total Marvel guy- except that I didn’t realy “get” the X-men, so, when I say “Marvel Guy” I mean “Spider-Man”. Spidey has a lot going for him. His spider sense warns him of imminent danger, and he can stick to stuff. Lest we forget, that he can swing from webs, any size, and he catches theives, just like flies. In fact, in the chill of night, at the scene of the crime, like a streak of light, he arrives just in time.  How many times have you said to yourself- “Man, that streak of light arrived just in time, fast things are very much like streaks of light, for all fast things are timely.”? Lots of times, probably.

Second of all, willpower isn’t much of a power. I mean, Hal Jordan, Susan Powter, you guys tell me the difference. One can make green hammers with his ring, and the other is a motivational fitness expert from the early nineties. Same same.

Maybe I’m being unfair on the Green Lantern because I don’t get how anyone who gets bitten by a radioactive lantern could become a superhero. I mean, that has to be the shittiest origin story ever told, and I remind you that I wrote and created the “Human Man” show, so, I know a thing or two about shitty origin stories. Nonetheless, if I had to be bitten by something radioactive, it would be a spider, or a fuckin’ shark, but not a green lantern, that’s totally retarded.

While I’m on the subject, i would love to be bitten by a radioactive shark, that would be the fucking coolest. It’s a fucking shark, people, a radioactive underwater death merchant with no fear. It’s like Daredevil, only good, and not stupid and totally hopeless in a fight against The Flash. Then, as Shark man, I would wreak havoc on the denizens of port cities, and I would eat the fuck out of Aquaman. Oh, and I don’t want Alan Moore anywhere near the writing, I want to be a purposeless killing machine, not a nuanced child abuse victim.

Anyways, Spidey takes this fight, no sweat.

Dave: Well, Rob should clearly be reading more comics, as he hasn’t discovered that Marvel has been terrible for about a decade now. But, I digress.

On the surface, this would seem to be an unfair match, with Green Lantern wielding the power of the central battery on OA. Hal Jordan was able to overcome death, as well as being the spirit of vengeance, and return to our world. He can create anything his mind can conceive, though apparently his mind only thinks of stuff that is green.

On the Con side: In All Star Batman and Robin, Hal Jordan was almost killed by a combination of a can of paint and a 12 year old. Also, Green Lantern depends on a rechargeable ring for his power, and as anyone who owns anything that needs charging will testify, they have a habit of crapping out on you when you need them both.

Spider-Man has many things going for him in this fight. He has Spidey-Sense, which warns him of impending danger, and allows him to react, and escape from danger. Add to this the whole strength and agility part, and he’s pretty freaking deadly. He tends to hold back in combat, and is capable of going toe-to-toe with the Hulk. With his quick wits and ability to adapt and outlast his opponents, he could easily keep Green Lantern occupied long enough to exhaust his power ring, while cracking wise the entire time.

So, while this fight is much closer than last weeks battle, I would give this fight to the Spectacular Spider-Man.

Tony: It comes down to the following questions:

1. Is Spidey smart enough to go get himself  a yellow suit?

2.Is he capable of getting the ring off of Hal?

3. Did Spider-man 3 suck ass, or what?

The answer to all three questions is yes. But this is no walk over. The Green Lanterns most devastating attack  has always been the power of green vagueness.  Which, for comic book writers, means he’s capable of just about anything, up to and including hitting on Superman at the JLA Christmas party. However, whatever Hal throws at him, Spidey knows it’s coming before it happens and gets out of the way. Eventually Spidey will realize , through a series of thought balloons that go on for far too long, that he needs to separate man from ring,and after some difficulty will probably manage to do so.

SPIDEY: Got to get that ring off of him….

GL: Keep still, you little fuck!

(One complicated plan involving the color yellow, some webbing and a distraction later)

GL: Gimme my ring back!!!

SPIDEY: Not until you teach me to harness it’s power to erase Spider-Man 3 from existence

GL: Fair enough

Definitely a win in the Spidey column

The winner, once again by unanimous decision…Spider-Man!

That’s one for DC, one for Marvel for those keeping count. We are adjusting our brackets slightly, but there should be some swell visuals to follow this  some tome today. In the meantime feel free to disagree, in a cordial fashion below. Or just ready your arguments for next week, as the Man of Iron faces the Man of Steel! Supes takes on Iron Man right here next week, so stay tuned.