Firestar Was Not Designed Based on Mary Jane Watson

In the latest Comic Book Legends Revealed,we try to figure out whether Firestar was actually based on Mary Jane Watson or not

Welcome to Comic Book Legends Revealed! This is the eight hundred and sixty-sixth installment where we examine three comic book legends and determine whether they are true or false. As usual, there will be three posts, one for each of the three legends. Click here for the first legend in this installment.

NOTE: If my Twitter page hits 5,000 followers, I'll do a bonus edition of Comic Book Legends Revealed that week. Great deal, right? So go follow my Twitter page, Brian_Cronin!

COMIC LEGEND:

John Romita Sr. designed Firestar based on Mary Jane WatsonSTATUS:

I'm going with False

A number of years ago a reader wrote in for a Comic Book Legends Revealed about the popular 1980s animated series, Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, and specifically about whether Mary Jane Watson was going to be part of the show at first when it was going to be Spider-Man, Iceman and Human Torch as the three heroes on the series, but when Iceman became unavailable, Mary Jane was revamped into becoming Firestar.

WHEN WAS FIRESTAR CREATED?

As I pointed out in that legend, Human Torch was never part of the Amazing Friends series in any real point of its development...

I noted that I understood how the reader could think it, because Angelica Jones certainly looks like Mary Jane Watson...

However, Firestar was part of the series from the word go. To wit, the concept of Firestar (originally called Heatwave) was around before they even hired the main writer for the show, Dennis Marks.

Here is John Romita Sr's design of Firestar (still Heatwave at the time) as part of the pitch to the network for the show...

Here are Romita's other pieces for the pitch, with the team in action...

and Iceman's spotlight piece...

So while it is clear that she looks like Mary Jane, there was no change - that's the way it always was. That, though, has led to a SECONDARY legend, one that I'll admit that I have passed along over the years, which is that John Romita based Firestar on Mary Jane Watson. She sure does LOOK like her, right?

However, the answer might not be that simple.

DID JOHN ROMITA BASE FIRESTAR ON MARY JANE WATSON?

The amazing Spider-Friends website did an interview with Rich Hoberg, an excellent comic book artist in his own right who did design work on Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, and he explained how everything went down:

Q) People tend to think that Firestar’s alter ego, Angelica, was INTENTIONALLY designed to look like Mary Jane. Any truth to that?

Rick Hoberg: There was a reason for that: Stan Lee liked that look…but it’s just a classic John Romita character. If you look at Gwen Stacy…Gwen Stacy and Mary Jane are pretty much the same look. The hair is a little different but the face and the body are very much the same.

Q) There is a joke in an issue of the old Marvel comic, NOT BRAND ECHH. It was illustrated showing how slight the differences in the designs of comic books women were at the time. The same drawing was used for each woman. The woman with red-hair was a take off of Mary Jane. The drawing with blonde hair was a take off of Gwen Stacy, etc..

[The bit in question from Not Brand Echh #12 was by Marie Severin in a parody of Romita's art - BC]

Rick Hoberg: I’m not putting John Romita down at all because he is one of my favorites. I don’t think anyone in superhero comics drew girls as sexy as him.

Q) I’m not putting him down either. He’s one of my favorite artists too. I think the same situation applies to any comic book artist of the time. I just think people have, strangely, not considered that point. So do you think it was intentional that she looked like Mary Jane or do you think people think that because John Romita drew her?

Rick Hoberg: I think it was just an effect of John Romita designing her, to be honest with you. John got pulled into doing that stuff as did John Buscema, who came out and did some designs for us at one point. And these guys were pretty much bored to death by this. They did it because Stan was paying them to do it. I don’t think they gave two shits about it. John was a very sweet guy and Romita was always very nice to me. I ended up ghosting the Spider-Man newspaper strip because I was sitting there and Stan wanted somebody he could put his hand on. I always got a great response from John Romita, he was always very kind to me and he was a real “artist’s artist”. He knew how to talk to you and how to teach you as well. And John Buscema was a really nice guy as well but he just didn’t give a crap about animation. He came out and did it strictly for the dough.

Hoberg worked with these guys directly, so I tend to trust his take on this. As he notes, Romita was just trying to do a design he thought Stan Lee wanted from him, and with the concept for the character being fire-themed, it just seems natural that she would have red hair, right? So if Hoberg thinks that it wasn't an intentional reference to Mary Jane, I believe him.