Appearing over the weekend at Fandomfest in Louisville, Kentucky, the 90-year-old comics legend appeared caught off-guard by a question from the audience about Garfield”s “request to make Spider-Man bisexual and Mary Jane male.” Lee initially offered a glowing assessment of the actor”s performance in The Amazing Spider-Man, before the question was explained to him.
“He”s becoming bisexual?” Lee exclaimed in disbelief, eliciting roars of laughter from the audience. “Who have you been talking to? Seriously, I don”t know anything about that. And if it”s true, I”m going to make a couple of phone calls. I figure one sex is enough for anybody.”
Garfield, who”s filming The Amazing Spider-Man 2, sparked a good deal of discussion among comics fans when he related a conversation with a producer in which he said, “I was kind of joking, but kind of not joking about MJ. And I was like, ‘What if MJ is a dude?” Why can”t we discover that Peter is exploring his sexuality? It”s hardly even groundbreaking! … So why can”t he be gay? Why can”t he be into boys?”
The actor expanded on his comments at Comic-Con International, explaining, “Listen, what I said in that Entertainment Weekly interview was a question. It was just a simple, philosophical question about sexual orientation, about prejudice. I obviously long for the time where sexual orientation, skin color, is a small thread in the fabric of a human being, and all men are created equal – and women, sorry, women as well. To speak to the idea of me and Michael B. Jordan getting together, it was tongue in cheek, absolutely tongue in cheek. It would be illogical for me in the third movie to be like, you know what? I”m kind of attracted to guys. That”s just not going to work. That”s clear.
“It was just more a philosophical question, and what I believe about Spider-Man is that he does stand for everybody: black, white, Chinese, Malaysian, gay, straight, lesbian, bisexual, transgender. He will put himself in harm”s way for anyone. He is colorblind. He”s blind to sexual orientation, and that is what he has always represented to me. He represents the everyman, but he represents the underdog and those marginalized who come up against great prejudice which I, as a middle-class straight, white man, don”t really understand so much. And when Stan Lee first wrote and created this character, the outcast was the computer nerd, was the science nerd, was the guy that couldn”t get the girl. Those guys now run the world. So how much of an outcast is that version of Peter Parker anymore? That”s my question.”
(via ComicBook.com)