Beyond Mary Jane: Fashion Models in Marvel Comics

The new "Models, Inc." series is not a relaunch of the really bad '90s Fox drama, but a comic about famous models from Marvel Comics history -- and a murder mystery! Someone gets offed during fashion week in NYC, and the Marvel models -- including Spider-Man's Mary-Jane -- team up with TIM GUNN to find the killer, like a really hot version of Scooby Doo team where everyone looks like Daphne, and Scooby is a supercilious gay man.

It's a bit of a blast from the past -- comics about models were a whole thing at Marvel back in the day, and while we've still got MJ kicking around, a lot of the pretty ladies of catwalks past have fallen by the wayside. We haven't forgotten them, though, no matter how freakin' ridiculous they were.

Click through the jump to see the pretty ladies of comic book ages past, and the revamped versions that are on the way.

Patsy Walker
Originally a romance comic star in the 1940s, Patsy became significantly more interesting in the 1970s when she became the superheroine Hellcat. Last year, she became the official superhero of Alaska via Iron Man's 50 States Initiative, and got her own totally awesome miniseries where she rode wolves and fought octopuses.

Millie the Model
The story of a super-glamorous New York City model with a whose life was a whirlwind of romance and endless photo shoots in bikinis, Millie's series ran from 1945 to 1973. Her curves came courtesy of artist Dan DeCarlo who later created "Josie and the Pussycats" as well as some really hot pin-up art. In the new series, she gets accused of murder. Presumably there are fewer of those "Gay Pages" referred to at the top of the old comic.

Chili (Marvel Comics)
Billed as Millie's "red-haired rival," Chili got her own comic in 1959 where she behaved like an arrogant, self-obsessed mean girl who demanded that men lavish her with money and attention constantly, and for some reason went to the moon once, which P.S. almost 40 years later a woman has still never done.

My Girl Pearl (Marvel Comics)
This particular Marvel model didn't make it into "Models Inc.," and I can see why. Her name is Pearl Dimly, so can you guess what cliché she represents? Yup, she's a really stupid blonde girl! Several of her covers actually have the subtitle, "She's beautiful, but oh so dumb!" Her 1955 series is basically that joke, over and over and over. Oh, and she's bad at driving.