Is that why they gave them bigger butts? Marvel revives its Swimsuit Special, with ‘designs for new costumes coming soon to Marvel Rivals’

Marvel Comics has announced it’s bringing back the most ’90s thing this side of jorts—the Marvel Swimsuit Special. Marvel Swimsuit Special: Friends, Foes & Rivals #1 will be published in July, and promises to “also include designs for new costumes coming soon to Marvel Rivals, the mega popular multiplayer video game from Marvel Games and NetEase Games.”

Marvel’s Swimsuit Specials were an infamous moneyspinner aimed primarily at horny teenage boys in the 1990s, and it makes a kind of sense to revive today when the entire internet is openly horny at all times.

While the originals were mostly just an excuse for pinups where the women of Marvel wore bikinis and the men DTs, they also had plots and the revival “continues the tradition with an overarching story by Tim Seeley and Tony Fleecs and drawn by superstar artist Nick Bradshaw that stars Earth’s Mightiest fashion designer, Janet Van Dyne, aka the Wasp!”

One of many strange things about the Swimsuit Specials was how many of the men had their own logos on their banana hammocks, meaning the Punisher hit the beach with a giant skull covering his area. I guess that’s the kind of thing we can expect to see in Marvel Rivals? For maximum fidelity to the comics they’d have to bring back that gross yellow skin tone they gave Psylocke, but let’s hope they draw the line there.

When Season 2 of Marvel Rivals came out, players noticed the men really did have bigger butts than they used to. (Then it turned out a couple of the women did too.) Given how much NetEase has leaned into the sex appeal of Marvel’s characters and the thirstiness of its player base that didn’t seem like it needed explaining, but I guess it makes sense if the summer wave of cosmetics will see all the dudes rocking nut huggers.