The Wallcrawler, the Webhead and the Webslinger. The King of Taunts and Snark. The Everyman Hero. The (non-sidekick) Teen Superhero, The Heart of the Marvel Universe and Company.

He's Amazing! He's Sensational! He's Spectacular!

He's just your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man!

Spider-Man is a Marvel Comics superhero created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko in 1962. He is considered to be Marvel's most popular and famous superhero. He is one of — if not the — premier company mascots of Marvel Comics and is as central to them as Mickey Mouse is to Walt Disney.

Peter Parker is a shy, bookish, and constantly picked-on high school student who lives with his Aunt May and Uncle Ben in Forest Hills, Queens due to the death of his parents. On a field trip to a science lab, he was bitten by a radioactive (and in some newer stories genetically-modified) spider, giving him amazing powers: the proportional strength of a spider, the ability to crawl on walls, a Spider-Sense to warn him of danger, as well as super-fast reflexes. A brilliant young man and budding inventor, Peter developed his own formula for an adhesive fluid that resembles and mimics a spider's web which he fires from wrist-mounted shooters, working as both a grappling tool and a projectile weapon.

Initially ebullient and overawed by his transformation from picked-on kid to superhuman, a Tragic Mistake that leads to the death of his beloved Uncle Ben permanently instills in Peter a sense of responsibility and duty to his fellow citizen. As the web-slinging, wall-crawling Spider-Man, Peter fights crime while trying to keep his identity secret from his widowed Aunt May and from the public at large, even if as a superhero from a struggling background starting out with almost entirely independent resources, he has few ways to defend himself from the misunderstandings and weak communication caused by his actions in the public eye.

Becoming a superhero on the cusp of adulthood, forced to grow up fast while barely having time to enjoy his youth, Spider-Man is the underdog superhero — scrapping to earn every inch of his triumphs, big and small, while living with the consequences of his actions, good and bad, and the ways it affects him and his loved ones for every waking day that follows.

Debuting originally in Amazing Fantasy #15, Spider-Man was an immediate hit and quickly became Marvel's top-selling title and in a few short years, he became one of the most iconic heroes, and despite starting nearly twenty years after both Superman and Batman closed the gap between them to become just as notable and proverbial in the global consciousness. Just like them, Spider-Man has a supporting cast that is equally iconic and popular — his elderly Aunt May, his famous editor/boss J. Jonah Jameson, his school friends and rivals (Flash Thompson, Harry Osborn) and of course his Love Interest who alternately like either Peter but hate Spider-Man or vice-versa, or are otherwise too much for him or anyone to handle (Gwen Stacy, Felicia Hardy, Mary Jane Watson). His Rogues Gallery is also one of the most notable and famous in comics' history — the Green Goblin, Dr. Octopus, Venom, Rhino, Vulture, Scorpion, Mysterio, Kraven the Hunter, as well as a series of popular Legacy Character and sidekicks (Miles Morales, Spider-Girl among others below).

Like Superman and Batman, Spider-Man has proven adaptable to multiple mediums. The arachnid-powered Superhero was relatively new to the Marvel Universe when he made his TV animation debut in 1967. The show's main contribution is the Theme Song ("Spider-Man, Spider-Man/Does whatever a spider can...") which has become a popular standard, and has been covered by artists as diverse as Aerosmith, The Ramones and Michael Bublé. In the 1970s, a silent costumed actor played Spider-Man in the "Spidey Super Stories" skits on The Electric Company (1971); he only spoke in word balloons that the show's young viewers were expected to read (there was also a Lighter and Softer Recursive Adaptation comic book series in print at the same time). Subsequent Animated Series teamed Spider-Man with other heroes, such as Firestar and Iceman. This period saw the beginning of the long-running newspaper comic Spider-Man that featured Stan Lee working on it for a longer time than the regular continuity. There was also short-lived live-action series The Amazing Spider-Man (1978) (which was pulled when the network noticed that they were running an awful lot of superhero shows at the same time — Spider-Man was a contemporary of Wonder Woman, The Incredible Hulk (1977) and The Six Million Dollar Man). A live-action Spider-Man was also produced as a toku series in Japan, which borrowed the costume but little else, and teamed the arachnid hero with a Humongous Mecha. (This series inspired the development of the Super Sentai franchise, which in turn created the Power Rangers.) Spider-Man also appeared in video games very early and in multiple console generations holding the record for most number of video games for any superhero character, according to Guinness World Records.

Spider-Man's fortunes leaped to new heights with the worldwide success of the Spider-Man Trilogy directed by Sam Raimi which made the character so popular that he remains in demand in movies despite reboots in limited intervals. If he was popular before, he's amazing, spectacular, ultimate, and sensational for all time at this point in as many mediums, analog or digital, as you can find. His character archetype itself is now so ubiquitous that it easily lends itself to parody, satire, or deconstruction.

Has a character sheet for both his regular comics continuity and the multiple iterations he has appeared in other titles.

General trope examples:

• Aborted Arc
• Abusive Parents
• Adaptation Distillation
• Adaptation Dye Job
• And The Fandom Rejoiced
• Characterization Marches On
• Deconstruction
• Depending On The Artist
• Early Installment Weirdness
• Evil Counterpart
• Expy
• Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse
• I Let Gwen Stacy Die
• Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain
• Remember The New Guy
• Ret Canon
• Retcon
• Shadow Archetype
• The Reason You Suck Speech
• Thou Shalt Not Kill
• With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility
• You Fight Like a Cow

Spider-Man comics, related comics and storylines

Theatrically Released Films and Western Animation

Video Games

"Spider-Tropes, Spider-Tropes, friendly neighborhood Spider-Tropes":

• Adaptation Personality Change: Future retellings, across several mediums, of Peter’s days just short of becoming Spider-Man have made him a more pure-hearted person from the get-go, while also makeing him far more willing to forgive and work with his former enemies after becoming Spider-Man. However, in the original Stan Lee and Steve Ditko run, it was quite evident that Peter was more of an irritable teenager, a good guy yes, but not an ideal pure hero, which gave weight to Peter’s immediate decision of trying to make money as soon as he got super powers instead of trying to be a hero right away; it was only after much hard-earned experiences that Peter grew to be up a fantastically heroic person.
• The Adjectival Superhero: The Amazing/Spectacular/Sensational Spider-Man, although Spidey himself prefers to use "Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man" (which was eventually used as a book title itself). He may well have been the Trope Codifier for this, as his first appearance was in Amazing Fantasy, which was soon after canceled, and replaced on the newsstands with Amazing Spider-Man.
  • When improvising a costume out of a borrowed Fantastic Four costume and a mask out of a paper bag, he became the Amazing or the Bombastic Bag-Man.
  • He is also the Avenging Spider-Man while a member of the Avengers, and the Fantastic Spider-Man while a member of the Fantastic Four.
  • When Venom acted as him during Dark Reign as a member of the Dark Avengers, he was called the Sinister Spider-Man. Sinister has also been applied to Silk as she drifts towards a Face–Heel Turn.
  • The Superior Spider-Man is Doctor Octopus having hijacked Peter's body.
  • When Blade needed to hide his identity, with the help of a Bland-Name Product Spider-Man outfit from a costume shop, he became the Splendiferous Spider Hero. With "Spider Hero" written across his chest. The Superior Spider-Man was not amused.
  • Spider-Girl also eventually inherited Amazing and later Spectacular from her dad.
  • The Radioactive Spider-Gwen (That can't be good!).
  • Miles Morales is often referred to as the Ultimate Spider-Man, referring to his original book, to distinguish him from Parker.
• Animated Adaptation: This could take a while...
  • The 1967 adaptation, which introduced the famous "Does whatever a spider can" theme song.
  • Spider-Woman, courtesy of DePatie-Freleng Enterprises, aired from 1979-1980.
  • Spider-Man (1981), which was most famous for having him meet up with Doctor Doom repeatedly.
  • Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, which aired around the same time as the above series, saw the webhead team up with Iceman and Firestar, and is much better-known nowadays.
  • Spider-Man: The Animated Series was pretty much John Semper doing the best he could with horrible animation, censorship and Executive Meddling. Nonetheless, the series has remained the Spider-Man animated adaptation for many fans, with Christopher Daniel Barnes' portrayal of the character often considered one of the best.
  • Spider-Man Unlimited was a sequel-but-not-really to the above series, which sees Spider-Man hopping aboard a spaceship to Counter-Earth, fighting alongside new allies and running into high-tech, futuristic versions of his classic rogues gallery. Notable for ending on a Cliffhanger.
  • Spider-Man: The New Animated Series blended CGI and cel-shading to create a unique form of animation. The series itself is set immediately after the events of the first Sam Raimi film, though its sequels would later render it Canon Discontinuity.
  • The Spectacular Spider-Man is the first animated Spider-Man series to focus his time as a teenager in high school, as it was originally in the comics. The show is also widely considered an Adaptation Distillation as it stays true to the comics (through using a lot of elements from the original Spider-Man comics that were written by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko; the show brought in characters, storylines, and plot elements with a similar balance of action, drama and comedy as well as a high school setting) in addition to utilizing material from all eras of the comic's run and other sources such as the more recent the Ultimate Spider-Man comics and the Sam Raimi movies, making a Spider-Man cartoon that is very popular and recognizable to both older and younger fans.
  • Ultimate Spider-Man is very loosely adapted from the comic book with the same name while using some elements from the 616 and Marvel Cinematic Universe. Aiming for a more comedic tone than its predecessors, the series tries its best to put a different spin on all the old characters and try to bring in something new.
  • Marvel's Spider-Man, Disney's newest foray into adapting the Spider-Man mythos for younger audiences.
  • Spidey and His Amazing Friends Disney Junior's take on the web-slinger for the preschool crowd.
  • Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, Spidey's first animated feature-length film.
• Bat People: In some appearance — like in an Exiles story arc and in animated series — Morbius was transformed into a half-man half-bat monster, seeing more like an anthropomorphic bat with wings.
• Bootstrapped Theme: The theme song for the 1967 cartoon is one for the franchise as a whole. Covers for it and variations appeared in Spider-Man Trilogy and a full orchestral symphonic opening for Spider-Man: Homecoming. It's also a popular standard covered by The Ramones and Aerosmith among others.
• Briefer Than They Think: Adaptations tend to emphasize the high school element to the degree that it has arguably become Lost in Imitation. Brian Michael Bendis took this to the logical extreme in the Ultimate Spider-Man comics, where 200+ issues were written and completed over a span of a decade without Peter or his class graduating from high school. Meanwhile, the recent Marvel Cinematic Universe films feature the webhead being played by Tom Holland, the youngest actor yet to play Spider-Man, and he's still in high school as of his seventh movie appearance (three of those being solo films) and 6 years of real-time.
• Capitalism Is Bad: The earliest instances of Peter Parker as an industrialist were in an alternate timeline in Spider-Man: The Animated Series and Spider-Man: Edge of Time and in both instances, the two wealthy Parkers were shown as jerks and bad guys
• Coming of Age Story: Adaptations tend to follow similar beats even when it is restricted to selected periods (his high school period and occasionally but rarely his college). Modern versions such as Ultimate Marvel and the MCU have Spider-Man trying to go from small steps hero to a bigger kind of hero working for the Ultimates or the Avengers.
• Friendless Background: In Adaptations, such as Ultimate Spider-Man, this is dialed down with Peter having Ultimate MJ as his friend from childhood and confiding in her his secret early in his run, which carried over in The Amazing Spider-Man Series and Spider-Man: Homecoming where Peter's no longer entirely alone.
• Genetic Engineering Is the New Nuke: Spider-Man's origins have moved from being bit by a radioactive spider in the original to being bit by a genetically enhanced "super spider" in The Spectacular Spider-Man, Ultimate Spider-Man, and both the original movie and the reboot. The '90s Spider-Man cartoon actually goes half-way, being bit by a spider that was hit by "neogenic" radiation. The mainstream comics eventually decide to hint that his powers might actually be magic, which to be fair makes more sense than radiation.
  • Spider-Man 2099, however, goes fully this way — Miguel O'Hara is a geneticist who's working on ways to combine man with beast for helpful purposes, but he's drugged with the Fantastic Drug Rapture, which affects him on a genetic level. He attempts to cleanse himself of it with a previous version of his DNA, but a jealous co-worker sabotages it, turning him into who we know now.
• Lost in Imitation: On account of Spider-Man's adaptation into diverse movies, games, cartoons, and even newspaper strips, which take a Compressed Adaptation and Composite Character approach, many elements get lost in the process. Not helping is when elements from these adaptations became Canon Immigrant. This tends to polarize Spider-Man's fanbase and it's partially to correct this, that recent stories like Spider-Verse were put into effect. The end result is that depending on where you start from, you end up having a different Spider-Man in your head.
  • For many people, before Sam Raimi's films, especially internationally^note Marvel comics in its back issues weren't always published regularly and serially in The '80s and The '90s around the globe and even then the decades of continuity and ongoing stories made it hard for newcomers to get into, their main exposure to Spider-Man was Stan Lee's newspaper strip that was published and syndicated in many newspapers around the world. It was in this newspaper that Spider-Man first married Mary-Jane Watson. In this strip, which is Lighter and Softer than the regular continuity, Peter Parker is an Experienced Protagonist who is Happily Married and his dynamic with MJ is closer to Nick and Nora rather than the Wet Blanket Wife she was in the mainstream comics. Most of the action has Peter working for JJJ at the Daily Bugle as a photographer (when Peter had taken a variety of jobs in 616 continuity). Eventually, the marriage went from the newspaper strip to the main comics continuity, and for a long time, Peter became known for being the most famous superhero who was a married man, which explains the backlash with One More Day.
  • Until very recently, most audiences who knew of Spider-Man tended to see Mary Jane as his Lois Lane and never even knew about Gwen Stacy (or Betty Brant, or Liz Allan), except through the internet. The Spider-Girl comics likewise established the most famous Legacy Character of Peter's at the time to be his daughter with MJ. The reason is that most of the cartoon adaptations and Sam Raimi's movies had established her as Peter's true love and the fact that Gwen Stacy had died was something that censorship would not allow kid's cartoons to put across. Gwen Stacy's fame as a murder victim in regular continuity is further diluted with her appearance as a supporting character in The Spectacular Spider-Man and the success of Spider-Gwen and the upcoming animated series where she has spider-powers from the start.
  • Likewise, for most people who come to the character from the newspaper strip or follow the regular continuity, Spider-Man hasn't been a Kid Hero or high-school student since his early issues. He graduated from high school to college similar to Marvel Comics Early-Installment Weirdness where they averted Comic-Book Time and had characters age and progress. However, cartoons and movies by focusing on his origins tend to paint him as that. Brian Michael Bendis' popular Ultimate Spider-Man wrote 200 issues with Peter still not graduating high school and the series ended without him graduating.
• Progressively Prettier: Brian Michael Bendis and Mark Bagley explicitly modeled Ultimate Peter on Romita's version, and their Peter is a fairly good-looking teenager. In the film versions, Andrew Garfield looks the most like the handsome Peter of the comics, while both Tobey Maguire's and Tom Holland's version of Peter, resembles the original version of Peter who could pass for nearly anyone on the street.
• Sidekick: Spider-Man's non-sidekick status gets diluted a little in Adaptations like Ultimate Marvel and Marvel Cinematic Universe, where Peter is designated as officially in "apprentice status" to either Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D. or to Tony Stark. And in the case of the latter, Spidey has his suit and equipment handed to him by Tony Stark.
• Sneaking Out at Night: Many adaptations that use his younger iterations where he's still a teenager (e.g. Ultimate Spider-Man, or cartoons like The Spectacular Spider-Man and Ultimate Spider-Man (2012)) sometimes use this trope, partially to get some drama out of it. One common example is Spidey thinking that he needs to wrap up a fight quickly so he can be home before May discovers he's gone.