Spider-Man
This article or section needs expansion. |
| Fandom | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Spider-Man |
| Abbreviation(s): | SM |
| Creator: | Stan Lee & Steve Ditko (Marvel Comics) |
| Date(s): | 1962 - present, 2002-2007, 2012 - present (films) |
| Medium: | comic books, cartoons, films |
| Country of Origin: | United States |
| External Links: | Official Website Spider-Man at the Marvel Universe Wiki |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Spider-Man is a Marvel Comics superhero, who has had various adaptations in film, television (live-action and animated), video games, and on Broadway. The main character is Peter Parker, the alter ego of Spider-Man, though other characters have also worn the mantle of Spider-Man. Miles Morales is currently Spider-Man in the Marvel Ultimates line. Peter B. Parker is an alternate universe version of Peter Parker appearing in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.
Marvel Comics
- See also Marvel Comics, List of Marvel Universes, Ultimate Spider-Man, Spider-Girl, Spider-Woman, The Avengers (Marvel), Fantastic Four, X-Men.
Spider-Man first appeared in 1962, in Amazing Fantasy #15. His longest-running title is The Amazing Spider-Man; another major title is Ultimate Spider-Man, where Peter Parker is killed and succeeded by Miles Morales. At various points, Spider-Man has been a member of The Avengers, Fantastic Four, and the X-Men.
Fandom
Main Topics of Discussion
Thanks to letters from fans being published in most issues from the start, a modern reader can still get an idea of what the fandom was like at the time. Occasionally, a reader would roleplay as characters like Captain George Stacy or the Green Goblin. Recurring topics included (and still include in modern fandom):
- Aunt May's storylines: For decades, Aunt May was mainly there to make Peter worried. From the start, she was so frail and sensitive that Peter reasoned that if he ever told her his secret, she would die from shock. Aunt May regularly goes to the hospital for fainting after getting too close to Spider-Man's enemies, and in the early decades (until ASM #200), she's of the same opinion as the Daily Bugle, that is: Spider-Man is dangerous. When May was sent away for a dozen issues and didn't appear anymore, the fans rejoiced. Outside of her annoying, overly coddly behavior, May also had controversial plots, such as her romance with Doc Ock, a main villain, or that time it was revealed she owned a whole island and not much was made of it.
Aunt May can't keep getting weaker and weaker without turning into an anemic vapor.
— Jan Wayenberg, Amazing Spider-Man #70, March 1969
- Norman Osborn's repetitive amnesia: The Green Goblin is revealed to be Norman Osborn, the father of Peter's classmate, Harry Osborn, in ASM #39. In the same issue, Norman unmasks Spider-Man, which starts a big problem of the next ~8 years: how can Spider-Man deal with a super-villain knowing his secret identity? The answer was, for a while, to give Norman amnesia through various means anytime his memories would come back.
- The social life/action ratio: The Spider-Man comics are usually character-centric. The interpersonal drama fuels the storylines, and Peter's secret identity is a constant threat on his and his acquaintances' life. Various writers/artists teams have handled this differently. It seemed mostly balanced during the first few years, and Gerry Conway (the first writer since Stan Lee, from 1972 to 1975) put emphasis on Peter's personal life, to great effect. After Conway's tenure, the magazine had trouble handling this balance for several years.
Action is great, but SPIDEY has too much. I myself don't like panels where Spidey hits the Kingpin as much as I like seeing the luscious Gwen or the lively Harry. In the past five SPIDER-MAN issues, there have been 427 panels, with only 46 of these pertaining to the social life of Peter Parker! This is only one-tenth of the mags!
— Ronald Gayda, Amazing Spider-Man #78, November 1969
- Politics: The Vietnam War being at first mentioned mostly neutrally in the comics, before getting criticized through Flash Thompson, who enlisted, and was visibly affected when he came back. According to the editors[1], about as many people wanted Spider-Man to take an active part in the Vietnam War as people who didn't.
- Peter's Secret Identity: Reveal it to whom? Captain George Stacy? His friends? Girlfriends? May? (No, she might combust.)
- Opinions on writers, artists, plots: Due to Spider-Man's extensive readership, you could find pretty much any sort of opinion. Let's give powers to Gwen Stacy! Let's get rid of her instead. This artist is awful. Actually, he's great. The magazine has been lacking recently. In fact, it's better than ever!
Now, with the first issue of Lee's return, ROBOTS! My God, Stan, no!
— Wally Conger, Amazing Spider-Man #109, June 1972
- The Clone Saga: The Original Clone Saga (1975) was a bittersweet, but short and ultimately interesting storyline that introduced the idea of various characters (namely, Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy) being cloned. When the Clone Saga later ran from October 1994 to December 1996 across four magazines, readers got tired of the numerous retcon, neverending storyline and tediousness of it all. To this day, it's still cited as one of the most controversial storylines of comic book history.
- One More Day: OMD marks the era where the readers started seeing the Marvel Comics office as their enemy. The basic premise was to give a new start to the comics by erasing Peter Parker and Mary Jane's marriage from existence. This angered the fans and is commonly mentioned as the end of anything good in the comics, although Dan Slott's decade-long run that followed is usually seen as alright.
- Paul: This single-name has been the bane of most fans since the start of Zeb Wells's run on ASM Vol. 6 (2022-2024). The events of OMD are still in effect, and regardless of the controversial quality of the writing on that run, one plot line that fans abhor is MJ's new relationship with Paul, as well as their two children. The lack of likability in the various characters of the run, combined with the feeling that Peter got "cucked" for no good reason, turned away a lot of people from this run.
In the end, the magazine enjoyed a solid popularity for its first few decades, then became controversial in the 90s (notably due to the Clone Saga), and kept that status to this day.
Warped Perception of General Audiences
The franchise has had a consequent number of adaptations in various media, which have colored general audiences' perception of it, including:
- Peter Parker is a high-schooler/an average-looking nerd: Adaptations often start during Peter's high school years, but the reality of it is that he graduated from high school after about three years of comics publications, in ASM #28 (1965). He's also pretty quickly depicted as a lady's man, especially by the time John Romita Sr. takes over Steve Ditko in ASM #39 (August 1966). Romita also drew romance comics, and every character in ASM during his tenure (and later, as he heavily inspired his succession) looked like a model. Even in the 1981 and 1994 animated series, he's shown to be handsome. This perception has likely been influenced by the release of Ultimate Spider-Man (2000-2011), AU comics where Peter's in high school for a much longer time and looks like an average nerd, as well as the movies directed by Sam Raimi (2002-2007).
I think Peter was consistently handsome from Romita's arrival up through the 90s and maybe early 2000s. It seems to be a recent trend to paint him as more average looking, most of it I think is done to prove some kind of weird point that a guy like him is out of MJ's league so they shouldn't be married (or something). Even with Ditko, Peter didn't seem especially unattractive compared to everyone else (Ditko didn't draw pretty people in general, at least compared to Romita).
I think Peter has always been a wish fulfillment character to some degree; he had Betty and Liz fighting over him after all with not much effort on his part. The relateability thing comes in when he screws up the potential romances or the relationships have rocky moments, combined with other issues he faces like lack of money, a crappy job or homework.
- Characters being more known for their alternate self: Gwen Stacy became known by mainstream audiences through the Marc Webb movies (2011-2014), but her depiction is much likable than her comics counterpart. She was already rewritten throughout various comics, including Marvels (1994). She became even popular when she was featured in the Sony animated movies as Spider-Woman, but this version is completely different, personality-wise, from her original incarnation. Hobbie Brown is another example of this. His appearance in Beyond the Spider-Verse (2023) was inspired by his Spider-Punk counterpart in recent comics, but he was originally the Prowler (who's more known nowadays as Aaron Davis).
Pairings
Male slash predominates in the fandom; the most popular pairings are Peter Parker/Wade Wilson, Peter Parker/Johnny Storm, and Matt Murdoch/Peter Parker. However, Peter Parker/Harry Osborn (also known as Parksborn) has recently seen a resurgence. The most common het pairing is the canonical pairing of Peter Parker/Mary Jane Watson, although he's also paired with Black Cat.
Peter Parker/Venom is a rare pair.
Notable Fanworks
| Examples Wanted: Editors are encouraged to add more examples or a wider variety of examples. |
FanFic
- Polarity by Chris Myers
- Deniigiq's Spider-Man universes
- Spider-Man Chronicles by Megamatt09
FanArt
FanVids
Fanzines
- Peter Parker's Pad, a now defunct e-zine
Meta
Archives & Communities
Sam Raimi Movies
- See Spider-Man (2002-2007) for canon and fandom information.
Marc Webb Movies
- See The Amazing Spider-Man for canon and fandom information.
Marvel Cinematic Universe
- See Spider-Man: Homecoming for canon and fandom information and see Spider-Man MCU Movieverse for a larger overview of the universe.
Sony Pictures Universe
Animated Spider-Verse
See Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse for canon and fandom information and see Spider-Verse for a larger overview of the universe.
Television Shows
Spider-Man has starred in a number of television shows, mostly animated series: Spider-Man (1967-1970), The Amazing Spider-Man (1978-1979, live-action), Spider-Man (1981-1982), Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends (1981-1983), Fox Kids' Spider-Man (1994-1998), Spider-Man Unlimited (1999-2000), Spider-Man: The New Animated Series (2003), The Spectacular Spider-Man (2008-2009), and Ultimate Spider-Man (2012-present).
Notable Fanworks
| Examples Wanted: Editors are encouraged to add more examples or a wider variety of examples. |
FanFic
- Fighting Crime, Spinning Webs is the longest running fanfic for The Spectacular Spider-Man series
FanArt
FanVids
Archives & Communities
- Spectacular Spider-Man (TV) on AO3
- Ultimate Spider-Man (Cartoon) on AO3
- Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends on AO3
- Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends & crossovers at FFN
- UltimateSpidermanTV on DeviantArt
General Archives and Communities
Archives
- Spider-Man fanfiction and crossovers at FF.net
- Spider-Man - All Media Types on AO3
LiveJournal Communities
- spidermen (general community)
- give_spidey_lov (general community)
- spidey_fanfic (all fanfiction)
- spidey_fic (all fanfiction)
- spideyslash (slash)
- spiderman_slash (slash)
- johnny_peter (Human Torch/Peter)
- gwenpeter (Gwen/Peter)
- parkerstark (Peter/Iron Man)
Dreamwidth Communities
DeviantArt Communities
- Spider-man-fan-club
- World-of-Spider-Man
- SPIDERMANOMNIVERSE
- SpidermanAU
- Spider-Man-Amazing
- SpiderManSlash
- Spidey-and-MJ-FC
- Peter x Gwen
- Mary Jane x Gwen
- Peter x Flash
- Peter x Harry
- Peter Parker x Mary Jane
- Spidey/Deadpool-Love
- ILOVEMARYJANE
- AmazingSpider-ManFan
- SM-VenomFanClub
Websites
- Elving's Musings: While the articles mostly analyze the comics, they also analyze some adaptations.
Resources
- ^ Amazing Spider-man #70, March 1979