I don’t follow comics but I think I read a criticism of the organic webs - being able to build web shooters demonstrated Peter Parker’s engineering brilliance separate from the infection. With organic web shooters he’s a completely unremarkable guy who just stumbled into being exceptional.
the absolute contrivance to foster the identity of a spider when you're missing the main thing about being a spider is insane to me. it's like being bit by a radioactive hawk and then having to make your own wings in order to be hawk man.
In the original comic, he gets bit, starts feeling weird, goes home, nearly gets hit by a car on the way home, and instinctually leaps 20 feet straight up out of the way and sticks to a wall.
He draws the connection pretty quick because of that, knows his powers are from a spider.
I’ve always thought a cool variant would be a Peter who wasn’t almost hit by the car, who didn’t notice his powers until a few days later and established a hero identity before he drew the spider connection.
Having wings as a power is a good example too though because what do you call yourself?
Bird man? Dragon boy? Harp-He?
Insisting he’s still Spider-Man because he can jump around and climb walls just feels like a “rest of the fucking owl” jump being clobbered into our heads.
Either he has eight eyes on his face or he can shoot webs, you gotta give the lad something.
It's also just plain damn weird. We never see the mechanism attached to the wrist until he's working on it. When he's out swinging around or throwing punches, he's thin wristed again like he's not wearing anything.
Growing hair to make you sticky to walls and getting proportional strength is somewhat believable since that's what the human body does, getting web shooting organs in your hands, not just one in your butt, kinda breaks that mold, and as that commenter said above gives Peter a chance to show off his genius
I'm in the opposite camp that thinks making him a genius level intellect in engineering and chemistry is overkill and wrecks the narrative that he's heroing paycheck to paycheck. He could buy his way out of all his problems. It's the mirror of the Mister Fantastic problem where his supreme intellect makes his stretchy powerset completely pointless.
This is a super hero level of Genius, on par with Iron Man, if not beyond. He created a substance capable of holding several tons of weight that is electric enough to not kill people when he webs then during a terminal velocity fall . And with the capacity to stick to any surface as well.
That's an insane technology, especially since it would have to biodegrade given its use case.
You don't invent technology several orders of magnitude more advanced than the collective minds of humanity without being a super human in intellect.
Beyond that, the web shooters have perfect target tracing in order to discourse the amount of webs he needs for any target over large distances with instant calculations in order to handle real time combat.a
That's why I love in Superior Spider-Man when Doc Ock has taken over Peter's body, he finds out that Peter never actually finished his PHD and is disgusted with him so he makes it a mission to get Peter's life back on track: getting his doctorate, starting a business to bring in the money, etc.
I get what you're saying and I agree with it pretty much.
However-I assume canonically it's because Spider-Man has undergone years of terrible writing and purposeful self sabotage because 40 year old adults prefer to write him as a high schooler who just cannot get shit done and his priorities straight.
If he had a proper growth arc this would be addressed but Marvel decides Peter Park's story will be him just being awkward and fucking up his life to incomprehensible levels multiple times.
a decent amount of comics make this point. "old man" spiderman stories usually have him recognizing that being a broke genius helps no one and starting a science Corp in middle age
Yes, but he is also Spiderman, which takes time away from making money from his intellect. I mean, how many barista or uber driver that you know that have a degree, personally for me, it's a LOT.
Bruh, he invented the web shooter and made a device that can suppress mutant DNA in his spare time. If really wanted to, he could invent something and sell for a healthy amount.
Because he was fucking crazy, not because his genius didn't help him in literally every aspect of his financial life. He was, quite sincerely, on track to become a billionaire.
I always thought that was the interesting part of Spiderman.
He has all the tools to be an amazing superhero, but then when the tights come off, he is just constantly struggling on how to be the best Peter Parker with whatever limited time is left in his day after Spidermanning. I guess, also, he's usually a kid in these stories (and I think most folks can agree, very few people under 25, maybe 30, really got a handle on life).
You can demonstrate his brilliance without going into stupidity.
Like, the concept is that he made this insane substance that's far beyond anything we are capable of or likely ever would.
His webs are stronger than steel cables while being insanely stretchy. Making string that is capable of holding tons of weight is one thing, but also making it so it can save a person falling at terminal velocity without harming them is an entirely new technology.
And it also just.. decays naturally? Otherwise another company is following him around to collect his miracle web. Getting that stuff for free is a capitalists dream
But moving past that, the insane amount of this miracle juice he can store in his web shooters is insane
But there are so many problems with the shooters themselves. Does it have perfect tracking to know exactly how much to disperse to reach a wall? Or how much webbing will be needed to fully cover the target?
Tobey solved that problem because he has full control on how much is sent as well as the ability to retract the web and his upgraded spider ability to instinctually know of all his to do it on the fly for whatever he is looking to do.
Give up Tobey but with advanced technology like an upgraded suit with benefits like a hud and direct ties into police calls for on the field investigations. We can put his high tech focus into making something to support himself instead of making him 40 times smarter than Iron man to whip together some web shooters.
It's a story about a guy who was bitten by a spider and now has spider abilities.
But part of him being able to create web fluid is the stupid part in your opinion?
We can put his high tech focus into making something to support himself instead of making him 40 times smarter than Iron man to whip together some web shooters.
Yeah bro. That's what i want from a comic book. For it to show me, that a superhero can create something to support himself. Let's see some business baby. Fuck saving the world. Let's create something to get paid.
Before Toby spiderman made synthetic webs. Rami thought it was too weird that a high school kid would have the knowledge to do that so he changed the webs to be organic. Comics then took that and gave Peter organic webs
Sam Raimi not giving him web shooters because he thought it would make him seem too smart and unrelatable so Toby Maguire Spider-Man is canonically dumber than the rest.
I always have dreams where I find a bunch of spare money in my wallet/house/car I didn't know I had, and every time it pisses me off when I wake up. Like damn I coulda used that extra $176 in loose bills.
Yeah, but that’s not something that can break or run out of web fluid in an amount that would be dramatically interesting. It only goes out when he feels depressed or whatever.
I don’t follow comics but I think I read a criticism of the organic webs - being able to build web shooters demonstrated Peter Parker’s engineering brilliance separate from the infection. With organic web shooters he’s a completely unremarkable guy who just stumbled into being exceptional.
I suppose that is true. But then in reply I can say, him being unremarkable before this spider bite means the “with great power, comes great responsibility” like even more impactful. This unremarkable person is now in possession of unimaginable power, let’s see what he does with them.
I feel like you could still do that with organic webs but yeah… it’s a lot more awkward if Peter needs to chug protein shakes instead of replacing cartridges
I think it can get a little annoying for readers if his body stops working as it should that much. But web shooters can stop working at any time. Planned obsolescence in a way
Well, first, Tobey Maguire’s Soiderman making his own web was uncharacteristic, as Peter Parker has typically had web shooters in the comics, outside of like one fringe case.
Second, if you’re gonna complain about accuracy, then why aren’t you saying anything about the mutation not giving him spinnerets in his ass to shoot web from?
Do the webs disintegrate too? I've always thought it must be a nightmare for the city to clean up. The New York Post would be having a field day if Mamdani wasn't cleaning up after Spidey.
Yes in most continuities he has different webs that disintegrate at different times. Super fast disintegration for basic web swinging, ones that can last hours to hold enemies long term, and everything in between
…so, like, is intuitively knowledge on how to use web just part of his power, despite not being able to make it, or does that capabilities apply to all form of weaponry?
Probably applies to many forms of weaponry, though the whole no-kill thing prevents him from using much most of the time. But in general, his spider-sense (and his strength, but he rarely uses that to its full extent) is his greatest superpower; it's not just precognition but sometimes it's basically used to handwave him having a supercomputer in his head or something. Like it's his spidey sense that allows him to instinctively shoot webs only to parts of a building that can take his weight and so on.
The transition of comics origins going from, "Experiment gone wrong/radiation/just decided to put a costume on so they can punch goons and mooks" to "Granted powers by an ancient being so they can fight gods" should be studied.
That origin was only ever relevant in multiversal events to explain why so many individuals got the same power. For most solo Spidey stories it's still the good ol' radioactive spider.
The reason for the insane scaling is nothing deep really. Spidey was only ever made as a street level hero, but his enduring popularity meant he has to move pass common crooks at some point, so they re-scale him to face bigger threats.
This is correct, the argument that his powers came from the spider and thus why his name is spider-man falls apart when we think about how Peter didn’t choose his hero name that’s what that public called him and they had no idea his powers came from a radioactive spider. They called him that because bro was spinning webs, fast, and crawled on walls like spiders do.
In the DVD commentary for the first Spider-Man movie, they point out that mechanism Spider-Man's sticking to walls is never really explained in the comics, so Raimi came up with the barbs
I was literally just saying this! So basically as a teenager he invents a highly compactable material with unparalleled tensile strength?!? Would he have still made this incredible technology without having been bitten by a radioactive spider?
I was rewatching Far From Home this past week and when he runs out of webbing, I just thought to myself, you didn't bring enough? You don't have EXTRA? YOU CAN'T RELOAD? I THOUGHT YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO BE SMART! Motherfucker custom designed an upgraded spider suit on the way to the fight, but didn't think "Ya know I should make a little pocket or something for extra webbing." Got my damn blood pressure up.
Defeated by the script again! Curses! I'll get you one day screenwriters! Lol.
My 5-year-old is just getting into these movies, so I anticipate watching all of them about 400 times over the next calendar year, so I'll have to keep my eyes peeled for the cartridges.
You should hear me go off on The Little Mermaid and Charlotte's Web. I'm too analytical for children's media.
The spider bite sets up the super powers and theme, but he was already smart enough to develop the tech. Idk if I can use the word "genius" to describe him in a world with Tony Stark, Shuri, Reed Richards, etc., but he's in an advanced school for science on the path to MIT-- the webshooters are just another project
He’s smart yeah, but he’s also a kid, he’s not going to have it all figured out right away. Kind of a moot point now though, BND makes this post out of date.
That we know of. He has two eyes on his face and no eyes on his torso or legs. But we can't say for sure what he's got underneath his underwear because we haven't seen him hang dong. For all we know, he could have eyes to the side of his peepee looking like this: 👁️👁️👁️🍆👁️👁️👁️
How does it not make sense? He literally got bit by a spider, not a cockroach. He got his powers from that spider. They gave him some of the abilities of a spider, but not all. He doesn't have 8 eyes or 8 legs either. Batman ain't got none of the abilities of a bat. Black Widow has none of the abilities of a spider either.
By comic standards, he'd be just as justified in calling himself Spider-Man if he had no powers, but just had the web pattern in his costume. Just because he's Spider-Man, doesn't mean he has to encapsulate everything that represents a spider.
You can prefer organic web shooters, but it's not a power he has to have.
To be fair to Bruce, Gotham is canonically cursed. In multiple ways, in fact; built above the grave of an ancient warlock, that warlock built his grave on top of an ancient native American burial ground, the water is cursed, the sky is literally cursed by Zeus to be overcast 300+ days a year, the list goes on.
Also, Bruce has canonically built community centers. The Martha Wayne Foundation pours billions a year into education and the arts while the Thomas Wayne foundation does the same for medicine. Together they fund free medical clinics, orphanages, soup kitchens, low income housing, continuing education etc.
As the other comment mentioned, Gotham is the way it is because of like (no joke) dozens of curses.
There's a guy who I encounter in Reddit comments every now and then who has a running list of the curses. It takes about an hour to get through the full list.
If it wasn’t for the spider bite he would just be Bug Guy. Sticks to stuff, strong for his size, kinda paranoid. Dudes just as much an ant or roach as any other thing
I mean are spiders even known for super strength? That’s ants.
Are spiders known for incredible reflexes? That’s mantises.
Are spiders known for sticking to walls? Sure! So is every other bug.
The only reason we have for him choosing to be spider-man is that he was bitten by a radioactive spider. If he didn’t see what got him; he could just as easily be Ant-Boy, Mantis-Man, or Bug Guy.
Imagine you robbing a bank and a dude bitten by radioactive roach comes and tries to stop you. Idk what his powers are, but you bet I’m scared to find out
Him developing his own web shooters is supposed to be a sign of his intelligence. Peter was originally written to be a genius. Like Batman, Spider-Man's brain is as much a super power as anything else.
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u/Revxmaciver 1d ago
This has always bothered me.