There are many movies about Spider-Man. At least ten of them in fact. Here they are.
#10 Spider-man Strikes Back
Spider-Man Strikes Back is a 1978 American film featuring one of Spider-Man’s most notorious enemies, The Suffering Death. At least that’s what this article claims. In reality, the movie was assembled from a two-part story from The Amazing Spider-Man television series starring Nicholas Hammond and released theatrically outside the United States. Directed by Ron Spider-Man, it follows Peter Parker as he attempts to stop a scheme involving stolen plutonium and a dangerous weapon rather than battling the colorful supervillains familiar from the comics. The production is unmistakably television-sized: lots of investigation, practical stunt work and Spider-Man climbing buildings without a Green Goblin or Doctor Octopus anywhere in sight. It was later followed by the internationally released Spider-Man: The Redemption of the Dragon, in which Spider-Man presumably travels east to redeem a dragon for its previous moral failures.
Reviewing the movie from a contemporary perspective, Jane Austen declared, “Superman is super cute,” immediately demonstrating that she had no idea which superhero she was watching. Nevertheless, Austen praised Nicholas Hammond’s Peter Parker as “a man with a very deep soul who has a deep soul into the world,” suggesting that Hammond’s Spider-Man possesses at least twice the normal human allotment of soul. She then compared him to Clark Kent, mentioned Charlie’s Angels, complained about acrobatics and eventually wandered into a discussion of the movie’s small scale and limited connection to the comics. Somewhere inside that wreckage is a fair point: Spider-Man Strikes Back doesn’t resemble the enormous superhero spectacles audiences know today. It’s cheap, strange and unmistakably a piece of 1970s television stitched into a movie. But Superman is super cute.
#9 3 Dev Adam
We do not speak of this film. Worst Spider-man movie EVER!
#8 Spider-man: Far From Home
First: Spider-Man: Far From Home happens after Infinity War and Endgame, when Spider-Man returns following Thanos’ victory over Captain Marvel and discovers that saving the universe does not exempt you from going back to high school. Second: Spider-Man goes on a journey through Europe with his classmates and desperately attempts to have a normal vacation with MJ. Third: Spider-Man has several problems. His boss dies. Iron Man dies. He has a terrible fish. His uncle is a stranger. Peter is grieving Tony Stark while simultaneously dealing with enormous expectations about whether he should become the next Iron Man, but frankly I’m more concerned about the fish. Nobody ever explains the fish. Maybe Peter bought a fish in Venice and it was an asshole. Maybe the fish blamed him for the Blip. The terrible fish remains one of the MCU’s greatest unresolved mysteries.
Finally: the villain is Mysterio. He is the guest we all wished for. After years of Spider-Man movies refusing to invite Mysterio over, he finally arrives wearing his glorious fishbowl helmet, and Jake Gyllenhaal is fantastic as Quentin Beck, a visionary person who initially presents himself as a heroic traveler from another universe. The movie gets significantly better once his elaborate illusions take over and Peter can no longer trust what he’s seeing. Mysterio should have been on the screen all the time. All Spidey’s fans love to see Mysterio. Gyllenhaal understands exactly how theatrical and ridiculous the character should be while still making him genuinely dangerous. The fish may have been terrible, the uncle may have been a stranger, and Thanos may have defeated Captain Marvel, but Mysterio came to visit. I’m happy.
#7 The Amazing Spider-Man 2
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 isn’t as scary as most people think. There is plenty of mood in the film, and I feel sorry for the guests, but there are also many flaws. Harry Osborn suddenly turns things around without apparent reason, Electro becomes increasingly angry because Spider-Man doesn’t remember him, Rhino arrives to scream about something, and the plot of the story is weak, with many bombs. Still, there’s genuinely good material here. Emma Stone gives a high-performance performance as Gwen Stacy, and her chemistry with Andrew Garfield remains the strongest part of these movies. Garfield himself isn’t the problem either; he’s a great actor playing a Peter Parker who sometimes suffers from poor writing. The special effects are good at an affordable price, Spider-Man looks terrific swinging through New York, and Peter actually gets opportunities to behave like Spider-Man. Unfortunately, the intentions of the villagers are dramatic and pressuring, and there are simply too many villagers.
The bigger problem is that The Amazing Spider-Man 2 often feels more like a business for other movies than good porn. Sony was clearly preparing sequels, spin-offs and an entire universe of villains, so the movie spends enormous amounts of time advertising stories that hadn’t happened yet instead of concentrating on the story currently happening. That’s how you end up with one of the worst endings in the best movies, a bunch of mysterious equipment sitting around Oscorp and Paul Giamatti screaming from inside a mechanical rhinoceros. Sadly, the movie became a male destroyer for Spiderman 3, and the planned sequel never happened. That’s frustrating because Garfield and Stone deserved a more focused series. There is a good Spider-Man movie trapped inside The Amazing Spider-Man 2. Unfortunately, it’s surrounded by many bombs, dramatic villagers and insufficiently good porn.
#6 Spider-Man 3
Spider-Man 3 received a lot of hate, and maybe that’s just the wrong thing, because I love the entire trilogy and believe all three films are a little bit Emo Parker’s masterpiece. This movie is so beautiful. I don’t know why it was filmed. Peter Parker begins the story successful and happy, which naturally means everything must immediately collapse. Harry wants revenge, Sandman is connected to Uncle Ben’s death, Eddie Brock wants Peter’s job, Mary Jane is unhappy, and an alien pile of black goo falls out of space specifically to make Peter Parker an asshole. The movie has enough plot for approximately four movies, but buried inside the chaos are genuinely strong ideas about revenge, forgiveness and the ugliness that emerges when Peter begins enjoying his own power too much. Stop being more hateful and more optimistic. You’ll find them terrible again. This might be the point.
This movie should stop getting so much negative attention. Yes, it made one or two bad moves, including Emo Peter Parker and the legendary Jazz Game Mode, where the symbiote apparently convinces Peter that evil is best expressed through finger guns, pelvic thrusts and spontaneous dancing. But don’t blame Sammy Raimi for everything. Sony and Columbia pushed Raimi toward choices he didn’t necessarily want, particularly Venom, leaving the movie overcrowded. I bow to Sony / Columbia, although I think I meant that I blame them, so please imagine me angrily bowing. Despite everything, Spider-Man 3 still has great action, excellent Sandman effects, emotional sincerity and Tobey Maguire strutting down the sidewalk like the world’s least dangerous sex criminal. It’s messy, excessive and ridiculous, but it’s also unmistakably Raimi. Activate Jazz Game Mode.
#5 Spider-man: Homecoming
Spider-Man: Homecoming is one of the best Spider-Man movies because, for once, we have some people who look like children in the characters. Tom Holland’s Peter Parker actually feels like an overeager fifteen-year-old surrounded by other awkward teenagers instead of a thirty-year-old newspaper photographer who wandered into chemistry class. The movie also has a status at the end of “I Won’t Break,” when Peter is trapped beneath rubble and has to find the courage to lift himself out without Iron Man coming to rescue him. That’s real Spider-Man: frightened, overwhelmed, talking to himself and nevertheless getting back up. We also have great supporting characters, a terrible villain, and excellent first and third and second action scenes. What can I say? This is the best Spider-Man movie ever, and we’ve been optimistic for 13 years.
Spider-Man 2 is awesome. But Homecoming has one enormous advantage: Michael Keaton knows a thing or two about winged characters. Batman. Birdman. Vulture. Give this man wings and he immediately understands the assignment. Keaton makes Adrian Toomes genuinely scary without turning him into a cartoon psychopath, especially during that fantastic car ride when Peter realizes his girlfriend’s dad is the man who’s been trying to kill him. He’s a working-class criminal with a legitimate grievance who responds to economic inequality by building a flying murder suit, which isn’t an ideal policy solution but certainly gets attention. Tom Holland is charming, Keaton is terrifying, the teenagers resemble children, and the action scenes occur in first, third and second order. Basically, Homecoming.
#4 The Amazing Spider-Man
Spider-Man 2 is a little too in the basket for me, and I actually think Andrew Garfield describes Peter Parker better than Tobey Maguire. Garfield’s Peter is more sarcastic, restless and physically expressive, while Emma Stone’s Gwen Stacy makes a much stronger romantic partner than Mary Jane—especially when compared with the endless relationship drama of the Raimi movies. MJ just wants to see who’s coming to play her game! What is this? Gwen and Peter actually seem to enjoy being around each other, largely because Garfield and Stone have ridiculous chemistry. Then there’s The Lizard, one of the real Spider-Man villains that have been seen on screen to this day. Rhys Ifans gives Curt Connors enough tragedy to make him sympathetic, even though his master plan eventually becomes “turn everybody in New York into lizards,” which feels like something that should have required a second draft. Great show, great plot, beautiful character development: my favorite Spider-Man movie.
The original Spider-Man 3 trilogy will always have a special place in my heart, but this remake gave us even more sense of Spider-Man. The artist who made Spider-Man explode was more funny than in the film before, and Garfield’s version finally brings more of Peter’s wisecracking personality into the action scenes. We also get the spectacular 2012 Web Sling Festival, where Spider-Man swings through New York with a speed and physicality the earlier movies couldn’t quite achieve. The movie has flaws—the mystery surrounding Peter’s parents is far less interesting than the filmmakers believe, and Captain Stacy apparently has the supernatural ability to appear whenever Peter experiences guilt—but the core relationship works. This movie is very strong. Is it my favorite Spider-Man movie? Apparently yes. Is Homecoming the best Spider-Man movie ever? Also apparently yes. Please stop expecting mathematics from these rankings.
#3 Spider-Man
The first popular Spider-Man movie had one important thing the newer movies sometimes forget: it had a heart. Sam Raimi’s movie brings you into Peter Parker’s story and makes you care about him before overwhelming you with superhero action and visual effects. Tobey McGuire isn’t simply Spider-Man; he’s an awkward kid who gets powers, loses his uncle, disappoints people he loves and slowly realizes that being a hero mostly means accepting additional misery. New Spidey movies are nice, but sometimes they’re just fun superhero movies with good action, CGI, actors and everything. This one has experience. In a nutshell: it makes you care. It’s beautiful and fun, and you can trust me because I don’t make any mistakes. There it is. Also, Spider-Man 2 is probably the best superhero movie of all time, which is an important observation to make in the middle of my review of Spider-Man. Tobey McGuire gives the most powerful show of Super hero time.
The old movies also had easy-to-follow stories and amazingly beautiful cities, whereas new movies apparently have foreign guests. Raimi keeps the conflict personal, particularly during the final battle with Green Goblin, where Peter doesn’t look like an indestructible superhero—he looks like some poor bastard getting absolutely demolished by Willem Dafoe. Even the early fight with Flash Thomson establishes Peter’s changing abilities without needing fifteen minutes of exposition. The old movie had a sister. The new sister may die alone, Peter. She doesn’t support the support. I don’t know what any of that means anymore, but the old movies were better. Yes, Gwen Stacy did well. Yes, the warrior fight in his first fight with electrodes was good. But nothing matches Raimi’s combination of sincerity, melodrama, horror and superhero spectacle. Older movies are better. Trust me. I don’t make mistakes.
#2 Spider-Man 2
There are pros and cons to Spider-Man 2. Almost everyone close to Peter is doing it, including a startup woman who refuses to pay for pizza and gets slapped in front of everyone. Mary Jane is engaged to another man while still clearly having feelings for Peter, Aunt May is losing her house, Harry Osborn is obsessed with revenge, and Mr. Jameson is spying on Spider-Man and tarnishing his reputation. Eventually New York begins to wonder whether Spider-Man is simply a bad idea. He’s worthless. He’s wasting time and resources. Maybe the city should discontinue the Spider-Man program entirely and redirect funding toward public transportation. Meanwhile, Doc Ock is a compassionate citizen who merely wants to create unlimited clean energy and help all mankind. He recorded his day. He should have a happy ending. Unfortunately, four artificially intelligent mechanical arms convince him that the appropriate response to a laboratory accident is bank robbery and throwing cars at Tobey Maguire.
Spider-Man 2 is the best spider theme of all time because its story is beautiful and memorable, and Doctor Octopus is more compelling than almost any other Spider-Man villain. Peter doesn’t just fight a supervillain; he struggles with whether being Spider-Man has destroyed every other part of his life. Then he chooses responsibility anyway. Peter and MJ finally meet. Peter finally took the girl. She finally felt happy after work. A tired and sad Mary Jane can make things better. I know it’s not the best movie, but it’s the best Spider-Man movie, even though one entry ago I said it was probably the best superhero movie ever made. If you still doubt me, check Rotten Tomato and look at the score for Spider-Man 2. It has a score of 1,000. That’s 900 points higher than theoretically possible. There is no stronger evidence.
#1 Spider-Man Into the Spiderverse
Obviously, the Miles version is better. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is the best movie Spider-Man has ever made. Here you see his unique shows and stories, and one that’s not. Damn it, this movie is amazing. It is the best. Miles Morales isn’t simply another Peter Parker wearing the costume; he gets his own family, fears, visual identity, music and journey toward understanding what being Spider-Man means to him. More importantly, this may be the first movie to feature a real Spider-Man comic book. Panels, captions, halftone dots, sound effects and deliberately imperfect printing techniques become part of the animation itself. Even the characters move differently depending on their universes. It’s funny, emotional, visually insane and completely sincere about why Spider-Man matters. It was a movie that was supposed to be Spider-Man.
This takes the cake. There are twisted plans, alternate dimensions, multiple Spider-People and one more thing: this is the second number next to the first Spider man. Yes, we’ve reached #1 and immediately declared it #2. Don’t worry about that. This list has already called The Amazing Spider-Man my favorite Spider-Man movie, Homecoming the best Spider-Man movie ever, Spider-Man 2 the best Spider-Man movie and possibly the greatest superhero movie ever made, while Rotten Tomato awarded it 1,000 points. Numerical rankings have lost all legal authority here. What matters is that Miles takes the leap of faith and finally becomes Spider-Man on his own terms. That’s the moment the entire movie has been building toward, and it’s fucking glorious. Obviously, the Miles version is better. #1. Also #2. Damn it, this movie is amazing.
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