Webs well woven
Swings from a thread: check. Catches thieves just like flies: check. To him, life is a great big bang-up: grammatically dubious, but check. Look out, here comes the Spider-Man. Again and again and again.
Aside from the comic books themselves, a Spider-fan’s early love of Marvel’s most famous superhero can often be traced back to a particular era of TV shows and movies. Each decade has had its own definitive Spidey, from the low-budget cartoon of the late ’60s — source of Spidey’s old-school theme song — to the big-budget movies of the ’10s.
Not all of Spider-Man’s film and TV outings have been as amazing as their namesake, though. While 2007’s Spider-Man 3 and 2014’s The Amazing Spider-Man 2 weren’t necessarily box-office busts, both led to a new actor taking over the webbed reins on the big screen, with Tom Holland donning the tights for Spider-Man: Homecoming. With Homecoming now in theatres, here are some of the wall-crawler’s best incarnations in TV and movies.
SPIDER-MAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES (1994-98) Netflix, iTunes, Google Play
The ’90s were a golden era for Marvel animation on Fox TV, as any kid who jumped out of bed on Saturday mornings can attest. While aimed at young, this series remains one of the most faithful adaptations of the comic book.
SPIDER-MAN (1967-70) YouTube
For some of us elderly Spider-Man fans, this Canada-U.S. co-production is the TV show that planted the seeds of lifelong Spider-fandom. The animation is joyously low-tech, the voice acting is awesomely cheesy and the theme song still kills, 50 years later. Stumbling across the entire series online has felt like its own sort of homecoming.
SPIDER-MAN 2 (2004) Amazon Prime Video, iTunes, Google Play, Cineplex Store, PlayStation Store, Microsoft Store
Still considered by most fans to be Spidey’s best big-screen outing until Tom Holland stole the show in Captain America: Civil War, the second instalment in director Sam Raimi’s trilogy had Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) suiting up to take on Dr. Otto Octavius (Alfred Molina).
THE SPECTACULAR SPIDER-MAN (2008-09) iTunes, Google Play, PlayStation Store, Microsoft Store
While some might fondly remember Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends from the ’80s, a lot of Spider-nerds hold this short-lived series as the greatest animated Spider-Man adventure. Not only is it faithful to the comic-book characters, it appeals to kids and is smart enough for grown-ups.
THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN (1977), SPIDER-MAN STRIKES BACK (1978), SPIDER-MAN: THE DRAGON’S CHALLENGE (1979) YouTube
If you’ve never heard of this trio of low-budget, live-action movies starring Nicholas Hammond (who?) as Spider-Man, you’re in for a hilarious treat. The films combine episodes of a CBS TV series that ran in the late ‘70s, and boy have they not aged well. Skip to the 58-minute mark of the first movie to get an idea of what passes for a fight scene in these laugh-out-loud howlers.