By: Thomas Horvath

Spider-Man is one of the most popular superheroes of our time and continually dominates the comic, movie, and video game scenes. Many comic book fans would tell you he is their favorite superhero, but how has Spider-Man become so popular? He’s not the best at anything, and a teenager dressing up like a red and blue spider fighting crime sounds like an outlandish idea for a soon-to-be juggernaut of modern media.

Spider-Man made his first appearance in issue 15 of Amazing Fantasy in August of 1962. Stan Lee came up with the idea of his powers after seeing an insect on the wall of his office and thinking that a superhero who crawled up walls would be interesting. He also decided that Spider-Man should be a teenager because he wanted the character to age through the comics and be relatable to teens reading the comics. Spider-Man is often cited as one of the most relatable characters in comics, going through many of the same struggles we have. He’s not meant to be the strongest or the smartest, but he was meant to be the most relatable to young, geeky kids that made up the majority of Marvel’s fanbase. 

No matter how many more decades pass, Spider-Man will never lose his popularity due to the foundation his character was built on. Whether it be Peter Parker, Miles Morales, or even Gwen Stacy, all of these characters are built off the original blueprint of the human outweighing the supernatural aspect of the character. “What I like about the costume is that anybody reading Spider-Man in any part of the world can imagine that they themselves are under the costume.” This is a quote from Stan Lee that perfectly sums up the character of Spider-Man and why the character will forever be an icon to people around the world.