Photo-Illustration: Vulture; Photos: Disney, Sony Animation, Sony Pictures
The world’s favorite webslinger is back this week in Spider-Man: Brand New Day, the fourth film starring Tom Holland as one of the most iconic superheroes in the history of pop culture. While Brand New Day pushes the character in a new direction, it also recalls a half-century cinematic history of the friendly neighborhood teen in tights, which got us thinking about the dozen or so adventures of Spider-Man on the big screen. From a 1970s TV movie through the Tobey Maguire years, Andrew Garfield era, Spider-Verse flicks, and now the Holland quadrilogy, it’s been an incredible ride, one with extreme highs and regrettable lows. The world loves Spider-Man, and this is the order in which that love should be enshrined.
Some housekeeping before we begin: After careful consideration, we disqualified the 1978 Supaidaman, a.k.a. Japanese Spider-Man. It’s just a 24-minute episode of the show, only included on some film lists because it played once at the Toei Manga Matsuri film festival in July 1978. It opens a Pandora’s box of potential inclusions if single TV episodes can make this list. (No one wants to consider where Spider-Noir ranks.) And yet, we’re making an exception for our first entry …
Photo: CBS
Why include what is basically an extended TV pilot for the 1977–1979 CBS series if we’re kicking Supaidaman to the curb? First, it’s feature-length, so it plays more like a movie than a show. Second, it was widely released internationally in theaters by Columbia Pictures, making a remarkable-for-1977 $9 million at the box office (almost $50 million in 2026 dollars). With that technicality out of the way: It’s horrible, even for its time. Yes, some of the ’70s aspects are nostalgic fun (it has the funkiest disco score in any superhero movie), but the script, which blends origin story with a mind-control villain in a way that never really intertwines the two, barely sustains the length of the movie. It’s constantly padding itself to get from one commercial break to another, including some truly hilarious scenes of wall-climbing that almost need to be seen to be believed. Michael Pataki also gets some good laughs as a cigar-chomping cop, but Nicholas Hammond is a snooze as Parker. Seinfeld fans will get a kick out of a cameo by Len Lesser, a.k.a. Uncle Leo, but there’s not much here to recommend otherwise. It should be noted that Columbia would again take a pair of two-part episodes from the run of this show to milk some foreign box office from them in 1978’s Spider-Man Strikes Back and 1981’s Spider-Man: The Dragon’s Challenge. Consider this an entry for all three.
Photo: Sony Pictures
Five years after the missteps of Spider-Man 3, Sony rebooted the series under the direction of Marc Webb, allowing Andrew Garfield to step into Spidey’s red suit alongside Emma Stone as Gwen Stacy, Rhys Ifans as Lizard, Martin Sheen as Ben Parker, and Sally Field as Aunt May. What’s funny about watching this misfire years later is how much it leans into one of the most mocked aspects of Raimi’s last movie: emo Spidey. Garfield is an undeniably great actor, but the decision to essentially remake the origin story a decade after watching it with Tobey Maguire does him no favors. So much of TASM is just a shadow version of Raimi’s first movie, right down to an Uncle Ben do-over, with less interesting characters, rhythms, and villains. It’s a version of Spidey that doesn’t just take itself too seriously, it drains the superhero of so much of what people love about him.
Photo: Niko Tavernise/Columbia Pictures
Some might understandably argue that this should be swapped with the previous entry for Electro’s dubstep soundtrack alone, but it barely sneaks past the first flick for one major reason: Garfield and Stone. Watching them now, one can see how they grew as performers even just from the first movie to the second, especially in the character-driven emotional beats of the first half. The truth is that the ensembles in the Webb movies are arguably the best of the entire franchise on paper — this one has three Oscar winners in Emma Stone, Jamie Foxx, and Sally Field — but the scripts are either shallow rehashes of what was better in the Raimi films or half-hearted attempts at fan service that feel like checklist assignments (remember the Sinister Six set-up?) more than anything born of creative passion. Worst of all, they’re obsessively morose, which no one wants from Spider-Man. He’s your friendly neighborhood ally, not your Goth one.
Photo: Columbia Pictures
The first hour of the last collaboration between Sam Raimi and Tobey Maguire is significantly better than you remember. It has that zippy Raimi style, one that feels like it weds a comic-book sensibility to the vibrant filmmaking of the man who made Evil Dead 2. Somewhat ironically, the movie falls apart when it leans into its more horror-driven ideas, including the clunky Venom subplot and everyone’s favorite Spider-Man whipping post, Evil Peter. More than that, though, Topher Grace just doesn’t work as Eddie Brock, Thomas Haden Church looks lost as Sandman, and James Franco lives in the shadow of Willem Dafoe as much as his character does. On the other hand, Bryce Dallas Howard plays an effective Gwen Stacy, Kirsten Dunst is typically fantastic, and Raimi and the great cinematographer Bill Pope craft some memorable imagery around the nonsense. There’s more here to like than the historical record would have you believe — this is the point on the list where we’d at least cautiously recommend seeing the movie — but not enough to rank it any higher.
Photo: Chuck Zlotnick/CTMG, Inc.
If John Hughes made a Marvel movie, it would look a lot like this coming-of-age blockbuster that reshaped the Marvel Cinematic Universe, finally fully bringing Spider-Man into the fold after a scene-stealing turn in Captain America: Civil War. The first Tom Holland movie is just barely the worst because of its inability to find its own voice in the already-cluttered MCU, sanding down too much of what people love about the character with shallow stakes. And it’s more of a way to connect the Battle of New York to the Blip than a movie that feels like it stands on its own webbed feet. It doesn’t help that Holland seems to be playing even younger than his teenage identity (he comes off more preteen than 15) and that none of the recurring characters like Zendaya’s M.J. and Jacob Batalon’s Ned have really found their voices. Honestly, the best thing about Homecoming remains Michael Keaton’s fun performance as Vulture, one of the better MCU villains of this series. For that alone, and the setup this movie does for superior Holland installments to follow, it’s worth seeing.
Photo: Jay Maidment/Marvel/Columbia Pictures/Everett Collection
The dramatic end of No Way Home required a reset for the Tom Holland franchise, and new director Destin Daniel Cretton mostly pulls off the tough act of following up a beloved blockbuster, even with a few common MCU missteps along the way. The evolution of Spider-Man from a globetrotting teenager to isolated Big Apple crime-stopper allows Holland to give his best performance to date, and probably the best Spidey acting turn by anyone so far, even if it’s hard to shake the feeling that this film is also a bit too transitional in the bigger MCU picture. Having said that, the young cast rules with Holland, Zendaya, Batalon, and Sadie Sink stealing the flick from vets like Jon Bernthal and Mark Ruffalo. It may not have the best action of the franchise, but it has a sizable heart, and it finally solves the “Emo Spidey” problem through Holland’s committed, emotional performance. Most of all, it’s an effective repurposing of a common superhero theme in that Peter learns that no one can successfully navigate this violent world alone, not even its most powerful beings.
Photo: Jay Maidment/CTMG
Yes, a lot of the Mysterio stuff in the back half of Jon Watts’s second film hasn’t aged well in terms of CGI or even memorable storytelling, but one should remember where this film exists in the MCU before considering its effectiveness. It was the megafranchise’s first major film after Endgame, which was intended as an intense chapter break in the history of all these characters. How does a saga hit refresh after something as monumental as the death of Iron Man? Watts was basically tasked with resurrecting the franchise, and he did so by shifting tones from the intense action of Endgame to a globe-trotting adventure. The Mysterio stuff even arguably plays into a wink-wink suggestion that maybe all the closure in Endgame wouldn’t be permanent. After all, you can’t always believe what you see in the MCU. It also feels like Holland and Zendaya find their characters more in their second mainline Spidey outing, making this one of the more underrated MCU flicks of the last decade.
Photo: Matt Kennedy/Sony Pictures
Remember when this movie cured COVID? One of the reasons No Way Home clicked was how much it felt like the pandemic era’s first universally beloved event movie. And what an event it was, bringing together characters and performers from across the entire Spider-Man mythology, including multiple Peter Parkers, Green Goblin, Doc Ock, and even minor players like Lizard, Sandman, and Electro. It really is the Endgame for the Spider-Man mythos, which means a degree of narrative bloat, but it’s still remarkably satisfying as a piece of superhero entertainment. It helps to have such ace performers as Willem Dafoe and Alfred Molina back in the mix, but this is the best Holland Spider-Man for one simple reason: It’s the most entertaining. It hums from plot point to revelation to explosion to tragic death, a reminder, maybe when we needed it most, of how purely enjoyable a blockbuster like this could be.
Photo: Columbia Pictures
Hollywood tried to make a Spider-Movie for a generation — with directors like James Cameron, Michael Bay, Tim Burton, David Fincher, and M. Night Shyamalan considered at various points — but it was Columbia Pictures head Amy Pascal who arguably changed the course of superhero moviedom with her first choice: The Evil Dead director Sam Raimi. She knew that Raimi’s kinetic, passionate visual style was perfect for the colorful world of Peter Parker, a gambit that paid off with the first studio blockbuster of his career. Of course, it’s Raimi’s poppy vision that makes this origin story so effective, but it helps to have an incredible cast at a time when it still felt like a bit of a step down to make a lowly “superhero movie.” It’s really got a perfect balance of rising stars (Maguire, Dunst, Franco) alongside established legends like Dafoe, Cliff Robertson, and Rosemary Harris. It also sets a crucial foundation for so much Spidey filmmaking to come in how much it centers the big theme: “With great power comes great responsibility.” Peter Parker learns not just about power but grief, regret, and morality. So many of the best superhero movies to follow, including everything from The Dark Knight to Black Panther, owe a debt to this flick, one that proved how much could be done within the genre’s sandbox.
Photo: Sony Pictures Animation
One could argue the order of the two phenomenal Spider-Verse movies, but the sequel falls just under the original for a couple reasons. First, it’s not a complete story. So while it’s undeniably about as entertaining as this kind of thing can be, there’s a sense that we won’t be able to fully appreciate it until we’ve seen how it lands some of its dangling plot points in the follow-up. Second, the first movie’s just a bit naturally tighter in terms of character and storytelling, what with this one being even more stuffed with Spider-People. Having said that, movies don’t get much more mesmerizing than Across the Spider-Verse, as directors Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers, and Justin K. Thompson take the creative confidence granted by the critical and commercial success of the first film and just go nuts with it, both visually and narratively. The storytelling is so ambitious as Miles Morales travels the multiverse to defeat the Spot (Jason Schwartzman), but it’s the nonstop visual thrills that really carry Across the Spider-Verse, a movie bursting with more creativity in every scene than most entire animated features.
Photo: Sony Pictures Animation/Marvel Entertainment
Hollywood hasn’t released an animated film of this caliber since its 2018 release. Into the Spider-Verse feels like it rewrites the potential of animated superhero movies, and yet so few have been able to follow in its ambitious footsteps because the degree of difficulty onscreen is so remarkably high. From its very opening scenes, Into the Spider-Verse plays with not just coming-of-age and superhero tropes but how much we love them, dropping in references to generations of comic books and even the live-action movies that preceded it. The voice work is unimpeachable, but it’s the way directors Bob Perischetti, Peter Ramsey, and Rodney Rothman wed the comic-inspired visuals to the emotionally driven storytelling that make the film so special. It’s funny, thrilling, and legitimately moving. And it feels like the movie on this list most likely to inspire future creatives to make something as remarkable.
Photo: Columbia Pictures
It might just be the best superhero movie ever made. Raimi and writer Alvin Sargent don’t make the mistake of simply repeating what worked in the first movie: They build on the foundation they’ve set, deepening the franchise’s themes and characters instead of just going bigger with them. The lessons that Peter Parker learned about the responsibility of great power are reflected in one of superhero moviedom’s best villains, as Dr. Otto Octavius finds himself wielding unimaginable force even as he’s wracked with unfathomable grief. From Pope’s vibrant cinematography to Danny Elfman’s killer score to an ensemble without a single weak link, it revealed that the ceiling for the superhero movie was much higher than anyone suspected. And it climaxes in one of movie history’s best scenes as Spider-Man’s act of great strength reveals his secret identity to a subway full of survivors, who use the moment to lift him above their heads before realizing he’s just a kid. As a character, Spider-Man has always been at his most interesting when he’s caught between being an ordinary teenager and the savior of the free world. Spider-Man 2 best captures that duality, making it the finest webslinger movie to date.
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