The History of Spider-Man: 1964

For over 50 years, Spider-Man has been a sensational standout in the Marvel Universe, and this summer, the web-slinger swings onto the silver screen once more in “Spider-Man: Homecoming”! In celebration of this stories history, we present Spidey’s spectacular step-by-step story!

Still new to the costumed crimebuster game in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #8, the wall-crawler battled The Living Brain, a robot run amuck, and mixed it up with his teenage nemesis The Human Torch at a swingin’ party.

After telling Iron Man to take a hike in AVENGERS #3, Spidey met a living dynamo called Electro in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #9, and suffered both from the latest attack by publisher J. Jonah Jameson and a dire medical emergency for his ailing Aunt May. The masked mobster known as The Big Man caused big trouble for the web-slinger in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #10 until his exposure as nebbish Frederick Foswell, one of Jameson’s employees.

A deepening secret surrounding Peter Parker’s friend Betty Brant reached a boiling point in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #11 when Doctor Octopus returned and her brother Bennett bit a bullet and died on Spider-Man’s watch. Doc Ock tried to use Betty as bait to lure Spidey into a trap in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #12, and managed to unmask the hero. Thankfully, nobody believed the bespectacled bookworm could be the powerful wall-crawler and laughed it all off as a simple impersonation.

The Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #8

• Published: January 10, 1964
• Added to Marvel Unlimited: November 13, 2007

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After a muddled mystery concerning a meddling Mysterio in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #13, and a clash with Giant-Man in TALES TO ASTONISH #57, Spidey glommed onto the sight of what would become one of his worst enemies, The Green Goblin, in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #14. Later, he met Kraven the Hunter’s challenge in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #15, and under the Ringmaster’s hypnotism spell, dueled with Daredevil in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #16.

Almost all of the web-slinger’s major villains to that point—Doctor Octopus, The Sandman, Electro, Kraven, Mysterio, and The Vulture—joined forces as the Sinister Six to stick it to Spidey in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN ANNUAL #1, but fell like ten-pins under their foe’s fists. The Green Goblin returned in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #17, enabling Jameson to once again label Spider-Man as a coward in his newspaper editorials. Peter decided to quit his wall-crawling career in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #18, but surged back into action when Flash Thompson once again posed as him and risked the wrath of The Sandman.

The Enforcers attempted another attack on the hero in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #19, but met defeat under the combined battery of Spidey and the Torch. Barely catching his breath from that, the web-slinger rooted out a robot duplicate sent by Kang the Conqueror to break up Earth’s Mightiest Heroes in AVENGERS #11.