Real Name: Peter Parker
First Appearance: Amazing Fantasy #15 (1962)
Affiliation: Independent hero
Powers: Spider-like strength and agility, wall-crawling, and a danger-warning spider-sense. His web-shooters are inventions, not a natural power.

Peter Parker is a teenage hero whose extraordinary abilities do not make ordinary life any easier. Bitten by a radioactive spider, he initially sees his new powers as a chance to improve his own circumstances. The death of Uncle Ben changes that outlook: Peter learns that refusing to help can have terrible consequences. His origin in Amazing Fantasy #15 establishes responsibility, rather than fame or reward, as the reason he keeps putting on the mask.

Peter must balance Spider-Man’s battles with school, money worries, and his responsibility to Aunt May. Keeping his identity secret protects his private life, but also makes it difficult to explain his absences and strange behavior. His scientific ingenuity helps him improvise when strength alone is not enough, while his camera gives him a way to earn money from the very adventures that disrupt his life.

His supporting cast creates problems no super-power can simply solve. Flash Thompson brings school rivalry, while Betty Brant and Liz Allen complicate his romantic life. J. Jonah Jameson is another persistent source of trouble. In Amazing Spider-Man #26, even finding a usable costume becomes a crisis, forcing Peter into an ill-fitting substitute while the Green Goblin and the Crime-Master struggle for control of the underworld.

That conflict continues in Amazing Spider-Man #27, where Spider-Man fights alongside the police but discovers that his suspicions about Frederick Foswell were mistaken. The Crime-Master is exposed, yet the Green Goblin’s identity remains a mystery. Peter’s courage does not make him infallible: he is still learning to judge people as carefully as he judges danger.

Coverage: based on reviews published on Reviewing Comics as of October 23, 2026.