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Spider-Man History


Spider-Man was not one of the first superheroes ever created, that distinction goes to the original Superman and other early characters such as Batman. However, Spider-Man has gone on to equal those two characters in popularity and is one of the most successful and well known comic book characters to this day.

Spider-Man was created in the midst of the Silver Age of comic books. In the beginnings of the Cold War in the United States, many elements of society came under scrutiny and attack as being un-American or against American ideals. Comic books too fell into this criticized heap.

This criticism and lagging sales led to the creation of the Comics Code Authority, and with it the Comics Code. Under these terms, superheroes once again found their place and a new popularity.

DC Comics was highly successful in retooling their old characters to fit in with the times. Seeing this, Marvel Comics would follow pace and get into the superhero business. Their first creations were the Fantastic Four. Looking for more success, Stan Lee and Marvel Comics then created Spider-Man, although surely even they could not have realized how popular the character would become.

One difference between Spider-Man and other superheroes is his age. Spider-Man when he was created was just a teenager in high school. Usually teenagers or children were relegated to second tier status in comic books as side kicks or partners. Spider-Man bucked that trend and was the star of his own show from the start.

Spider-Man’s first appearance was in Amazing Fantasy issue number 15. The issue sold so well that Spider-Man soon moved to his own comic book series, entitled the Amazing Spider-Man. Ironically, the Comics Code which in many ways led to the creation of Spider-Man was brought down by Spider-Man.

In 1971 Stan Lee released several issues of Spider-Man that dealt with the use of drugs. In the issues the drug use was portrayed negatively and the issue concept itself was something that the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare had requested to be done.

Despite these facts, the Comics Code prohibited all depictions of illegal drugs and did not give their seal to those issues of Spider-Man. Marvel published the comics anyway which has led to the current status of the Comics Code as not having the ultimate say on what gets published or not, with some companies such as Marvel completely abandoning that system.

Spider-man has one of the most distinctive and recognizable costumes of any superhero; the trademark blue and red with the web design and the spider on it, with a suit that completely covers the face. An unconfident school boy, Spider-Man receives his superpowers through the bite of radiation contaminated spider. Among these superpowers include the ability to shoot out spider webs and his famous “spider-sense”.

Like any good superhero, Spider-Man has a slew of super villains with which he must do battle. One of the most well known and frequent counterpart that he faces is the Green Goblin. This character has been seen in the recent Spider-Man films, which were amazingly lucrative at the box office.

Today Spider-Man is still going strong as a comic book character and appears in many different lines and series.