The Spider-Man Movies Ranked
Spider-Man is my favorite superhero. I wanted to be Spider-Man as a kid. I’ve written before about how much Spider-Man means to me. And the first SPIDER-MAN movie had a lot to do with that. I’ve enjoyed almost every Spider-Man movie, and in fact, as you may see quite soon, I’ve even got a spicy take or two about how they stack up against one another. This piece will encompass the eight Spider-Man movies released since the aforementioned Sam Raimi film; it won’t take into account the earlier theatrical releases of episode compilations from the ’70s TV series or Spider-Man’s appearances in CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR (2016) or the most recent AVENGERS movies. I also almost included VENOM (2018) since it’s, ya know, part of Sony’s weird potential Spider-Villain-Verse, but it’s just too far gone from anything actually Peter Parker related.
EDIT 12/21/21: Added SPIDER-MAN: NO WAY HOME.
EDIT 6/5/23: Added SPIDER-MAN: ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE.
#10 — SPIDER-MAN 3 (2007)
D: Sam Raimi
Yeah, of course SPIDER-MAN 3 is the worst Spider-Man movie. Overstuffed with villains, replete with bizarre scenes like the street dancing (you know what I’m talking about), and a real commitment to making the movie as 2007-emo as possible, SPIDER-MAN 3’s biggest sin was probably making Venom a real lame character. I mean, Venom’s already kind of corny, but he’s always been threatening in the comics. I love Topher Grace, but he’s not necessarily the dude to make Venom a powerhouse presence. SPIDER-MAN 3 is also a totally forgettable movie, besides its memeable moments. It feels like a world apart from its predecessors, truly, both in quality and actual tone.
#9 — SPIDER-MAN: NO WAY HOME (2021)
D: Jon Watts
In the two years since I originally wrote this list, COVID has ravaged the world, Disney has continued to cement its multimedia domination, and the monolith’s properties have continued to box out cinematic art of any other form. While I think some of the “MCU will kill film” takes are a bit overblown, it’s hard to look at all the hype for a movie like SPIDER-MAN: NO WAY HOME, its box office domination, and the marginalization of movies like Guillermo Del Toro’s NIGHTMARE ALLEY (2021), which was even released by Disney itself, and not feel a little depressed. I provide this much background because it defined my attitude going into NO WAY HOME, an exciting new film starring my favorite superhero, with many aspects of old movies and other Spider-Man “cinematic universes” coming into play. And when the mammoth runtime was all over…I wasn’t smitten with the nostalgia-inducing and multiverse-bending movie. There are many spoilers wrapped up in my perspective on the movie, and since the movie is still new at the time of this writing, I won’t delve deep in that way. Instead, I’ll note two outstanding qualities of NO WAY HOME, one good, one bad. Let’s start with the good news. I think NO WAY HOME, akin to SPIDER-MAN 2 in a way, evolves the MCU incarnation of Peter Parker to consider the tragic aspects of the character’s life, something that always appealed to my angsty self. But after all of the factors that support this interpretation (here comes the bad news) are brought into play, when the movie was over, it all felt a little hollow. NO WAY HOME is a postmodern, ironic adaptation of adaptations, the product of a self-aware, almost cynical formula that brought to my mind that I was watching a movie with every applause- and scream-inducing character reveal (yes, grown people did this in the theater I watched the movie in). Even though elements of them are in NO WAY HOME, the earnestness of Raimi’s films, and even Webb’s, are overridden. NO WAY HOME is entertaining and fun, but like the popcorn I ate while my stomach was completely empty, it was satisfying in the moment, then left me with an appetite for something richer.
#8 — SPIDER-MAN: FAR FROM HOME (2019)
D: Jon Watts
Woo, the spicy take(s) is(are) underway already! Look, I really enjoyed FAR FROM HOME. From here on in, that’s the case with every Spider-Man movie. But as with HOMECOMING, but to a much more extreme degree, I was quite disappointed after Tom Holland’s Peter Parker presence in AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR (2018) and AVENGERS: ENDGAME (2019). I didn’t really get any of the emotional beats in FAR FROM HOME that were so strong in those movies, beyond perhaps his budding romance with Zendaya’s MJ. But the things that made Peter’s storyline so strong in the Avengers movies, his connection to Robert Downey Jr’s Tony Stark, bogged FAR FROM HOME down. Never have I felt the omnipresent Marvel Cinematic Universe plot machine complicate a movie so needlessly. It feels like half of the movie is exposition and a reminder that ENDGAME happened. Peter Parker’s identity is wrapped up in Iron Man and moving parts that really miss the point of Spider-Man’s singular place in the Marvel universe; that is, his most compelling moments are when he’s a lone wolf. FAR FROM HOME attempted to embrace this by leaving Peter stranded without the resources that he’s had so far, and the moment when he has to leave MJ at the opera is resonant of the best comics moments. But this isn’t capitalized on nearly enough. I love Jake Gyllenhaal, and he delivers a good performance, but Mysterio’s machinations are a bit dubious, even as far as superhero movie funny business goes. BUT. But. The movie is fun, the action’s good, there are jokes. I just can’t face the fact that it doesn’t measure up to other true Spider-experiences on film.
#7 — THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN (2012)
D: Marc Webb
The Andrew Garfield “duology” is unfairly maligned, I think. Sure, they’re a bit conventional. They came probably a bit too close on the heels of the previous reincarnation of the franchise, rehashing an origin story that even distant pop culture watchers knew quite well. But Marc Webb’s two movies tried to do something interesting with it, creating a longer through line surrounding Peter’s parents. That stuff was a bit much, but otherwise, THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN still satisfactorily nailed the come up of Spider-Man and the problems Peter faces. It was given a nice, “modern” 2012 sheen too, something that quite appealed to me at 16 years old. It had the perfect balance of angst and coolness. The sequence with the Lizard in the sewers was pretty cool, even if the villain’s CG is a bit wonky. The first of these movies, however, is more forgettable and rough in my opinion…
#6 — THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2 (2014)
D: Marc Webb
…even though many agree the sequel is one of the worst Spider-Man movies. I loved it. The chemistry between Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone is palpable; Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy’s romance in this movie affected me more than even Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst’s in the original trilogy. And the commitment to Gwen Stacy’s storyline was actually chilling. I kept thinking “they” weren’t going to break her neck, but “they” did. Spoiler I guess. I would have been really interested to see where the third of these movies would have gone, but it’s probably for the best we got Tom Holland into the MCU. But did the MCU have Paul Giamatti as the Rhino, a performance I unironically loved!? I think not.
#5 — SPIDER-MAN: HOMECOMING (2017)
D: Jon Watts
But yeah, Spider-Man’s full-fledged introduction into the MCU was pretty good. Bypassing the origin story while keeping Peter firmly in the high school environment more convincingly than the Andrew Garfield movies and unlike the Tobey Maguire ones, HOMECOMING nailed that era of Peter Parker’s life the best. And it updated it to the modern era; high school Peter Parker hasn’t been seen in the comics for quite some time, even counting the Ultimate universe. And it updated it to include a world of other superheroes, something no Spider-Man movie had to do before. The influence of Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley on the screenplay (which of course is credited to a million people) makes for a pretty hilarious and clever movie. It was beholden to the events of CIVIL WAR and such while keeping Peter in his own world, for the most part. We still got street level exposure, and his angst was more faithfully rooted and compelling than what felt rushed or scattershot in FAR FROM HOME. Michael Keaton also plays a tremendous and relatively complex villain as the Vulture. I remember being somewhat disappointed in HOMECOMING for some reason, but my esteem for it has risen in the couple years since it released.
#4 — SPIDER-MAN: ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE (2023)
D: Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers, Justin K. Thompson
INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE was nothing less than an animation marvel and its sequel upped that ante with an eclectic array of styles and inspirations, melded fluidly and with palpable movement. The controlled chaos of SPIDER-MAN: ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE’s look matches its amping up of the previous movie’s multiversal metatext, throwing what seems like hundreds of different Spider-People at the screen and imparting expansive implications for the fate of every dimension. This all makes for a heady brew and at ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE’s core is the satisfaction of great humor and heart that marked INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE. But the massive swing of this film, which will lead into another sequel directly tied to the very end of ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE, plays into the pitfalls of multiverse stories chock full of references and broader points about the medium(s, of film and comic books and video games and…). Now, since I love Spider-Man, those elements are intriguing, and to the movie’s credit, it never truly falls prey to the weight of “hey, recognize this?” moments like many other works that attempt this approach. Nevertheless, there is a slight downgrade from the self-contained arc and relatively reined-in self-referential style of its predecessor, making ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE a phenomenal movie with a bit, truly a small amount, of baggage.
#3 — SPIDER-MAN: INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE (2018)
D: Bob Persischetti, Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman
A lot of people have taken to calling INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE the best Spider-Man movie, which is fair. Nostalgia is a hell of a beast, but make no bones about it, INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE is in the upper echelon of superhero movies period. And it’s animated. That’s not a dig, since in fact I love animation. I just mean that animated movies are often taken less seriously, so for SPIDER-VERSE to receive the attention it has speaks volumes of its emotional resonance and clever writing. And oh yeah, of course, its incredible animation. Spider-Ham is in the movie, voiced by John Mulaney. That should tell you all you need to know about how gotdang committed to the weird wonderful world of Spider-Man’s history this movie is, but also how committed it is to telling new(ish) stories by way of Miles Morales and his relationship with his real dad and alternate-universe-middle-aged-spider-dad-Jake-Johnson-voiced-Peter-Parker.
#2 — SPIDER-MAN (2002)
D: Sam Raimi
But as mentioned, it is so hard for me to move past how much SPIDER-MAN impacted me as a kid. And it truly was, is a good superhero movie, especially at a time when there weren’t really…any of them. SPIDER-MAN was probably the best comic book movie to date; I think it’s better than X-MEN (2000). Anyways, Raimi’s adaptation nailed the special place Peter Parker occupies in my heart, and why Spider-Man is so entertaining but also kind of dark and sad. Tobey Maguire pulled off a good sad but charming and funny Peter, and the supporting cast is so good, most notably including scenery chewers Willem Dafoe and J.K. Simmons.
#1 — SPIDER-MAN 2 (2004)
D: Sam Raimi
And SPIDER-MAN 2 ratcheted everything up. It’s a rare movie sequel, one that expands the scope and evolves the characters meaningfully. Peter Parker’s no-good-very-bad days are not schmaltzy…OK, maybe they’re a little schmaltzy, but the angst is not unwarranted or cheap. Alfred Molina as Doc Ock is a sympathetic villain, and all the action sequences of the first movie are eclipsed by those in SPIDER-MAN 2. These lists are always interesting, because I always seem to have the fewest words for my favorites. But just know that no other Spider-Man movie has pulled off what makes the character so special to me quite this well.
