No superhero has enjoyed as many 21st-century screen incarnations as Spider-Man – a testament, perhaps, to the studio machine in cynically regenerative overdrive, but also to the universal, anyone-can-be-a-hero appeal of the teenage web-slinger, the most enduring comic book movie icon this side of Batman.
Spidey's elastic appeal was best captured in 2018's Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, the Oscar-winning animated hit that added Spider-women, spider-pigs and even more Spider-men to an already crowded mix, all while unleashing the reality-bending possibilities of the Multiverse – a concept that quickly became a stock device driving Marvel's lucrative fan service (with diminishing creative returns).
