Blogzarro Question #6
By James Aquilone on April 28th, 2007
Why is the classic Spider-Man character nothing like a real spider?
He can’t shoot webs biologically (the orignal Spider-Man had to create web shooters); he doesn’t have eight legs or eight eyes; and he doesn’t produce venom. His only connection to real spiders is the fact that he was bitten by a radioactive arachnid and that he can cling to walls and has “spidey sense.” He has superhuman strength, too, but so does the non-spider-like Superman.
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April 29th, 2007 at 1:52 pm
A. Because he’s Spider-MAN not MAN-Spider.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v231/eldritchmonk/Spider-man_man-spider.jpg
B. Because that would have taken away from a readers ability to empathize with Peter Parker as an adolescent teen struggling to cope with extraordinary responsibility in the form of superhuman abilities.
C. Steve Ditko probably didn’t want to draw 8 arms all the damn time.
May 2nd, 2007 at 12:25 am
Good question! I bet ole Stan Lee was so busy cranking out characters he never gave any one too much thought, and had no ideas which ones, if any, would some day be part of our culture’s mythology.
Actualy, that would be a great interview question to ask him, if someone hasn’t already.
And, come to think of it, Batman isn’t really all that batlike. A little, but not much. He doesn’t have sonar batsense, and he can’t fly. But he IS a mammal.
May 4th, 2007 at 9:25 pm
So true!! That guy doesn’t have much in common with a spider at all. I could never figure out why they called him spider man. I know about the radioactive spider and all that jazz…It would be cooler if he sucked out the juice of the bad guys.
February 28th, 2008 at 4:31 pm
[...] Spider-Man is neither a spider nor a man. Discuss. [...]