Editing Marvel Comics (section)

===Spider-Man===
Arguably  the most famous Marvel superheroes who actually isn't part of a team. Spider-Man was Stan Lee's attempt to get away from the "kid sidekick" trope, which he loathed, by creating a fully independent teenage superhero - Peter Parker, a brilliant but socially awkward youth from a blue-collar background who gained fantastic spider-like powers after being bitten by an irradiated spider. When his Uncle Ben is murdered by a robber that Peter could have stopped but selfishly chose not to, Peter vows to live up to his uncle's creed that "with great power, there must also come great responsibility", and attempts to become a superpowered costumed vigilante, whilst juggling a normal life (and love life, namely around one Mary-Jane Watson) around his secret life as a crime-fighter.

Surprisingly, he's spun out a rather large "family" of knock-off Spider-folk, something that you normally see more in [[DC Comics]]. A ''short'' list of Spideys:
* ''Scarlet Spider:'' The original knock-off Spider-Man, this poor bastard was part of the infamous convoluted 90s mega-event known and loathed as "The Clone Saga". Long story short, there was a clone of Peter Parker created, nobody was sure who was the original at first, and the guy who thought he was a clone went off, dyed his hair blonde, changed his name to Ben Reilly, and created a new identify for himself as the Scarlet Spider - his suit was solid red, contrasting a blue hoodie (hood usually worn down) with a black spider emblazoned on the front. Most notable for wearing tricked out gauntlets that could launch "impact webbing" (basically webbing grenades) and spiked projectiles called "spider stingers".
** ''Kaine:'' A failed and deformed prototype clone, also from the Clone Saga. Basically Spidey's answer to Red Hood, eventually taking up the Scarlet Spider name and a new black and red suit.
* ''Venom:'' A former rival journalist bonded to a [[slime]]-like alien organism that Spidey wore for a while as living battle armor, until he found out it wanted to permanently fuse with him on a genetic level. Has repeatedly flipflopped between hero and villain. More details are below
* ''Spider-Woman:'' There have been ''multiple'' female counterparts to Spider-Man, many of them unrelated to him. All of their backstories are all a mess.
** ''Jessica Drew:'' The first Spider-Woman. Has had multiple contradictory backstories, including being treated with radiation and spider venom to save her from an incurable disease or being an actual spider hyper-evolved into a human woman. Wore a red and yellow suit. Can fly, fire bolts of bio-electricity from her hands, and emit pheromones that repulse women but enthrall men. Was introduced and kept around more for trademark reasons than anything else.
** ''Julia Carpenter:'' Got superpowers by being tricked into entering a shady super soldier program. Gained super-strength, wall-crawling, and the ability to project "psychic webbing" from her fingertips. Better known as '''Arachne''' if only because there are so goddamn many Spider-Women.
** ''Charlotte Witter:'' A psychic whose powers were involuntarily activated through torturous experiments inflicted upon her by Dr. Octopus. Possessed adhesive "psi-webs", the ability to produce telekinetic "limbs" that looked like ghostly spider's legs, precognition, telepathy, and psionic detection. The only villainous Spider-Woman.
** ''Martha Franklin:'' Niece of Spidey's antagonist J. Jonah Jameson. Through magical bullshit, gained the combined powers of the first three Spider-Women above. Then got killed off.
** ''Anya Corazon:'' Latina who belonged to a mystic society, which gave her a magical tattoo that she could use to summon a mystical carapace that gave her enhanced strength and durability. Lost that power and switched to spider-themed gadgets instead. Originally called herself '''Araña''' ("Arachnid"), now goes by Spider-Girl.
** ''Cindy Moon:'' The most recent Spider-Woman, introduced in 2014. A girl who got bit by the same spider that bit Peter Parker, but she couldn't control her powers, so she was sealed up in a bunker for a decade until Spidey freed her. Same powers as Spider-Man, but produces organic webbing from glands in her wrists. Calls herself '''Silk''' rather than Spider-Woman.
** ''May Parker'': A "What if?" story on if Mary and Peter's baby from the Clone Saga wasn't stillborn got popular enough to make her adventures an on-going that lasted over 100 issues on top of some shorter lived sequel series. The alternate reality she existed in spanned MC2, the largest AUs in Marvel's history before the Ultimate Universe came along. Is noted for her very stable, "normal" relationship with her parents that (eventually) support her heroing and, thanks to having her own original antagonists, being able to reform most of her recurring foes and make them allies. Actually called herself "Spider-Girl" in her own series, herself noting that "Spider-Woman" sounded like "somebody's mom", but less talented writers bringing her back as an adult have had her adopt the -Woman moniker.
* ''Miles Morales:'' Technically comes from another dimension, but has been permanently moved to the mainstream universe, so he counts. Mixed race (Black/Latino) teenager who got bit by the same spider that bit his dimension's version of Peter Parker. Refused to become a hero until his dimension's Spider-Man got killed. Then tried to take up the mantle in guilt. The [[skub]]biest Spidey-clone; you either love him as a genuine affirmative action legacy character, or you hate him because he doesn't seem to have any character depth outside of "Teen Spidey, but BLACK!" (A third faction exists which doesn't mind if he's just "Teen Spidey, but BLACK!" so long as his existence can head off another stupid attempt to youthen up Peter Parker like "One More Day", possibly one of the worst and most disliked retcons in comics history). Got a boost in popularity from the Spider-Verse animated movies.
* ''Gary Drew:'' Son of Jessica Drew in MC2, he had an uncurable illness so his mom subjected him to the same process that gave her her powers. This gave him Spider-Powers ''but didn't actually cure him'', so he responds by spending what he's sure will be a short life to the fullest by helping people like the original Spider-Man he idolized. May eventually convinces him to seek help from Mr. Fantastic, but he's never seen again after this, giving all sorts of grim implications. He's since appeared as a baby in mainstream Marvel continuity, largely to cap off the stupid arc where his mom continued superheroics while deeply pregnant.
* ''Miguel O'Hara:'' In the [[Cyberpunk]] future of 2099, Alchemax employee Miguel O'Hara tries to quit his job. In response, his employer drugs him with a highly addictive drug they have a monopoly on to force his continued employment. In desperation, Miguel tries to splice his own DNA, but the procedure is sabotaged. Fortunately, this only gives him spider-powers instead of killing him. After saying he's the historical figure Spider-Man in jest, he realizes taking that identity is actually a good idea. Easily the most successful 2099 series, in large part because he's not the original ''but in the future'', and has his own substantially different powers (venomous fangs and gliding) and costume.
* ''Gwen Stacy'' AKA ''Spider-Gwen'' or ''Ghost Spider'': Comes from yet another alternate universe, and thus isn't the same Gwen as below. In Spider-Gwen's continuity, ''she'' was the bitten by the Radioactive Spider, and lost Peter Parker to his self-destructive tendencies, leading to his death being a sore point for her ever since. One of several "new" characters invented for the well-received "Spider-Verse" event; she has since become a notable B or C lister--somebody the fans like, and don't mind seeing, but not popular enough to sustain her own series.

====The Many Loves of Spidey====
Since Spider-Man's core appeal is "unlucky everydude tries and usually fails to successfully juggle real life and crime fighting", of course he's got to have a lovelife as part of that. There's actually been a lot of different ladies who have dated or at least flirted with Peter Parker over the decades, but as far as casuals are concerned, there are only three girls who really matter: Gwen Stacey, Felicia Hardy, and Mary Jane Watson.

*'''Gwen Stacey''' was the very first love interest introduced in the series, and most widely remembered for the fact that her death at the hands of Spidey's archenemy the Green Goblin issued in the Bronze Age of Comics. In fact, she's not really remembered for much else! This is because she was introduced at a time when Steve Ditko was writing and, well, Ditko was a hardcore Objectionist, so those early stories about her tended to really, really ''suck'' in so far as portraying her and Peter having any sort of relationship. She did get better after Ditko left and new writers took over, but frankly she never really was handled all that well, and is mostly remembered for being the first and being the one who got killed.
*'''Mary Jane Watson''' was the second girl introduced as Peter's potential love interest, and in fact showed up for the first time whilst Peter was technically dating Gwen Stacey. Her exotic charm, sassy personality and the fact she had much more presentation as somebody with a life outside of being just "Peter's Girlfriend", which was ironically part of an attempt to keep her ''from'' overshadowing Gwen, led to fans vastly preferring her. Once Gwen died, Mary Jane became the defacto love interest, which ultimately was cemented when they got married and even nearly had a kid together. Unfortunately, that was disastrously ended in the much-hated "One More Day" storyline.
*'''Felicia Hardy/Black Cat''' was the third major love interest in Peter's life, and was essentially the "80s bad girl" counterpart to Mary Jane. A wealthy and beautiful heiress turned jewel thief, Felicia was always depicted as the more shallow of the two girls compared to Mary Jane. In particular, being an adrenaline junkie who shunned Peter's guilt-laden moral trappings, she was vastly more interested in the side of him that was Spider-Man - a man of action, confidence and death-defying stunts - than in the insecure, guilt-riddled and somewhat unhinged "Parker side" underneath.

To give you an idea of just how much Mary Jane and Felicia came to overshadow Gwen Stacey; in the 1990s Spider-Man cartoon, widely considered the best Spidey animated adaptation, they dropped Gwen Stacey entirely. Instead, Felicia was presented as Peter's first love, a Veronica-esque rich girl that Peter constantly tried to date, but never could get her to take him seriously - she even absorbed Gwen's role of being Peter's excuse for putting off meeting Mary Jane until Aunt May finally sprung her on him and he learned she was actually a hot redhead.

====One More Day and the Clone Saga====
A lot of writers and editors really hate the Peter Parker Spider-man, especially once he married Mary Jane Watson. This lead to several attempts to "fix" the character, two of which were some of the most hated storylines in all of comics. The Clone Saga (originally intended simply as a way for Peter Parker to retire as Spider-man, replacing him with Ben Riley) was hated because it went on a year longer then it should have, and had a bunch of really confusing and nonsensical plot points. One More Day had Peter Parker make a deal with Mephisto (essentially, the Devil) to save his Aunt May's life by undoing his marriage to Mary Jane. The latter is held to be one of the stupidest decisions in the history of comics, for many, many, ''many'', '''many''', '''''many''''', {{Blam|MANY}} obvious reasons.
<!-- August, 1962 -->