The Snyder Cut

[Peelee]

So, Marvel does a comic called What-If

Imean, isn't every comic a What-If?

But yeah, when Kingpin is trying to kill Spider-Man and has him in a bear hug and Spider-Man can't break free, I'm calling shenanigans on exactly how powerful his super strength is.

[Psyren]

I agree that Kingpin's portrayals are wildly inconsistent, but that's more of a Kingpin problem than a Spiderman problem. He really does belong more as a Daredevil/Iron Fist villain than facing off with Spidey, but that's where he debuted so they keep crossing paths.

For what it's worth, Back in Black had Spiderman cut loose and body him in seconds, as you'd expect:

Spoiler: Excerpt, three pages

Show

[Rater202]

Imean, isn't every comic a What-If?

But yeah, when Kingpin is trying to kill Spider-Man and has him in a bear hug and Spider-Man can't break free, I'm calling shenanigans on exactly how powerful his super strength is.

There's not being able to break free and there's not being able to break free without maiming the person holding you.

And Peter, is, ultimately, still a human being. He has the same physical and structural vulnerabilities as humans. Someone squeezing your ribs hard enough to put pressure on your lungs isn't the most easily escapable hold—Flesh and bone can only be so-durable. Just becuase Peter's bones don't break like a normal human would, that doesn't mean that his airway wasn't restricted and he doesn't still need oxygen to function.

[Psyren]

If they insist on having Kingpin slug it out with Spiderman, they can easily handwave Kingpin's strength up to metahuman levels by just having him stick some kind of nanotech or endoskeleton into his zoot suits that gives him a strength boost. He's stuffed gadgets in there before, he's certainly rich enough to afford it, and he's so comically massive anyway that making it believable wouldn't even mess with his iconic character design. Just have his goons kidnap/blackmail some D-Lister like the Tinkerer or Melvin Potter (like he does in the Netflix series) to make it for him, and you're good to go.

Compare that approach to DC, and the goofy grape-and-lime-green monstrosity DC keeps cramming Lex Luthor into when they run out of better ideas and need him and Superman to punch each other, or whatever the hell they did to Joker when he took super-steroids in the Arkham games so they could have a completely out-of-character boss fight. Kingpin might just be a mob boss type of villain like Joker or Two-Face, but at least I could believe him charging into walls repeatedly while the hero flips out of the way.

[Dragonus45]

It's also worth noting Kingpin's physical strength, and Peter's, in various adaptations varies a lot, to the point where in a lot of the various animated series I would be willing to bet the gap is much much smaller either due to Spidey just not being train juggling strong or Kingpin being a metahuman in all but name.

[Mordar]

Pretty sure my good friend Rater has talked about Spiderman being stronger than he seems and having took on very powerful foes.

I forget the details but he it made Spiderman sound like the Batman of the Marvel Universe: in his original own series he fights street level villains, but in reality he has taken on beings far greater and is capable of punching far above his weight class.

My only issue with Spider-Man's supposed super-strength can be summed up in one word: Kingpin.

Imean, it's not terribly fair since Kingpin is mostly a Daredevil villain, but still. Spidey can be strong, but unless he just likes struggling and losing, he's probably not pulling his punches that much. And definitely not punching through Iron Man's faceplate.

But yeah, when Kingpin is trying to kill Spider-Man and has him in a bear hug and Spider-Man can't break free, I'm calling shenanigans on exactly how powerful his super strength is.

When Spider-Man hit the scene, he was fourth strongest in the Marvel Universe (behind Hulk, Thor and Thing). I think his strength is often overlooked, flexed or temporarily diminished to make the street-level thing stick. If he eats his Wheaties he can stand toe to toe with most anyone not on the cosmic scale (and yes, much of that is agility/skill related), and if he needs to be challenged by Kingpin they'll make that happen.

I wanted to say leverage plays a role in the Kingpin scene, but there are still limitations. It just seems that was an instance of flexible storytelling to create drama.

- M

[Rater202]

he can stand toe to toe with most anyone not on the cosmic scale (and yes, much of that is agility/skill related)

Peter has canonically defeated Firelord, who was a Herald of Galactus.

[Peelee]

I agree that Kingpin's portrayals are wildly inconsistent, but that's more of a Kingpin problem than a Spiderman problem. He really does belong more as a Daredevil/Iron Fist villain than facing off with Spidey, but that's where he debuted so they keep crossing paths.

For what it's worth, Back in Black had Spiderman cut loose and body him in seconds, as you'd expect:

Spoiler: Excerpt, three pages

Show

Note to self, check out Back in Black. The art looks fantastic.

There's not being able to break free and there's not being able to break free without maiming the person holding you.

And Peter, is, ultimately, still a human being. He has the same physical and structural vulnerabilities as humans. Someone squeezing your ribs hard enough to put pressure on your lungs isn't the most easily escapable hold—Flesh and bone can only be so-durable. Just becuase Peter's bones don't break like a normal human would, that doesn't mean that his airway wasn't restricted and he doesn't still need oxygen to function.

Yes, but at Pete's level of power, Kingpin shouldn't be able to constrict him to that point. It's muscle vs muscle, and our FNS-M should win easily.

Same with breaking out without breaking Kingpin. And, I have to note again, Kingpin is trying to kill him. That's not the time to play pretend and let him try regardless.

When Spider-Man hit the scene, he was fourth strongest in the Marvel Universe (behind Hulk, Thor and Thing). I think his strength is often overlooked, flexed or temporarily diminished to make the street-level thing stick. If he eats his Wheaties he can stand toe to toe with most anyone not on the cosmic scale (and yes, much of that is agility/skill related), and if he needs to be challenged by Kingpin they'll make that happen.

I wanted to say leverage plays a role in the Kingpin scene, but there are still limitations. It just seems that was an instance of flexible storytelling to create drama.

- M

My tastes in comics are very different from most, because I've never really enjoyed the whole cosmic scale heroes and villains. Does the fate of the universe need to be at stake so often? Can't smaller, more personal stakes come in more frequently? That's what I like about Spider-Man, most of the stories of his I'm familiar with are the smaller, more personal ones, and the ones I dislike are the overarching grand secrets of the universe like Madame Spider or whatever her name was. I know I'm in the minority here, but I like not needing my local heroes needing to go fight Galacticus and Universoid and the Keepers of the Eternal Moss every other week. That's just me.

[Rater202]

Yes, but at Pete's level of power, Kingpin shouldn't be able to constrict him to that point. It's muscle vs muscle, and our FNS-M should win easily.

Same with breaking out without breaking Kingpin. And, I have to note again, Kingpin is trying to kill him. That's not the time to play pretend and let him try regardless.

It doesn't matter that the Kingpin is trying to kill him, becuase unless he's wearing powered armor or using weapons that put him beyond peak human level, he's not a threat.

Peter's not gonna throw the punch that broke the robot that kicked Thor's ass against a man whose only superpower is a glandular condition.

Though, now that I think about it... I think the "bear hug" was only a thing in Spider-Man TAS. For some reason, they weren't allowed to show people punching each other.

IIRC, most of PEter and the Kingpin's fights in the comics, the ones that are actual straight-up fights instead of Fisk acting through assassins are fistfights or martial arts duels and Peter is canonically established to be humoring Fisk.

Peter's a psychological hero. Humoring villains who don't stand a chance against him is as much of his gimmick as telling Dad Jokes is: If the bad guy thinks he has a chance, then he gets overconfident and might start boasting about his plans or give you an opening.

[Psyren]

I will point out that super strength doesn't necessarily mean you're invincible if you're caught off guard. Consider Goku getting hurt by a thrown rock in DBZ, or shot in DBS.

With that said, I'd rather they augment Kingpin's considerable strength if they're going to have him and Spiderman continue being foes. (The most recent prominent example was of course Into the Spiderverse, where Kingpin KILLS him, but he's also nearly impossible to consider as a regular human in that continuity given his size.)

[Peelee]

It doesn't matter that the Kingpin is trying to kill him, becuase unless he's wearing powered armor or using weapons that put him beyond peak human level, he's not a threat.

[lukeskywalker] Your overconfidence is your weakness. [/lukeskywalker]

Spidey doesn't know what Kingpin has up his sleeve. So far as he knows, Kingpin is holding him in place until the Super Spider Bullet Gun is loaded up. Letting Kingpin try is not a smart move, and Peter is a smart guy (both academically and streetwise). I can't see most versions of Spider-Man just letting Kingpin do his thing. Getting out of his (or anyone's) control ASAP is important.

[Mystic Muse]

Peter has canonically defeated Firelord, who was a Herald of Galactus.

Ah, but has he defeated the dreaded Melon lord?

Firelord made me think of Avatar the Last Airbender. By all means ignore me and continue on.

[Rater202]

Honestly, my problem with the Kingpin is that he's not believable as a Daredevil villain.

(Note, he was a Spidey villain first.)

Fisk regularly hires super-humans who put various WWII era super soldiers t shape and funds the construction of killer robots that, unlike himself personally, are a threat to Spider-Man.

Daredevil has superhuman senses and special training that allows him to combine his senses to create a radar... But is otherwise just a normal guy. His super senses only just barely make up for the fact that he can't see.

He's an exceptionally trained normal guy, but he's otherwise no different from any given Ninja.

If Fisk devoted even a fraction of the resources he devotes to killing Spider-man to killing Daredevil, Matt Murdock would be dead. Mat can't shatter steel with his fists and while his radar sense is canonically better than Peter's Spider-Sense, he can't move as fast as Spider-Man and doesn't have Spider-Man's superhuman reflexes. If he got into a fight with the Scorpion or a Spider-Slayer, Matt would lose.

But instead, Fisk hires random ninjas and the same three people who failed to kill Matt the last time.

[Keltest]

[lukeskywalker] Your overconfidence is your weakness. [/lukeskywalker]

Spidey doesn't know what Kingpin has up his sleeve. So far as he knows, Kingpin is holding him in place until the Super Spider Bullet Gun is loaded up. Letting Kingpin try is not a smart move, and Peter is a smart guy (both academically and streetwise). I can't see most versions of Spider-Man just letting Kingpin do his thing. Getting out of his (or anyone's) control ASAP is important.

Guns dont work like that. Shooting Peter while Kingpin is actively hugging him is just going to result in Kingpin getting shot too. Even in comic book logic, the human shield is a recurring trope.

[Fyraltari]

[lukeskywalker]Peter is a smart guy (both academically and streetwise)

[nitpick]
I dunno, he did confuse trachea and oesophagus in those three pages upthread.[/nitpick]

[Peelee]

Guns dont work like that. Shooting Peter while Kingpin is actively hugging him is just going to result in Kingpin getting shot too. Even in comic book logic, the human shield is a recurring trope.

The third dimension is fun!

Besides, Kingpin is wearing his Unobtanium vest. Obviously.

[nitpick]
I dunno, He did confuse trachea and oesophagus in those three pages upthread.[/nitpick]

Eh, he's a physicist, not a biologist.

.... I think?

[Rater202]

Peter's degree in is Bio-physics, the interplay of physics and biology, though he's also noted to be a talented bio-chemist to the point that Reed Richards has canonically gone to Peter for help with biochemistry issues.

Though it should be noted that Peter canonically has an IQ of 250(which implies that the population of Earth 616 is much, much higher than in real life) and is depicted as being a all-around general genius.

The Web-Fluid is something that he invented a whim in 10 minutes out of stuff he had in a storebought chemistry set and yet government agents and Reed Richards himself have both failed in replicating it, even with samples to study, and Hank Pym was pissed off when he examined the Spider-Tracers.

Peter mentioned that they're sloppy becuase he made them back in high school on a shoestring budget and never got around to redesigning them when his skill improved... And this pisses Hank off because the Spider-Tracers(which are keyed in such a way that PEter can track them with Spider-Sense) operate using the same technology as his ant controlling helmet... But are more powerful, smaller, and more efficient.

Meaning that a significant portion of Pym's life's work was independently invented and then improved on almost casually by a highschool kid with no budget.

In Spider-Man and the X-Men(TLDR, Spider-Man is teaching ethics at the Jean Grey Institute for Mutant Education and Outreach because Logan suspects that there's a spy in the student body and didn't trust the rest of the X-Men to be objective) Hank "Beast" McCoy seemed to feel threatened by Spider-Man's presence and issued a challenge: Spider-Man and the students in his ethics class vs BEast and the students in his advanced engineering contest both enter an exhibit into the school's science fair.

Beast's class studied the teleportation of the Demon Bamfs(minor demons from the Brimstone Dimension, basically little tiny Nightcrawlers) and created a teleportation gate to the SWORD space station.

Peter's class cured cancer.

[Psyren]

I like the idea of Peter being smart enough to design something that, in combination with his unique power set to iterate on it, proved difficult if not impossible for other Marvel luminaries to replicate.

I don't as much like the idea of Peter being in the same mental weight class as Reed, Banner, Stark and Pym. Part of Spiderman's appeal is that anybody lucky (or unlucky) enough to get these powers could be a hero, and that's a harder sell if he's a Class A prodigy. This is why I also dislike stories about the spider bite being somehow destined or arranged by Peter's dead parents.

[Lemmy]

It's worth noting that the levels of physical and mental prowess a "normal human" can achieve in comic books are waaaaaaaay higher than what can be achieved IRL... Even without the assistance of magic or technology.

It's possible (and extremely likely) that Kingpin is super-human by real life standards, but still within what's humanly possible in the Marvel universe.

[Peelee]

I've always liked the natural webbing over the devices he created. It's thematic with his other powers and, as Psyren put it, better fits the whole "anybody could be Spider-Man" message.

[Rater202]

I don't as much like the idea of Peter being in the same mental weight class as Reed, Banner, Stark and Pym. Part of Spiderman's appeal is that anybody lucky (or unlucky) enough to get these powers could be a hero, and that's a harder sell if he's a Class A prodigy. This is why I also dislike stories about the spider bite being somehow destined or arranged by Peter's dead parents.

That's the thing about Spider-Man, despite being presented as a normal guy he kind of... Isn't.

Normal guys don't get to be good-looking super-geniuses who exclusively date strong, intelligent women who are beautiful enough to be supermodels or movie stars without excessive makeup or unhealthy diets and be rich at multiple non-sequential periods of time.

Peter's Parents were CIA Agents that were friends with Nick Fury and wolverine for crap's sake. The reason he's an orphan is because his parents were murdered by the Red Skull and he discovered that they were spying on him(The Soviet Imposter, not Johann Schmidt.)

Peter is relatable but he's not an ordinary guy by any means.

[Peelee]

That mostly sounds like power creep mixed with bad writing. Which sadly seems more and more likely the longer a series lasts. It's like Godwin but for narratives; as a series continues, the likelihood of ridiculous power creep approaches 1.

[Willie the Duck]

I've always liked the natural webbing over the devices he created. It's thematic with his other powers and, as Psyren put it, better fits the whole "anybody could be Spider-Man" message.

That's the thing about Spider-Man, despite being presented as a normal guy he kind of... Isn't.

Normal guys don't get to be good-looking super-geniuses who exclusively date strong, intelligent women who are beautiful enough to be supermodels or movie stars without excessive makeup or unhealthy diets and be rich at multiple non-sequential periods of time.

Peter's Parents were CIA Agents that were friends with Nick Fury and wolverine for crap's sake. The reason he's an orphan is because his parents were murdered by the Red Skull and he discovered that they were spying on him(The Soviet Imposter, not Johann Schmidt.)

Peter is relatable but he's not an ordinary guy by any means.

Peter is hardly the first or last fictional character who has a primary core of his being (relatable every-man) take something of a hit (or at least a fridge realization that maybe it doesn't really apply) as their backstory becomes retroactively cluttered. I don't think people would have glommed on to Spider-Man in the 60s if he already had the backstory created by subsequent works.

[Lord Raziere]

That's the thing about Spider-Man, despite being presented as a normal guy he kind of... Isn't.

Normal guys don't get to be good-looking super-geniuses who exclusively date strong, intelligent women who are beautiful enough to be supermodels or movie stars without excessive makeup or unhealthy diets and be rich at multiple non-sequential periods of time.

Peter's Parents were CIA Agents that were friends with Nick Fury and wolverine for crap's sake. The reason he's an orphan is because his parents were murdered by the Red Skull and he discovered that they were spying on him(The Soviet Imposter, not Johann Schmidt.)

Peter is relatable but he's not an ordinary guy by any means.

I was gonna ask why Marvel keeps trying to convince us that he is somehow a loser when he does this amazing stuff. But the reason is clear: Profit.

Also the "anyone can be spiderman" message I'm sure is more of "Into the Spiderverse" thing which while a stellar film, phenomenal really, one of my favorites films of like, all time......I'm not sure was ever a Spiderman theme in general? I dunno.

[Peelee]

It may explain why Into the Spider-Verse is the best Spider-Man story I have seen thus far. Or at least my favorite by a long shot.

[Dienekes]

That mostly sounds like power creep mixed with bad writing. Which sadly seems more and more likely the longer a series lasts. It's like Godwin but for narratives; as a series continues, the likelihood of ridiculous power creep approaches 1.

Yeah, comics are by their nature inconsistent.

Spidey is portrayed as stronger than the average person. How much varies based on the author and themes of the works. When he’s facing Juggernaut in an awesome comic about Pete striving against impossible odds, it doesn’t matter that he has canonically lifted heavier things than Juggs ever has.

Trying to make a consistent guideline about who’s stronger or what powers relate to each other seems an exercise in futility.

Fisk has gotten into fistfights with Pete and utterly stomped him. Fisk has also been beaten in like a page. Both are canon.

If you’re interested in internal consistency, then yeah it’s pretty bad writing. If you’re interested in watching character dynamics, personality growth, development of arcs. It’s... still often pretty bad. But occasionally really good.

[Psyren]

That's the thing about Spider-Man, despite being presented as a normal guy he kind of... Isn't.

Normal guys don't get to be good-looking super-geniuses who exclusively date strong, intelligent women who are beautiful enough to be supermodels or movie stars without excessive makeup or unhealthy diets and be rich at multiple non-sequential periods of time.

Peter's Parents were CIA Agents that were friends with Nick Fury and wolverine for crap's sake. The reason he's an orphan is because his parents were murdered by the Red Skull and he discovered that they were spying on him(The Soviet Imposter, not Johann Schmidt.)

Peter is relatable but he's not an ordinary guy by any means.

I'm saying all the CIA/Red Skull/Nick Fury stuff was a mistake. It adds nothing to his character save complexity and a superfluous "chosen one" angle, and the one big screen iteration where they tried to use any of it bombed atomically hard. (There were multiple reasons for that obviously, but I firmly believe the insane level of clutter from the Richard and Mary Parker storyline played a big part in that.)

Also the "anyone can be spiderman" message I'm sure is more of "Into the Spiderverse" thing which while a stellar film, phenomenal really, one of my favorites films of like, all time......I'm not sure was ever a Spiderman theme in general? I dunno.

ITS came out in 2018, and that central theme of the movie was based on a Stan Lee quote from 2015, where he said "What I like about the costume is that anybody reading Spider-Man in any part of the world can imagine that they themselves are under the costume. And that’s a good thing.” Making Peter a scion of super-spy parents whose machinations led to him being chosen for the bite undermines that considerably.

[Rater202]

1: The bite was a freak accident.

2: Peter's parents being super-spies gave us Terressa Parker and Terressa is awesome.

[Psyren]

1: The bite was a freak accident.

2: Peter's parents being super-spies gave us Terressa Parker and Terressa is awesome.

1. Had ASM continued, it didn't seem like that's what they were going to go with.

2. Resounding ehhhhh. Another femme fatale spy, really? Marvel doesn't have enough of those?

[Lord Raziere]

I'm saying all the CIA/Red Skull/Nick Fury stuff was a mistake. It adds nothing to his character save complexity and a superfluous "chosen one" angle, and the one big screen iteration where they tried to use any of it bombed atomically hard. (There were multiple reasons for that obviously, but I firmly believe the insane level of clutter from the Richard and Mary Parker storyline played a big part in that.)

ITS came out in 2018, and that central theme of the movie was based on a Stan Lee quote from 2015, where he said "What I like about the costume is that anybody reading Spider-Man in any part of the world can imagine that they themselves are under the costume. And that’s a good thing.” Making Peter a scion of super-spy parents whose machinations led to him being chosen for the bite undermines that considerably.

Well your probably right.

But too bad. "Normal everyman" in comic books generally actually means they're a world-class prodigy hypertalent human whose skills are ludicrous to impossible just to make sure they can keep up with all the superpowers, ultra-tech, magic, aliens and gods flying around. other supers as evidence:
Batman
Green Arrow
The Joker
Lex Luthor
Many Batman villains
SHIELD Agents
Deadshot
Amanda Waller
The Punisher

If anything, Peter's default state of being poor is giving him a handicap in terms of this since many of these others have money or agencies backing them to make all the stuff that helps them.