List of Spider Man enemies

Debuting in Spider-Man titles

The majority of supervillains depicted in Spider-Man comics first appeared in The Amazing Spider-Man while some first appeared in later spinoff comics such as The Spectacular Spider-Man and Marvel Team-Up and other titles.

The Amazing Spider-Man debuts

Most of the supervillains of Spider-Man would be introduced in The Amazing Spider-Man comic book starting with the Chameleon. The early villains would be introduced in the 1960s in the Silver Age of Comic Books. Originally created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. John Romita, Sr. would soon replace Ditko starting with the Rhino. Gerry Conway later replaced Stan Lee and helped create new adversary for the web-slinger and also helped pave the way to the Bronze Age of Comic Books with depicting Green Goblin as the killer of Spider-Man's long time romantic interest, Gwen Stacy. Many collaborators would soon take over The Amazing Spider-Man title. One of the more popular examples included Todd McFarlane's Venom in the Modern Age of Comic Books. Note: Alter ego characters who are the most high profile in the supervillain alias but others have shared that supervillain name are in bold. Alter egos listed having N/A use their real name as the supervillain name. In chronological order.

The Spectacular Spider-Man debuts

Note: In chronological order.

Marvel Team-Up debuts

Note: In chronological order.

Debuting in other Spider-Man titles

Note: In chronological order.

Reformed supervillain / anti-hero opponents

Almost all the characters listed first appeared in The Amazing Spider-Man with the exception of Kaine and Humbug first appearing in Web of Spider-Man. The Prowler is the oldest character appearing in The Amazing Spider-Man in the 1960s in the Silver Age. Many other anti-heroes were introduced in the 1970s in between the Silver Age and the Bronze Age while Humbug was introduced in the 1980s right around the start of the Modern Age. Kaine is the youngest debuted character while Cardiac is the second youngest. Both Kaine and Cardiac appeared around the 1990s.

Non-supervillain enemies

The Burglar and Flash Thompson both appeared in the first comic book starring Spider-Man appearing in the anthology series Amazing Fantasy. The certain comic book story inspired a comic book series entitled The Amazing Spider-Man which J. Jonah Jameson would appear in the first issue. All three of the characters listed appeared in the 1960s around the Silver Age of Comics.

Lesser foes

Delilah

Delilah first appeared in The Amazing Spider-Man #414 by Tom DeFalco and Mark Bagley. The Rose's confidante as well as his chief enforcer, Delilah helped battle to maintain control of part of the New York crime scene against the threat of the Black Tarantula.

During her career, she had a role in the rebirth of two of Spider-Man's old foes during the Rose's efforts to gain extra muscle: she was the one who threw the switch of the electric chair which gave Electro his powers back, and helped set up the theft of Doctor Octopus' corpse for re-animation from the Hand. She also appears in Loners as an assassin smuggling MGH.

Spidercide

Spidercide was a major antagonist in the Maximum Clonage story arc. He first appeared in The Spectacular Spider-Man #222 by Tom DeFalco and Sal Buscema. He is depicted as an evil foil of Spider-Man and Ben Reilly. He is one of the clones created by Jackal just like Ben Reilly and Kaine. This time being a clone to Ben Reilly.

He was designed as a red herring that was introduced to make him seem to be the real Peter Parker and that Spidercide was the original Parker but only to discover later discover that the Peter Parker they had been reading for years was actually a clone.

He is eventually granted the unique ability to turn into other materials and shapes much like the symbiotes. He was killed off in Spider-Man: Maximum Clonage: Omega #404 by being thrown off in the Daily Bugle.

Group villains

Note: The common leader of the group is in bold.

Archenemies

Unlike well known rivalries in comics book depictions where heroes always still have more than one enemy but usually one archenemy (e.g., Joker, to Batman in DC Comics, Red Skull to Captain America, Doctor Doom to the Fantastic Four and the Brotherhood of Mutants to the X-Men in Marvel Comics etc.), Spider-Man is known to have three archenemies and it can be debated or disputed as to which one is worse:

1. ^ Doctor Octopus is regarded as one of Spider-Man's worst enemies. He has been cited as the man Peter might have become if he hadn't been raised with a sense of responsibility. He is infamous for defeating him the first time in battle and for almost marrying Peter's Aunt May. He is the core leader of the Sinister Six and has also referred himself as the "Master Planner". ("If This Be My Destiny...!") Later depictions revealed him in Peter Parker's body where he was the titular character for a while.
2. ^ Norman Osborn using the alias as Green Goblin is Spider-Man's archenemy. Mostly after he is responsible for setting up the death of Spider-Man's girlfriend in one of the most famous Spider-Man stories of all time which helped end the Silver Age of Comic Books and begin the Bronze Age of Comic Books. He was thought to be dead after that but writers help bring him back from the 1990s and he returned to plague Spider-Man once more in the comic books (such as being involved of the killing of Aunt May) and other heroes (such as the Avengers). He is also an enemy of Spider-Man sometimes just as Norman and not just only as the Green Goblin.
3. ^ Another character commonly described as archenemy is Venom. Eddie Brock as Venom is commonly described as the mirror version or the evil version of Spider-Man in many ways. Venom's goals are usually depicted as ruining Spider-Man's life and messing with Spider-Man's head. Venom is also one of the most popular Spider-Man villains. This popularity has led him to be an established iconic character of his own with own comic book stories.

Reception

Reaction to Spider-Man's rogues gallery has been overwhelmingly positive with many journalists citing it as one of the greatest comic book rogues galleries of all time, with Batman's rogues gallery being its most rivaled contender. Although editors such Hollywood Reporter's Graeme McMillan felt that only Flash's rogues gallery can compete with Spider-Man's rogues. Kyle Schmidlin of What Culture! described the superhero's rogues gallery as "one of the most colorful in comics" explaining that Batman could only be debated as having a great number of enemies as good as Spider-Man. IGN staff editors, Joshua Yehl and Jesse Schedeen, described the Spider-Man villains as "one of the most iconic and well-balanced in comics". They opined that the scope of their schemes, how cool their powers are, and how dramatically they have affected Spider-Man's life is what makes the Spider-Man villains so great. Newsarama ranked Spider-Man's rogues gallery as number one out ten as the greatest rogues gallery of all time.

Themes

George Marston of Newsarama explaining why he felt that Spider-Man rogues gallery was the best was the thematic elements that the villains of Spider-Man manifested. He explained that just like the superhero they have the same concept of science gone wrong. They are "like him, great men with great minds, great power, and great determination." But instead they fail to use their powers responsibly. Separating the thin line between being a hero from being a villain.