This definitive history of Spidey on film has been updated with a brand-new chapter on Spider-Man: Brand New Day, featuring interviews with Tom Holland and director Destin Daniel Cretton!

Spider-Man's legacy dates back to 1962, with his unusual origin story in Amazing Fantasy #15, helmed by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. Since then, this wisecracking crimefighter has dominated pop culture, expanding from comics to Spidey-centered television shows, video games, toys, theme park rides, and—most successfully—blockbuster movies.

But Spider-Man suffered the bumpiest ride through Hollywood's production cycle. Marvel helped create squabbles at rival studios over character rights. Filmmakers like as Roger Corman and James Cameron stalled out on big-screen Spider-Man adaptations. It was a struggle getting Sam Raimi's Spider-Man off the ground in 2002. And launching that franchise was only the beginning.

Veteran film reporter Sean O'Connell covered every Spider-Man film as they happened. With Great Power digs deep behind the scenes to unearth stories fans have never heard about Raimi's original trilogy, Sony's Spidey spinoffs, the MCU, and beyond.



Sean O'Connell spent his 30-year career covering superhero films for CBR, CinemaBlend, Fandango, USA Today, The Washington Post and more. He's been to the set of several Spider-Man films. He has interviewed the cast and creatives behind every major Spider-Man project. He even named his first son Peter (because J. Jonah O'Connell does not roll off the tongue).



Chapter One: An Amazing Time to Be Spider-Man

Chapter Two: TV Roots and Hollywood's First Silver Screen Spider-Man

Chapter Three: Cannon Fodder and James Cameron's Big Swing

Chapter Four: Marvel's Original Big Three

Chapter Five: Sam Raimi's Spider-Man

Chapter Six: The Overwhelming Challenges of Sequels

Chapter Seven: Andrew Garfield Goes to Comic-Con

Chapter Eight: Think Bigger

Chapter Nine: Shailene Woodley's Mary Jane Watson

Chapter Ten: Lending Spider-Man to Marvel

Chapter Eleven: "A Film by Peter Parker"

Chapter Twelve: Spider-Man, the Avenger

Chapter Thirteen: A Leap of Faith

Chapter Fourteen: Sony's Spider-Verse

Chapter Fifteen: An Abrupt Breakup, a Drunken Save

Chapter Sixteen: Tobey and Andrew Come 'Home'

Chapter Seventeen: Brand New Day and Spider-Man's Hollywood Future



"Sean O’Connell’s With Great Power is a perfect example of how pop culture, comic books, and even specific characters transcend cultural differences."



"A hugely entertaining and informative chronicle of the big screen history of everyone's favorite web crawler from Queens. This is a Spider-Man book by a fan for fans!"



“From the Spider-Man projects that didn’t swing to arguably the greatest film achievement in history, Sean helps the reader understand how it all unfolded. There will never be another Spider-Man book like With Great Power.”



"Clones? Alternate timelines? Parallel realities? The behind-the-scenes history of the Spider-Man movies has them all beat for head-spinning complexity, and Sean O'Connell arrives just in time to untangle that web."



"O'Connell spins a web that readers will find hard to put down. Excelsior!"



"The love for the Spider-Man character, in all of his various media, is apparent from the very first page. [...] This book has certainly made me want to dig into anything and everything Spider-Man"