Spider-Man has been a fantastic character for Marvel for many decades, becoming their best-known superhero in the world and proving to be equally popular when it comes to cinematic adventures, having excelled over and over on the big screen since first appearing in 2002 played by Tobey Maguire. The character has been recast and other versions than Peter Parker have appeared on the big screen in more recent years, but one thing that remains the same is loss.
Spider-Man: Across The Spider-Verse made a major point out of the fact that loss journey of every version of Spider-Man. Whether in live-action or animation, across film, TV, and comic books, the story of Spider-Man, every Spider-Man, includes an element of loss that fans have become accustomed to, breaking the hearts of fans time and time again as characters near and dear to Spidey meet their demise.
WARNING! Spoilers ahead for Spider-Man movies.
9 Peter Parker
Into the Spider-Verse did something that fans have never seen before in a film setting, it killed Peter Parker. This shocking act made for an excessively strange moment, and a sad one, as the world mourned the loss of a much-beloved version of Spider-Man himself. The story didn’t end there, however, but simply shifted to focusing on Miles Morales as he became the new Spider-Man for a world painfully left without one.
Nevertheless, the fact that Peter Parker actually perished at the hands of Kingpin and stayed dead made for some unexpectedly high stakes right off the bat for Into the Spider-Verse to work with. Peter Parker’s death set the story off in the direction that the Spider-Verse films have stayed on, a true sense of heroism and loss, a darkness that many wouldn’t have expected from an animated superhero movie.
8 Uncle Ben (Amazing Spider-Man)
Martin Sheen was a great choice to help Marc Web’s new take on Spider-Man get off on the right footing. Fans had already seen the origin of Peter Parker featuring the death of Uncle Ben a mere ten years earlier in the Tobey Maguire movies, and everyone in the cinema knew that this death was inevitable, but despite lacking a shock factor, this one still hurt because of the great performances of Martin Sheen and Andrew Garfield.
Uncle Ben’s death is an iconic one, and while this version of the death wasn’t the first time it had been seen on the big screen, the effect it had on Peter and his life was a similarly painful one to watch as the first time around. Andrew Garfield’s version of Peter Parker experienced a lot of loss over his two films, but this starting one was a big hit in the feels for audience members.
7 Harry Osborn
This final loss that ended the trilogy of Sam Raimi films felt inevitable in coming. After Harry Osborn found out that his childhood friend, Peter Parker, was Spider-Man, the very hero he blamed for the death of his father, it became very likely that there would be a conflict in which Harry’s survival odds were less than promising.
However, like several villains throughout the Spider-Man franchise, Harry actually managed to reform in time to save Peter when he was outmatched by Sandman and Venom working together. Though this led to his sacrifice and Venom killing him, Harry got to fully reform by telling Peter that they were still best friends in his final moments, making this death all the more heartbreaking.
6 Aaron Davis
Into the Spider-Verse contained another major death, once again choosing to kill the uncle of the leading character as part of an emotional journey for the lead. It happened in quite a different way for Miles though, first finding out his uncle was the villainous Prowler before having to defeat him.
However, Aaron somewhat redeemed himself in the end by refusing to kill Miles after discovering his identity and was subsequently shot by Kingpin for his inaction. Aaron expressed regret before slipping away, making this scene that much more heartbreaking. We've also seen this character in live-action, though his death might not be repeated.
5 Captain Stacy
The Amazing Spider-Man didn’t have a final death as significant as in some other Spider-Man movies, but the loss of Captain Stacy during the final battle with the Lizard was a heart-breaking moment. Gwen’s father, Captain Stacy had proven himself a reliable officer, even if he was extremely reluctant to trust in Spider-Man and his intentions.
Nevertheless, Stacy proved himself honorable, his death scene becoming all the sadder because of his final request to Peter. In his final moments, he asked that Peter would leave Gwen out of his future superhero activities. Given Peter later going back on this promise and how that led to Gwen’s future death, this scene feels all the more tragic.
4 Otto Octavius
The saddest villain death by far throughout any Spider-Man movie to date is that of Otto Octavius. Alfred Molina’s infamous portrayal of this villain was part of what made Spider-Man 2 such a beloved movie, and his loss after attempting to redeem himself in his final moments felt like a truly tragic one, which other, stranger versions of the character haven't done as well.
Octavius realized what he had done and was lucid again in his final seconds, his final words “I will not die a monster” brought him back around in the opinion of the audience, making his loss a truly sad moment. Stopping the deaths of so many with his own made him one of the few truly redeemable characters in Spider-Man’s large villain roster.
3 Uncle Ben (Spider-Man)
The first time that audiences saw Uncle Ben die in 2002’s Spider-Man was a true telling of the origin story and a terribly sad moment for audiences, though he'd appeared in video games before this. This original death came as quite a shock to many audience members, and almost completely out of nowhere. The worst part was that Peter was willing to let his murderer get away when he could have stopped him prior to the murder.
This act led Peter down a rabbit hole of violence, and he was partially responsible for the death of Uncle Ben’s killer after hunting him down. But the final moments he had with his uncle were some of the most tragic and heartfelt in the franchise’s history.
2 Aunt May
Of all the times Uncle Ben died, the reverse wasn’t as frequent an occurrence. Aunt May is a perennial figure in the Spider-Man franchise, something left behind in the wake of all the other deaths that usually occur around Peter. But in Spider-Man: No Way Home, even she managed to suffer consequences for getting involved in the crazy superhero world.
Marisa Tomei played a great version of Peter’s sole caretaker, but No Way Home was about consequences and loss for Peter, the most brutally felt of all being May’s death in the aftermath of the Green Goblin’s attack. Giving Peter the sense of loss and the pain that Uncle Ben’s death usually brings, this one hit harder coming at the end of a trilogy of films, having allowed the audience to get to know this version of May so well.
1 Gwen Stacy
But the saddest and most completely heart-breaking death of any character in the Spider-Man franchise goes to Gwen Stacy in The Amazing Spider-Man 2. After the first film in that edition of the Spider-Man movies presented such a great love story between Peter and Gwen, the tumultuous nature of their relationship in the sequel, followed by this climactic loss, was a true heart-break for fans.
Emma Stone was a great Gwen Stacy, providing Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man with a fantastic side character, and the slow motion death scene before the horrible crack that told audiences she hadn’t survived and Peter had technically killed her made for one of the most terrible moments to be witnessed in a superhero movie, although Garfield's character later made up for it in one of the best Spidey moments ever. The original, comic book defining loss for Peter was the one that truly broke audiences in the cinema over all else.