For me, the ones that stick out are the issue where the Beyonder turned the Heroes for Hire building into gold and Peter was torturing himself over keeping a gold clipboard or something (guest starring Duke from GI Joe..or someone who looked like him), the Hobgoblin arc and Spider-Man beating Fire-Lord, which was really the 80's version of him lifting the rubble from the 60's.

So, the Stern era Spidey.

Definitely the Lee/Ditko run. I got to read most of that monthly in Marvel Tales in the '80s - so great. (I loved the Stern run, too).

The issues of Spectacular in which he fought Carrion and met The White Tiger (while studying the 'Erskine Papers' at Empire University), and Gloria Grant was J. Jonah Jameson's secretary. I love that era/version of the character; even though I initially read B&W reprints of the Lee/Ditko stuff when I was first starting to get into comics, the version who appeared in Spectacular was "my" Spider-Man. I'm not even sure why, that's just my favourite version of him. Maybe it was because there was such a great cast of supporting characters, and the plot seemed to move along at a steady pace - I just really loved those issues when I first read them, and I still use that as my 'gold standard' for Spider-Man stuff.

The definitive Spidey was in the Lee/Ditko/Romita comics of the '60's.The most successful of the later day Spider-comics stick to the spirit of the '60s comics,such as Roger Stern's stories or Ultimate Spider-Man at its best.

The first 150ish issues of Amazing, Spectacular 150ish-200, Amazing 298-328, The JMS/JRjr issues of Amazing. That would pretty much cover everything I've liked.

Absolutely definitive for me would be the first 33, first 2 annuals. Contrary to most, I really like the JMS/JRjr stuff too.

First and foremost, the Lee/Ditko run. I read those in Pocket Books form in the 1970's, and they contain the essential elements that I will always associate with the character.

But I'd say the entire first 200 issues carries a certain "canon" like feel to me. To this day, when I see one of those covers, it smells like America.

I liked the JMS/JRjr run, too. Rita loved it.

I liked the art in it. The totem stuff was just garbage, though (imho).

As for what comics define Spider-Man, another vote for Ditko and Lee.

Lee/Ditko/Romita era and all the way up to the 90s. The moment Peter's parents showed up was the moment Spider-Man jumped the shark. There have been good runs and good stories since, but nothing consistent. I think that storyline (which led directly into the clone saga) is what really started throwing it off the rails, never to return.

Funny thing is, other than the first 6 or so Lee/Ditko issues, I didn't read any of that stuff until after I'd survived the 90s. I realized that all the little things that I liked about the character were brought fully to life and better represented by that older stuff than by what I'd been reading. I couldn't look at my back issues the same way again, and ditched them all.

The Lee/Ditko books were what we had in the house. I bought a ton of Spider-Man titles in the early/mid 70's, but none stand out in my memory. I enjoyed the Romita Jr. run a while back, even though the totem stuff was lame. When I think of Spider-Man, I think of those Lee/Ditko stories.

Thanks, but I can't take credit for the Beyonder story or the Spider-Man/Fire-Lord battle. That was Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz.

For me, the Definitive Spider-Man starts here ...


and ends here ...


There's lots of good stuff afterwards, of course. But it all derives from the Lee/Ditko era.

-- Uncle Rog

Incidentally ... every Batman Beyond villain has a Spider-Man villain equivalent. He's basically Spider-Man in blue, with gadgets.

What's the Spider-Man equivalent of the Royal Flush Gang?

I think it only works with the individual villains, not the groups. I don't know, I read it somewhere.

I can't really cite particular issues, but the version that made the most impression on me was the 1970s Spider-Man. Which I suppose was basically the continuation of the later 1960s Lee-Romita Spidey.

Roger Stern's run!

Ditko Spidey for me, but I bought Spider-man books off and on for many years until their
just got to be too many of them. That's when I started tuning out.

Mix Spider-Man with Batman,add some Iron Man,set it in the future,and you've got Batman Beyond.

Amazing Fantasy #15 and Amazing Spider-Man #1 through #121 (death of Gwen Stacy) are the core, for me.

There's a lot of really good stuff after that, but the essence is in that stretch IMO.

I supposed he's defined by how I got introduced to the character. The first Hobgoblin story, the Romita Jr. run, allllll they way up to the wedding, then I tuned out until Venom showed up, and lasted until the Clone Saga.