Amph Spider-Man & SSU Films (Madame Web, Venom 3, Kraven, Beyond the Spider-Verse)

In the comics, Spider-Man is supposed to an insanely-smart supergenius.

The comics originally compared him a lot to Otto Octavius (Dr. Octopus) as what Peter could have become if he didn't learn about power and responsibility.

 

"At one time, Peter sought to sell the formula for webbing to make money, but the company to which he tried to sell it did not want it, not seeing the use for such a short-lasting glue."

Anyway, Peter Parker is actually a Marvel Universe genius level intellect by inventing web shooters, he doesn't get to do his Science Powers Activate a lot but he's close to Tony Stark, Bruce Banner, T'Challa and almost Reed Richards (but nobody is as smart as Reed Richards anyway). But they have consulted Spider-Man about technology (and after Doc Ock started it, Peter made a bunch of technological genius products for Parker Industries)

Anyway if Iron Man can build robots and Reed Richards makes flying cars a kid from Queens can be a chemistry genius.

 

I'm sorry. That's still--even especially--idiotic. These "explanations" aren't helping at all.

 

i forgot about that, he did try to sell it at one point

 

A. It's not even about being a genius, at some level. If a substance like that could be made from common items--even items available to a magnet school chemistry class--it would already exist. The idea that only one human being on Earth is so uniquely smart that they could invent it is absurd. You're not dealing with intelligence at all, but something stupid and weird.

B. The idea that in the entire international business regime, only on company would even express any interest in a spider silk replica, and then ultimately decline it is just absurd. Even laymen are familiar with spider silk being specifically cited for its combination of tensile strength and flexibility. That's why it was listed as a power in the first place, so it's pretty insulting to thereafter pretend no one would care.

C. Again this whole scenario just seems to misapprehend what intelligence even is, at the most fundamental level. It doesn't just magically impart knowledge into your head. This isn't the Matrix. One can be highly intelligent, but without appropriate education still struggle to make an impact in one's field. Peter is presented as a person in high school. Still studying to master high school level scientific concepts. That can't be the case while he's free-lancing post-graduate level independent investigations in his spare time. It's ridiculous.

This is especially frustrating because, as compared with Tony Starks or other idiots, Spiderman is supposed to be the grounded super hero. The one with more of a common touch, and every day problems. This completely devastates all of that.

 

I could buy that Peter would try to sell it, get turned down, then give up, he can be a bit defeatist when it comes to certain things attributing it to "Parker luck". Also, yeah, guy selling Spider-Man's special web fluid would be a bit of a red flag about his secret ID.

As for Parker being only high-school smart, it's not, he's a genius and he doesn't have any problems academically. He can and does ace his science stuff. When he's bothered to show up and not busy knocking The Shocker over his head or trying to stop The Rhino.

 

If he was truly that much of a wunderkind, he would have long ago tested out of high school level science and probably would have attracted serious professional attention. You know, as geniuses of that caliber tend to do. For instance, Yo-yo Ma wasn't just premiering at his local middle school band performance.

 

Let me be explicit. The entire educational system and at least the local press would be well aware of him. Not just a few people playing a mentoring role. This story is made in every way worse by his not having organic web. At this point, if even prefer the idiocy about him intuiting the knowledge as a result of the spider bite.

 

What other stories are you thinking of?

High school level chemistry is introductory in the US. Someone doing what Parker is supposed to would be advanced into collegiate coursework, and probably far beyond.

 

Wocky's posts had me going to TV Trope's "Cut Lex Luthor a Check" and "Reed Richards is Useless" pages for about 40 minutes.

 

Alright. But in that story there were significant reasons for his talent to have been overlooked. It was also a much more "normal" sort of genius than the demigodhood you are proposing here.

 

I agree with this part. And I am sure you'll agree that him shooting them out his wrists is absurd. And further agree we want to see Spider-Man shooting webbing out his abdomen.

 

An existing bodily orifice would be even more grounded.

 

Reed Richards is the demigod genius. Peter Parker has always been the more normal genius. A basic comparison would be that Reed has a 200 I.Q. and Peter comes in at say, 170. Smart enough to create the web fluid, the spider tracers, the standard web shooters, the web shooter cannons and to modify the web fluid in order to be withstand Electro's amped up powers, twenty years ago. His clone, Ben Reilly, once claimed that he was able to make a batch of web fluid using toothpaste when he was short on cash. As to his talent being overlooked, he was able to get a scholarship to Empire State University, which in the comics is pretty prestigious. But as noted, Peter's academia suffers due to his commitments as Spider-Man. He had graduated from college, but while doing his undergraduate studies, he had dropped out a couple of times due to either burnout or an intense period of instability in his life. When Doc Ock had occupied Peter's body, he was able to create Parker Industries, a multi billion-dollar tech company. So what he missed out on by not continuing to try and market the web fluid was made up for in other innovations, both the ones Otto came up and with his own after regaining control. As noted, up until the last few years, he's lacked ambition to be rich and to put himself on par with Tony Stark.

 

There is no "normal" genius working alone with a high school education and basic science equipment (e.g. Not even what's available in an undergraduate college laboratory) that invents in a few weeks a perfectly functional compound whole teams of career scientists with PhDs have failed at for decades despite multi-million dollar budgets, the most cutting edge equipment (several orders of magnitude better), more relevant background in the subject, more time to work on a daily basis, and the full backing of multinational corporations.

Have either of you ever tried to do anything even remotely scientific before in life? That's not how this works. At all.

 

Jabba telling people how life is in a comic book thread?

 

Comic books do stupid, wholly implausible things all the time.

What's infuriating is the idea that somehow, this isn't one of them.

 

well the main thing is the writers didn't want Peter to grow up, so for stretches there they had him drop out of college and just be a photographer.
i don't think it made sense with his character, but we see in movies and cartoons him constantly being pushed back to his teens, while in the comics he should be around 30 now.

 

He was around 30-40 in the comics for a while... but then they undid MJ's pregnancy and his marriage to her and he was suddenly an 18-24-year-old again too.

For a Spider-Man that actually ages, Spider-Girl is the comic to go to... in the timeline where his daughter wasn't murdered soon after birth.