The concept of the Spider-Verse has taken root in popular fiction, thanks to films like Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse, Spider-Man: No Way Home, and the recent Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. In the vein of Marvel teams such as the Avengers or the X-Men, a group of Spider-Men (and Spider-Women) join forces to fight an interdimensional threat. But it all started with the final two episodes of Spider-Man: The Animated Series. Those two episodes make up the Spider-Wars storyline and are the reason the very concept of the Spider-Verse exists.
How Did 'The Animated Series' Introduce the Spider-Verse?
The Spider-Wars saga piggybacks off of Spider-Man: The Animated Series' adaptation of the classic Secret Wars comic, which saw the web-slinger (voiced by Christopher Daniel Barnes) assembling a group of heroes as part of an experiment by the omnipotent Beyonder (Earl Boen) to see if good or evil was the dominant force in the universe. After defeating a godlike Doctor Doom (Tom Kane), the Beyonder reveals to Spider-Man that the entire Secret Wars was a test to see if he was worthy of saving the universe.
As it turns out, an alternate version of Peter Parker had gone mad with power after bonding with the Carnage symbiote and sought to destroy all reality. To battle him, Spider-Man was joined by six alternate versions of himself: a Spider-Man who was actually the star of a blockbuster franchise; a Spider-Man who sported the silver and black armor the web-slinger wore in the '90s; a Spider-Man who wore the garb of Parker's clone Ben Reilly, better known as the Scarlet Spider; a Spider-Man who came into possession of Doctor Octopus' tentacles; and finally, a version of the six-armed Spider-Man.
This story arc managed to bring together six different Spider-Men, a feat that Into The Spider-Verse would echo when it brought together a quintet of different Spider-Men (and Women, and Pig) from across their respective universes; though rather than saving the universe Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) is trying to get them back home while figuring out how to be Spider-Man himself. And in the same way that No Way Home united Tom Holland, Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield as their respective versions of Parker, the Spider-Wars story arc unites six different Peter Parkers and showcases how they interact with each other. For example, the actor Parker feels way out of his depth while the six-armed Parker quickly becomes a liability once he starts mutating into a giant spider.
But at their core, each of these Peter Parkers has accepted the message of "With great power comes great responsibility." Despite the odds being stacked against them, they manage to work together. Even Spider-Carnage embraces the classic mantra once Spidey Prime draws him to a universe where Peter Parker's Uncle Ben never died. Ben manages to talk Spider-Carnage out of his mad plan, and the villain more or less effectively commits suicide by leaping into a black hole with the weapon he intended to use to destroy reality.
Stan Lee Joins the Spider-Fun
The finale of Spider-Man: The Animated Series is best known for its very last scene, where Spidey returns his actor self to his home universe — and literally meets his maker in the form of Stan Lee. The sight of Lee and Spidey swinging through New York City was a dream come true for many Spider-Man fans; Lee's wife Joan also played a major role in the series, as she voiced the clairvoyant Madame Web. Lee would have a similar role in Into The Spider-Verse, where he plays the clerk of a costume store named "Stan." When Miles asks if he can return his costume, Lee says, "It always fits...eventually." This one line serves as an overarching theme for Miles' journey, and for the mantle of Spider-Man in general; everyone who's ever donned the mask has grown into it in their own way, and the same holds true of Spider-Man: The Animated Series' Peter Parker.
The concept of the Spider-Verse would later take root in the video game Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions. Much like the Spider-Wars arc, it featured a group of Spider-Men working together in different realities in order to stop Mysterio and other villains from getting their hands on the Tablet of Order and Chaos. Game developer Beenox would later take a similar approach with Spider-Man: Edge of Time, which featured Peter Parker forming a connection across time with Miguel O'Hara — the Spider-Man of 2099 (who also becomes a major part of Across the Spider-Verse). Barnes would voice Spider-Man Noir in Shattered Dimensions and O'Hara in Edge of Time, while Shattered Dimensions co-writer Dan Slott would eventually pen the "Spider-Verse" comic storyline during his lengthy run on the Amazing Spider-Man title.
With Across The Spider-Verse out now and its sequel, Beyond the Spider-Verse, coming out in 2024, the Spider-Verse will continue to be a source of inspiration for various Spider-Man stories. And it all started with the Spider-Wars.
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