Whether it be Raimi, Webb, or Watts, the Spider-Man films have always done a good enough job at captivating audiences despite their rather inconsistent quality. The MCU stands out as perhaps the strongest of the bunch on a technical level, but Spider-Man’s universal appeal has always been his character: everyone’s friendly neighborhood Spider-Man.
The success of a film thrives on not only Peter Parker’s characterization, but how he interacts with the world as Spider-Man. This naturally means that Peter spends a good chunk of each film suited up. It’s the character’s main iconography, so it has to be on display. That said, Peter rarely if ever sticks to the same suit, constantly updating his look between films and universes. For better or worse.
The Amazing Spider-Man Suit
The Raimi movies might not be masterpieces of cinema, but they do make up a rather solid trilogy of films. If nothing else, a rather solid two-thirds of a trilogy. Going into The Amazing Spider-Man’s rebooted universe, some fans were hesitant. After all, Raimi was planning on a fourth film and Andrew Garfield was a drastic departure compared to Tobey Maguire.
Worse yet, Peter’s rebooted suit left quite a lot to be desired. While straying from Raimi’s depiction was absolutely the right direction to go in, Peter’s first Amazing Spider-Man suit places a comical amount of emphasis on the body’s blue, making Spider-Man look far less intimidating than he should.
Wrestling Suit
Sloppily thrown together using whatever clothes Peter clearly had laying around, Raimi’s wrestling suit only makes a very brief appearance, but it helps to humanize Peter considerably. This is the suit that a real-life high school graduate would make because this is the suit only a real-life high school graduate could make.
In that regard, it’s a nice way of diving deeper into Peter’s character. Of course, this doesn’t change the fact that the wrestling suit frankly doesn’t look that good. It’s meant to look rubbish, but it perhaps embodies that essence a bit too much. This is to say nothing of how poorly the wrestling scene has aged.
TASM Suit 2
Peter’s suit gets a nice little upgrade in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, but it overcorrects a bit too much in the wrong direction. Seeing how badly the blue clashed with the rest of the outfit, Peter’s suit in the sequel branches the red out just a bit more, creating a more complete and stylish look.
This one looks quite a bit like the Raimi suit. It isn’t completely identical, of course, but it may as well be. For as good as the suit looks, it’s just further evidence that Sony had no real vision for Marc Webb’s take on the web-slinger.
Raimi Suit
A nice emphasis on red, wide-set eyes, and a detailed body, the Raimi suit is considered by many to be the definitive Spider-Man suit. It’s not hard to see why, either. The suit is as classic as it gets, paying tribute to the character’s original design while also adding some nice flair of its own.
The Raimi suit also gets upgraded between the first and second film, sporting very minor and subtle differences in the back half of the trilogy. Peter personally designing such a slick suit himself is probably a bit on the unrealistic side even for the Raimi trilogy, but given how “comic booky” those films tend to be, that’s not a bad thing.
Night Monkey
Given Sony’s hold of the Venom character, Night Monkey almost seems like the MCU’s way of doing the Symbiote suit in their universe without actually needing to include Venom, the Symbiote, or a cartoonishly evil Peter Parker. Naturally, the Night Monkey suit isn’t nearly as iconic as the Symbiote suit, but it is one of Peter’s more stylish suits.
The Night Monkey persona is one that seems to personify stealth above all else. While Peter does blow his cover pretty immediately in Far From Home, his brief stint as Night Monkey makes for a memorable set-piece. The more traditional goggles also work surprisingly well with the more standard, black body.
Iron Spider
As far as combat goes, the Iron Spider suit is far and away the best suit any movie Peter has ever fought in. Peter’s bout against Thanos makes for one of the best choreographed Spider-Man action scenes in the character’s history. The Iron Spider suit offers Peter a degree of agility he simply doesn’t have without robotic spider legs to move him around.
It’s also his only suit that actually functions as full-on armor, something Peter probably should have thought to implement way earlier in his career. The Iron Spider suit does have the pesky misfortune of directly representing Peter’s rejection of the Avengers in Homecoming— something Infinity War blatantly ignores— but that’s the price to pay for a cool suit.
Symbiote Suit
Speaking of cool, there are few superhero outfits as explicitly cool as Peter Parker’s Symbiote Suit. All black, all stylish, it’s one of his most iconic looks, in and out of the movies. Yes, it might feature in what many consider to be one of the worst films in the franchise (if not the worst,) but it works well in the context of its own movie.
Peter’s arc, while hard to stomach, does make for an interesting twist on “With great power comes great responsibility.” It’s one of the only suits in the series to have thematic relevant in its own movie which alone helps elevate above most of the lot.
Makeshift Suit
Peter’s makeshift suit in the MCU is leagues above Peter’s wrestling suit in the Raimiverse. Not only is it more down to earth, it actually looks stylistically appealing. It might lack most of Spider-Man’s signature flairings outside of the color scheme, but that’s not a bad thing by any means whatsoever.
It’s one of the few suits where Peter’s personality comes out in full. He’s scrappy, feisty, but clearly cares about his image as Spider-Man. Not only that, it’s the makeshift suit that Peter wears during Homecoming’s finale, not his Spider-Man suit. That alone places a great deal of emphasis on Peter Parker saving the day.
Far From Home Suit
The MCU does an incredibly good job at expressing Peter’s character through his suits. His black and red Far From Home suit puts this on display better than any. It’s a suit the audience gets to actively watch Peter build. Not just that, in building the suit, Peter visually takes over Tony’s role in the franchise.
It’s while building his Far From Home suit that Peter comes into his own at last, no longer living in Tony Stark’s shadow. It’s also just an excellent looking suit that manages to look familiar without being derivative. By simply swapping blue for black, Peter’s newest suit ends up one of the slickest in the franchise.
Homecoming Suit
There’s really no beating the classics, though, and Peter’s Civil War/Homecoming suit is one of his simplest suits yet. It’s as close to the comic as it gets, only rivaled by Raimi’s original suit, while also having a distinct identity of its own. This is the suit Peter’s worn for most of the MCU and the one that best screams “Spider-Man!” It’s simple, stylish, and incredibly memorable.
It’s also not overused, either. Peter uses it for most of the Civil War, but he’s only in the film’s second act; he uses it in Homecoming, but he doesn’t save the day in it; and he ends up prioritizing other suits in Infinity War, Endgame, and Far From Home. This keeps Peter’s Homecoming suit both fresh and novel.
