The Amazing Spider-Man started as something unique in the comic book world when he debuted in the '60s. He wasn't a rich man, or a soldier, or a God. He was a teenager, a kid with no friends, and an insecure boy who made wisecracks to cover up how nervous he was. That made him the ultimate underdog, no matter how many powers he had.
However, at the same time, he was brilliant. However, as smart as he was, he was still a teenager battling adults who wanted to hurt him for continuously thwarting their attempts at robberies and world domination. As time went on, Peter Parker grew up and became one of the smartest heroes in Marvel Comics. At the same time, his most capable villains matched him in intelligence, making their battles even more interesting. Here are the 10 most intelligent Spider-Man villains.
10 TINKERER
The Tinkerer was one of Spider-Man's earliest villains, even though no one talks about him. After fighting The Chameleon in the first issue of The Amazing Spider-Man, there were two stories in the second issue with Spider-Man battling two of his most intelligent villains — The Vulture and The Tinkerer.
The lesser-known is The Tinkerer, who Spider-Man initially believes is an alien, all due to a plot by master criminal Mysterio. However, Tinkerer is a scientific genius named Phineas T. Mason, and he is best known for creating devices for other villains, including Mysterio, Kingpin, and Rocket Racer.
9 SPENCER SMYTHE
J. Jonah Jameson wanted nothing more than to bring down Spider-Man. When he realized his newspaper articles slandering Spider-Man wasn't working, he hired a few different villains to take the Web Crawler down. One man that Jameson went to was Spencer Smythe.
Smythe was a genius who convinced Jameson to work with him, and he is the man who created the original Spider-Slayers. He also was responsible for creating the Molten Man. Even after his death, both Jameson and Smythe's son Alistaire used his inventions to make Spidey's life a living hell.
8 VULTURE
As mentioned earlier, Vulture was the second super villain Spider-Man faced in his career, following only Chameleon, and in a story right before The Tinkerer appeared for the first time. While Adrian Toomes was old by the time he first fought Spider-Man, his younger years were spent as an inventor.
Toomes started his own company with a man named Gregory Bestman, but when Bestman embezzled money, Toomes lost his part of the company. As a result, Toomes created his flying harness and became a supervillain. Vulture has a Master of Science degree in electrical engineering.
7 MORBIUS
When Spider-Man first battled Michael Morbius, he was a vampire with a degenerative blood disease that lost control when the sun went down, making almost similar to a werewolf. Little else was known, but over time, Marvel revealed more about the living vampire that will appear in his first movie in 2020.
The truth is that Michael Morbius was a brilliant Noble Prize-winning biochemist born in Greece. He suffered from the blood disease and tried to use experimental treatments on himself, turning himself into a sort of vampire creature.
6 KINGPIN
Being intelligent does not always been being a scientific genius. In the case of Wilson Fisk, the Kingpin of Crime, his intelligence comes from his street smarts and the ability to build an entire empire with nothing more than his brains and strong will.
He was a large child, with no friends, but when he became an adult, he used those memories to ensure that he never feared anything again. Kingpin has crafted an empire around him, able to control a plethora of villains and assassins. He also has the intelligence to ensure he never gets caught, getting off on technicalities more than almost any villain in Marvel Comics.
5 LIZARD (AS CURT CONNORS)
Curt Connors is very similar to Michael Morbius. While Morbius had a blood disease that he attempted untested scientific experiments to cure, Connors was missing an arm he lost in the war and used his own untested scientific experiments to try to grow it back.
Instead, thanks to the lizard DNA used in the serum he took, it turned him into a vicious lizard creature. Ironically, Morbius' blood helped Connors control his inability to stop his changes. As Connors, he is brilliant, a genius-level herpetologist.
4 THE LIVING BRAIN
Spider-Man battled the robot known as the Living Brain very early on, meeting it for the first time in Amazing Spider-Man #8 in 1964. An engineer brought the Living Brain to Peter Parker's high school to show its ability to solve any problem. When it malfunctioned, Spider-Man almost met his match.
Jump ahead years later, the creator was now discredited, and his son ended up stealing the Living Brain and turning it into a weapon. It was even part of the Sinister Six at one point. The Living Brain has a hard drive that can store an unlimited amount of data, and it has more knowledge than anything or anyone on Earth.
3 JACKAL
Jackal was responsible for the worst moment in the life of Peter Parker. Jackal is the scientist who created the clones that ruined Spider-Man's life for years. Miles Warren first appeared in Amazing Spider-Man #31, a genius in the realm of biochemistry, genetics, and cloning.
Jackal created clones of Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy. Hw also created Ben Reilly, who took Spider-Man's place, believing himself to be Peter Parker, later becoming the Scarlet Spider. Fans universally hate the Clone Saga, and Jackal is responsible.
2 NORMAN OSBORN
Norman Osborn was one of Spider-Man's oldest villains as The Green Goblin, although it took a long time to reveal his identity to readers. He was also diabolical, responsible for the death of Gwen Stacy and secretly bankrolling the entire Clone Saga with Jackal.
Norman Osborn is so smart and tenacious that he later was almost more than Tony Stark could handle. He is skilled at math and science with a vast knowledge of chemistry. Osborn also gained increased intelligence thanks to the Goblin Formula, and he is a genius in genetics, robotics, chemistry, and engineering.
1 DOCTOR OCTOPUS
Most of the time, Spider-Man deals with his rogues' gallery by shouting out one-liners, flipping around and hitting people, and sticking them to walls with his web serum. However, when Spider-Man battles Doctor Octopus, it is different, as the two men are always in an intellectual battle.
Doctor Octopus is smarter than Peter Parker, or at least he is more willing to take chances with his scientific experiments. When Doc Ock took over Peter's body and became the Superior Spider-Man, it wasn't just a name. He upgraded everything about Spider-Man, and proved to be the most intelligent villain he ever faced.