13 greatest Spider-Man villains ranked from worst to best

13. Uncle Ben’s killer

This is where it all started for Spider-Man (his biggest canon event, if you will). Before using his powers for good and saving the world, Peter needed to learn a crushing and valuable lesson: With great power comes great responsibility. Uncle Ben’s words became a life motto for the super-powered teenager after a terrible tragedy occurred. The event that put Peter on a path to becoming a hero also represented one of the most significant losses of his life, and it was all done by one single man.

Uncle Ben’s killer is often portrayed as a burglar with no superpowers or special abilities. Sure, there have been stories where this changes a bit (like that one time when the killer was a cannibal version of the Vulture). However, more often than not, he’s a simple man that turned Peter’s life upside down. When it comes to Uncle Ben’s killer, there are no mechanical tentacles or symbiotes involved. All that was needed was a gun and Ben being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Spider-Man is considered a “street-level” hero who prioritizes protecting citizens from regular criminals, and you could argue that’s because of Ben’s death. Peter is trying to make amends by saving everyone he can from suffering a similar fate as him. In fact, you can’t tell a Peter Paker / Spider-Man origin story without the man that killed his uncle, proving how impactful he was in the wall-crawler’s life. That’s what makes him such an important villain who has even appeared in two of the three live-action iterations of Spider-Man. No matter what Peter does, it seems like he will never escape the pain of losing Uncle Ben to a burglar.

First appearance: Amazing Fantasy #15 (1962)