Why Spider-Man's upside-down kiss was even more iconic than you realise

Peter Parker is a big ol' nerd. That's easy to forget sometimes, especially when Tom Holland's pecs pop up or you suddenly get lost in Andrew Garfield's eyes, but it's a fact nonetheless.

In that sense, Spider-Man is a wish fulfilment fantasy for anyone who's socially awkward or who doesn't know how to talk to hot people (or anyone who was bitten by a radioactive spider for that matter too). Out of all the countless adaptations Marvel has (web)spun out over the years, perhaps none of them have understood this concept better than Sam Raimi's movie trilogy back in the noughties.

That emo dance aside, Tobey Maguire's take on Peter was desperately awkward, especially around Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst), and in the first film especially, that stumbling awkwardness repeatedly got in the way of anything happening between the pair.

Read more: When are all 8 Spider-Man films returning to UK cinemas?

Once Parker becomes Spider-Man, that problem is exacerbated tenfold because Peter wasn't just competing with hotties like Harry, but also himself as Spidey. Yet for one brief moment, none of that mattered when Peter's two worlds suddenly combined with MJ's lips in a game-changing kiss.

The smooch in question didn't happen on a cute date, unless you count a mugging as cute. Anything goes in New York, I guess, although it still didn't look like MJ was having the best time when four men approached her in the dark on a stormy night. Four was quite a lot, too. What do you call it when a group of muggers flock together? A "mock"? A "muggle"?

Mary Jane managed to hurt a couple of them when things got violent, but the "muggle" ended up overwhelming her still. Thankfully, Spider-Man was already stalking MJ by then, which is not creepy at all, so he just so happened to appear at the right time to pull them off her with his webs.

It wasn't long before Spidey took the gang out and then leapt off into a nearby alley because he was afraid MJ might catch a glimpse of his face, which remained uncovered. She ran after him, keen to speak to the man in spandex who had just saved her.

Spidey zipped down then, fully masked now, and together the pair shared an intimate conversation where Mary Jane described him as "amazing. An Amazing Spider-Man, if you will...

But that's not what fans remember most when it comes to this scene. It's what happened after when MJ pulled Peter's mask up and started to kiss him with Danny Elfman's score playing, all while our hero hung upside down on a sticky webline. The pair took their time with a long, delicate, open mouth kiss as heavy rain poured all around them. Spidey thwipped away then, launching himself up into the rooftops as Mary Jane looked up, extremely happy with what's just gone on.

We'd be happy too, of course. After all, that spandex leaves absolutely nothing to the imagination. But is MJ ok? She was wet in the worst way possible, drenched in freezing cold rain. She could have easily caught her death standing out there so long without a coat. Imagine being saved from muggers just to die of pneumonia a few days later.

But we digress. What's important here is how this legendary, one-of-a-kind kiss reverberated throughout the rest of the franchise and beyond to become genuinely iconic in ways this word rarely means anymore. Visually, this was a comic book panel brought to life back at a time when this was practically unheard of.

The upside down, asymmetric configuration of the kiss itself was unique to Spider-Man too, embodying his arachnid physicality with equal emphasis on the "Spider" and the "Man" in his name.

The kiss combined these two worlds thematically as well. Because finally, for one brief moment, Peter's competing identities finally merged as his tongue merged with MJ's too. Quite literally, he got a taste of what life could be like if the pair could be together, great power and great responsibility be damned. When Mary Jane pulls the mask up, it's everything Peter's ever wanted, just to be vulnerable with her.

It's also incredibly tender, especially when MJ senses Spidey holding back, afraid that his identity will be exposed. In response, she stops pulling the whole mask off to honour his secret and just focuses on his lips instead. Peter trusts her and MJ instantly respects that, even though she doesn't actually know who Spider-Man really is.

The kiss was a rare moment of calm amidst all the blockbuster action, a quiet beat that gave the romance a chance to breathe. If only the actors involved had been given that same grace.

It's well documented how what looked romantic and sexy on camera was actually very uncomfortable and borderline dangerous for Maguire especially, who's talked at length about how the rain poured down his nose so he couldn't breathe mid-kiss.

“It was really tough, actually,” Maguire told The Hollywood Reporter in 2022. “It was really challenging. They’d yell cut, and I would be [gasping for air], totally out of breath. It was torture. It makes you realise how important oxygen is.”

Kirsten Dunst has since revealed it wasn't so great from her side either. During an appearance on The Jonathan Ross Show earlier this year, per Digital Spy, the MJ star described filming their kiss as "kind of miserable," adding: "It was pouring with rain, freezing, Tobey couldn’t breathe so it was almost like I was resuscitating him."

We were left gasping for air too, in a very different way of course, yet it turns out this moment almost didn't happen at all.

In a retrospective for The Ringer, Raimi’s second-unit director (named Doug Lefler) explained that Raimi originally wanted to film a golden-hour kiss where MJ made out with Spidey over his mask while treating a chest wound. Logistically, it didn't work out, although you'd think a wet upside-down kiss would perhaps have been harder to film.

We're not complaining though, because this course correction ended up changing history, and we're not just talking about that MTV Movie Award for Best Kiss. Co-hosts Jack Black and Sarah Michelle Gellar parodied the scene for their show's 2003 taping, and they weren't the only ones.

Everyone from Shrek and Weird Al to even Seth and Summer in the OC got in on the act, because why kiss comfortably when you can do it awkwardly hanging upside-down with all the blood rushing to your face (instead of elsewhere)?

But beyond the scene's cultural impact, that lingering kiss lingered on in the film's final moments too, coming full circle when MJ kissed Peter for what she believed to be the very first time. He turned down her advances, afraid that his life as Spider-Man would put her in harm's way.

But then, after Parker left, MJ touched her lips as she realised that kissing Peter felt very much the same, almost identical in fact, to kissing Spider-Man. Face it MJ. You just hit the jackpot.

Looking back at it now, it's strange to think that superhero movies haven't always been devoid of passion. It's been a conscious choice, especially on Marvel's part, to sanitise sex on screen in recent years, even as the number of shirtless men has increased.

That means there isn't much competition for MJ and Spidey when it comes to the most legendary kisses ever puckered in superhero fare. But the power of this moment transcends genre, making their smooch an all-timer across this franchise, across comic book storytelling, and even cinema as a whole. It really is that special. Not bad for an awkward dweeb like Parker.

Spider-Man is being re-released in cinemas on Friday, 2 August as part of a Spider-Man retrospective season.