(Or for a real longshot, Homer the Happy Ghost.)

I think Stan & Steve struck pure gold when they create Spidey - undoubtedly their best work.

Credit to Stan for coming up with teh idea and the character traits and also credit to him for turning down the Jack Kirby intepretation - a young muscular guy with a web-gun - and switching to Ditko.

And the biggest cheer for that wierdo Ditko for developing such a distinctive character - each facet of the charcater Steve imbued with original thought and ground-breaking originality.
The design of the costume - each part - hand, foot, arm, back etc. to be instantly recognisable - how many heroes can boast that?
The iconic poses - starting with that his fascination with hands and the unique way of shootng a web, through to the wall-climbing and the dynamic leaping, the split face/mask shot for the spider sense and those awesome villians.
Look through that Ditko run from 11 to 20 and you will see him create a major villian nearly every month - what a superb streak of creativity.

Many other artists have burnished that Ditko gold - & some better than others - but he laid the foundations for unique appeal.

I believe this list to be quite fluid. Do it in a year and the results would be proibbaly quite different, except Spidey would still be top.

I know Steve's contribution to Spider-Man as co creator is titantic, iconic and eternal but Mr Lee did come up with the concept, Pete/Spidey's personality and so on...

1) Spider-Man- 220
2) Cap. America- 147
3) Iron Man- 117
4) Thor- 110
5) Dr. Doom (tie)-109
Deadpool (tie)-109
7) Cyclops- 106
The Hulk- 104
9) Daredevil- 99
10) Magneto- 88
11) Iron Fist- 80
12) Wolverine- 77
13) Ms. Marvel- 59
14) Namor- 58
15) Multiple Man- 55
16) Jean Grey- 51
17) Emma Frost- 49
18) Winter Soldier- 48
19) Luke Cage- 44
20) Beast- 43
21) Silver Surfer (tie)- 40
Nightcrawler (tie)- 40
23) The Thing- 34
24) Rogue (tie)- 33
The Punisher (tie)-33

Biggest difference between the rankings was Winter Soldier, i believe.

That's pretty beautiful, Michael.

This has been awesome!

You are awesome!

It's good to see Cap still kicking ass from beyond the grave (God rest his soul.)

The moment that defined Cap for me came during the finale of the Onlaught arc when all of earth's superheroes were sacrificing themselves to contain Onlaught. At some point, someone (I think it was the Falcon) remarked that no one was coming out again. To this Cap responded "I realize that the world's at stake. Don't confuse me with details. AVENGERS ASSEMBLE!" And he charged in without a second's hesitation.

As for Spidey, I am simply overjoyed. I had as my #1 (along with pretty much everyone else), so I guess there's really nothing more to say that isn't painfullly obvious already.

Cap's was cool too, but Spidey's is the best and Batman's #2 (From the 60's show), then Cap would be in there somewhere with Underdog, Space Ghost, and the Hulk.

Better than this one?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRhPIvwUQag

I like the characters becasue I like them, not for how popular they are.

Other than the powers I've been able to relate to Peter Parker and Spidey in many ways--or else realte things in his life to friends' lives.

Sure, some writers were hacks, but the other make up for it.

Spidey will transcend all the different versions of him, all the wirters & all the artists.

And a very nice piece from Michael Pullman.

With all that's wrong with comics, and with both companies trying to break their characters in attempts to be shocking or cutting edge, it's good to be reminded why we care about these fictional people to begin with.

It all has to do with how each off these characters resonate with us. How they strike a chord individually.

I hope folks at DC and Marvel were looking at this, so they understand what they have.