History Film / SpiderMan1

** When the Oscorp board agrees to be taken over by Quest Aerospace. As the founder and the CEO, it would be very strange for Norman Osborn to have zero say about the merger, let alone for the board to be able to unilaterally fire him with so little notice. It's possible he just had such a small equity percentage that his voting rights don't matter. Even if his stake in the company were that small, the board would spend years in court over wrongful termination -- [[AcceptableBreaksFromReality but if that happened, there'd be no movie.]][[note]]Not to mention Norman at this stage wouldn't even consider that option.[[/note]]
** Mergers and acquisitions between publicly traded corporations require a public vote of ''all'' of the shareholders, not just approval from the boards of both companies even though Maximilian Fargas tells Norman that they'll be "announcing the sale" after the World Unity Festival. Even if Norman didn't have enough equity to block the sale he would have to be alerted to such a vote as a stakeholder -- so the likelihood of him not knowing about the proposed sale at all would be nearly impossible.

** Flash's new convertible, a luxury Plymouth Prowler, which has both Peter and MJ name-dropping the trope and motivates Peter to try getting a car of his own.

** After school, Mary Jane tells her parents about Peter and Flash's fight. It's revealed that she primarily dated Flash under pressure from [[AbusiveParents her father]]; Phillip set up their date that night so Flash could show MJ his birthday present, upsetting her. They argue about this before she storms out and encounters Peter. He was home alone because Ben and May left to play bridge with friends.

** Peter's spider-sense gives off a vague warning around Norman post-Goblin transformation, though he doesn't know why. At Thanksgiving as Norman begins to piece together Peter's secret identity, his spider-sense goes into overdrive.

* ArtisticLicenseEconomics: When the Oscorp board agrees to be taken over by Quest Aerospace. As the founder and the CEO, it would be very strange for Norman Osborn to have zero say about the merger, let alone for the board to be able to unilaterally fire him with so little notice. It's possible he just had such a small equity percentage that his voting rights don't matter. Even if his stake in the company were that small, the board would spend years in court over wrongful termination -- [[AcceptableBreaksFromReality but if that happened, there'd be no movie.]][[note]]Not to mention Norman at this stage wouldn't even consider that option.[[/note]]

** Flash's new convertible, a luxury Plymouth/Chrysler Prowler, which has both Peter and MJ name-dropping the trope and motivates Peter to try getting a car of his own.

* ArtisticLicenseEconomics: When the Oscorp board agrees to be taken over by Quest Aerospace. As the founder and the CEO, it would be very strange for Norman Osborn to have zero say about the merger, let alone for the board to be able to unilaterally fire him with so little notice. It's possible he just had such a small equity percentage that his voting rights don't matter. Even if his stake in the company were that small, the board would spend years in court over wrongful termination -- [[AcceptableBreaksFromReality but if that happened, there'd be no movie.]]

* ArtisticLicenseEconomics: When the Oscorp board agrees to be taken over by Quest Aerospace. As the founder and the CEO, it would be very strange for Norman Osborn to have zero say about the merger, let alone for the board to be able to unilaterally fire him with so little notice. It's possible he just had such a small equity percentage that his voting rights don't matter.

* AccidentalSuicide: In a last-ditch attempt to kill Spider-Man, [[spoiler:the Green Goblin summons his bladed glider to fly at the hero. Spider-Man dodges the attack, and the glider [[ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice impales the Goblin instead]]]]. It is later discussed in ''Film/SpiderMan3'' that "he died by his own hand".
** The cash register thief trips out of a window and falls to his death when Peter confronts him.

** The novelization features a part with Mary Jane and Harry discussing the book ''Literature/InterviewWithTheVampire'', where MJ remarks that she "saw [[Film/InterviewWithTheVampire the movie]]. The little kid in it creeped me out." Creator/KirstenDunst, of course, was that little kid.0

** The novelization features a part with Mary Jane and Harry discussing the book ''Literature/InterviewWithTheVampire'', where MJ remarks that she "saw [[Film/InterviewWithTheVampire the movie]]. The little kid in it creeped me out." Creator/KirstenDunst, of course, was that little kid.

* BittersweetEnding: Spider-Man manages to save Mary Jane and the kids at the bridge and defeat the Green Goblin, earning New York's acceptance in the process. But Norman is accidentally [[ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice killed by his glider's blades]], leaving Harry without a father and swearing revenge on Spider-Man, and [[ItsNotYouItsMyEnemies Peter rejects Mary Jane's romantic advances to keep her out of danger]].

* BackstabBackfire: As in the source material, Norman is killed by his own attempt to (literally) stab Peter in the back.

* CutHimselfShaving: It was [[BlatantLies a bike messenger cutting Peter off]], I swear!
* DamselInDistress: Mary Jane. It's her primary role in the movie.
* DarkReprise: The whole sequence where Peter furiously chases Dennis Carradine is a darker rendition of the earlier idealistic sequence where Peter first climbed walls, roof-jumped and webslinged.

* DeathBySecretIdentity: The robber dies in a convenient accident seconds after Peter unmasks in front of him. Norman Osborn, the only other person in the movie to learn the truth, is also dead by the end of it.

* DisneyVillainDeath: Dennis (the robber involved in Uncle Ben's murder) is confronted by Peter, who breaks his wrist. Dennis in fear staggers backwards and trips on a pipe, causing him to fall out the window to his death.
* DisproportionateRetribution: Osborn and Goblin in a nutshell. Slight him, insult him, or irritate him and the Goblin will kill you, maim you, and torture you. This applies to Mendell Stromm who told General Slocum that they need to go "back to formula", Quest Aerospace and General Slocum because the US Army chose to go with them instead of Oscorp, the Oscorp board of directors for deciding to force Norman out of ''his own company'', and then Aunt May simply because she tapped his hand when he wanted to eat Thanksgiving dinner before saying grace (from the way he begins slicing the knives, you can tell he's considering gutting her then and there).

* FooledByTheSound: When Spider-Man is rescuing some citizens from a burning building, he hears an old woman screaming for help and goes back in to save her. However, it turns out that the "old woman" was actually the Green Goblin making the sound and attempting to lure him back in.

** Also for the gorier scene, at the end of the film during Norman Osborn's death, it looks like his glider's blade impaled him right in that spot.

* HeroicSecondWind: Peter gets one in the final fight.
* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Norman ends up impaling himself with his own goblin glider.

* InexplicableCorneredEscape: Peter sneaks into his room before a dinner party, and guests come up to investigate the noise. A pan of the room shows it empty -- then we see him hiding on the ceiling. Just as they leave, a drop of blood falls from his arm. Someone sees the blood on the floor and looks up... at an empty ceiling. He walks to the window and looks out, again seeing nothing -- then a pan down shows Peter has [[OffscreenTeleportation teleported offscreen under a balcony]].

** Early on, the wrestling promoter cons Peter out of his promised $3000; when Peter insists that he needs the money, the promoter tells him, "I missed the part where that's my problem." Seconds later, Peter repeats the line to the promoter after he lets a robber escape with the money and the promoter says he could've stopped him.

** When General Slocum visits the Oscorp factories, Dr. Stromm informs him that they need to take the entire product line "back to formula" due to the unstable nature of the performance enhancers. When Norman reawakens after being injected with the serum, the first thing he says as he prepares to throttle Dr. Stromm is, "[[PreMortemOneLiner Back to formula?]]"

* IronicNurseryTune: The Itsy Bitsy Spider.

* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: J. Jonah Jameson. Although he is shown to be incredibly rude to Peter and knowingly produces libel against Spider-Man, he refuses to give up the identity of Spidey's photographer to the Green Goblin, even though said photographer (Peter) is literally only a few feet away.

* LegallyOustedLeader: What the board of directors at Oscorp do to Norman to take over and merge with Quest Aerospace. [[AssholeVictim It later comes back to bite them in the ass.]]

* MsFanservice: MJ gets multiple shots of her cleavage thanks to her [[ImpossiblyLowNeckline plunging necklines]], particularly at the field trip, and [[SexySoakedShirt wet]] [[VaporWear attire]] during the iconic kiss in the rain. Her [[LegFocus legs are also on display]] when she's in danger at the festival.

** The film took a large amount of its elements from ''WesternAnimation/SpiderManTheAnimatedSeries'':

*** When the Goblin first arrives at the Unity festival, the Oscrop board members initially wonder if he is a [[Franchise/{{Superman}} bird or plane]]. Later as Spider-Man and Mary Jane swing away from the festival, she wonders if he's taking her to "[[Franchise/{{Batman}} the spider cave under his mansion]]" or "[[Franchise/{{Superman}} back to his place in the frozen north]]".

* SuperWindowJump: The robber accidentally defenestrates himself backing away from Peter after he was disarmed. The authorities immediately think Peter [[DestinationDefenestration pushed him out of the window]], but Peter escapes before they can intervene.

* SwordLimbo: With Green Goblin's flying blades.

* TalkingToThemself: Norman talks to his alternate personality in a mirror.
* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodSandwich: As soon as everyone sits down for Thanksgiving dinner, Norman notices a cut on Peter's arm, which Peter claims he got from being hit by a bike messenger. Realizing that Peter is Spider-Man, Norman gets up and leaves, and when Harry stops him in the hall, he makes some misogynistic remarks about Mary Jane, accusing her of being a GoldDigger. Mary Jane, having overheard the conversation and Harry only halfheartedly defend her, gets upset and leaves after Harry takes his father's side. No one eats a bite on-camera, and two people don't eat anything period.

* VillainBall: In the last fight, Spider-Man is battered and at risk of being killed, but the Green Goblin waits at a critical moment in order to gloat. Being a pure sadist, he says he's gonna hunt down Mary Jane and give her an excruciating death as revenge for all the trouble Spidey's give him. Cue HeroicSecondWind.

** After Peter gets bitten, he flicks the spider away and we see it crawl under some cabinets. While in the background, we heard Mary Jane inform them that it's missing, we never do find out what happened, or if there is a random genetically altered Spider that can give people super-powers still at large in New York City? Though in nearly every version of Spidey's origin, the spider dies after biting him. Even with the change from radioactive contamination to genetic engineering, it's reasonable to assume the spider never made it very far. The novelization implies it starved to death.
** Quest Aerospace was never brought up again, following Green Goblin killing off Oscorp's board of directors before they could publicly announce selling the company to Quest. The later films' novelizations confirm Quest is still operational.

* WithGreatPowerComesGreatResponsibility: [[TropeNamers What did you expect?]]
* WouldHurtAChild: The Goblin uses a literal carload of them in a SadisticChoice for Spidey that he hopes results in their death. Even before that, him attacking the festival and setting a building on fire to lure out Spider-Man is clearly shown putting children in peril.

* YoureNotMyFather: When Norman Osborn, [[spoiler:who has just revealed himself to be the Green Goblin to Peter/Spider-Man]], pleads with Peter to spare him and be his son, Peter fires back his pleas by saying, "I ''have'' a father. His name was Ben Parker."

---> "Mark my words, Osborn: The closest we come to heroes these days is some schmuck with bad timing who falls into it by accident!"\\

--> '''Green Goblin:''' Hello, my dear...

%%* MatchCut

--->'''Norman:''' ...last night I was -- \\

* PoliceAreUseless: Not for lack of trying, but the cops are simply outclassed when it comes to dealing with Goblin. One calls for a Code 4 when Goblin attacks the Unity Festival, and four try to take him down when Spider-Man sends Goblin crashing into a balloon. He promptly curb-stomps them, leaving Spider-Man to handle the villain.

* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodSandwich: As soon as everyone sits down for Thanksgiving dinner Norman notices a cut on Peter's arm, which Peter claims he got from being hit by a bike messenger. Realizing that Peter is Spider-Man, Norman gets up and leaves, and when Harry stops him in the hall, he makes some misogynistic remarks implying that Mary Jane is a GoldDigger. Mary Jane, having overheard the conversation and Harry halfheartedly defend her, gets upset and leaves after Harry takes his father's side. No one eats a bite on-camera, and two people don't eat anything period.

*** Two cops who find a pair of jewelry robbers Spider-Man caught are named [[Creator/TomDeFalco DeFalco]] and [[ComicBook/{{Daredevil}} Owlsley]]. Owlsley mentions hearing reports of "some kind of [[ComicBook/TheIncredibleHulk incredible hulk]]" attacking some soldiers last week in New Mexico.
*** Other characters name-dropped throughout the book include [[ComicBook/MisterFantastic Reed Richards]], [[ComicBook/IronMan Tony Stark]], [[ComicBook/AntMan Hank Pym]], and [[ComicBook/DoctorStrange Stephen Strange]].

* ToughRoom: Played with. When Peter is forced to fight Flash Thompson in high school, and kicks his ass with ease with his new spider powers, some students cheer but several, notably Flash's fellow crony, desert him as a "freak". While viewers have noted that any kid suddenly capable of whupping a JerkJock so soundly would in reality impress the whole school and become popular overnight, it could be [[JustifiedTrope justified]] in the sense of this being a [[Creator/MarvelComics Marvel]] [[Franchise/MarvelUniverse universe]] whose [[{{Muggles}} muggle]] population usually hates and fears people with similarly amazing abilities. They may have concluded that Peter might be a [[Franchise/XMen mutant]] and shunned him as such.

* PlotHole: The wresting ring manager sees Peter Parker's face and knows he was the Spider-Man that beat up Bonesaw, but never bothers to put two and two together or even shows up later in the movie.
** Likewise, many of Peter's classmates saw him drag a lunch tray using a sticky white substance and defeat Flash in a fight with near-inhuman reflexes, acrobatics, and strength, yet only MJ seems to make the connection between him and Spider-Man by the end of the film. She even lampshades in the novelization how many students are [[ArbitrarySkepticism skeptical of what Peter did despite witnessing it first-hand]].