Marvel Comics fans may be surprised to find out that the company's flagship character, Spider-Man's amazing powers.
For the longest time, Marvel readers were convinced that the incident that gave Peter Parker his powers was a purely scientific event. The unlucky spider, caught in the experiment, bit Peter and the radiation somehow overwrote the teenager's DNA with that of an arachnid. It was wacky, but it made perfect sense in the context of the 1960s when radioactivity was the subject of fear and awe. Fast-forward to the early 2000s, and Amazing Spider-Man writer J. M. Straczynski decided that Peter Parker needed more mysticism in his life. Then came the concept of the Spider-Totems, avatars of godlike beings tasked with overseeing a multidimensional construct called the Web of Life and Destiny. The radioactive spider only triggered Peter's transformation into a totemic avatar, meaning that his powers do not actually have a scientific origin. Since then, both explanations have been canon, and Peter himself itted that they are not mutually exclusive.
However, the majority of Spider-Man fans may not be aware that the character has actually a third, completely different origin story, that has never been disproved by Marvel. In Marvel Two-In-One Annual #2 by Jim Starlin and Joe Rubinstein, Peter Parker and the Thing from the Fantastic Four are summoned by two cosmic entities, Lord Chaos and Master Order, to help the Avengers, Captain Marvel, and Adam Warlock in defeating Thanos, during the Mad Titan's first attempt at pleasing Lady Death by destroying the Sun. Peter and Ben are not aware that they are really pawns in a cosmic game, but they still manage to tip the scales in favor of the heroes. During the battle, however, Lord Chaos and Master Order reveal that they are responsible for choosing Peter for the destiny of becoming Spider-Man, all so that he could be in the right place at the right time and play his part in Thanos' defeat.
While this theory has never been mentioned again, the story in the comic is indeed canon and is actually of great overall significance because it establishes Thanos as Marvel's premier villain, setting up the stage for many following epic sagas such as The Infinity Gauntlet. What is most fascinating, however, is that all three of Spider-Man's origin stories make sense together, and do not contradict each other. Chaos and Order steered Peter into a place of cosmic significance, which got him noticed by the Spider-Totem as the perfect embodiment, which then prompted the scientific experiment that irradiated the spider and gave Peter his powers. This is one of the rare cases where decades of accumulated stories, retcons, and relaunches have not messed up a character's lore (too much).
With the Multiverse becoming a key feature in Marvel stories and the success of the Spider-Verse sagas, Peter's mystical origins as a Spider-Totem are currently the prominent versions of the story. However, the scientific component and even the mostly-unknown cosmic intervention of Lord Chaos and Master Order are also part of Peter Parker's origins, and they all contribute to making Spider-Man the unique and iconic character he is today.
