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Giant Spider (view source)

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{{trope}}
[[File:rsz_rick_overton_eight_legged_freaks_001_7778.jpg|link=Eight Legged Freaks|frame|"Dispatch, [[Apollo 13|we have a problem.]]"]]
 
 
{{quote|And [[Superman]] needs to fight a Giant Spider in the third act. Do you know about spiders? [[Critical Research Failure|They're the fiercest killers in the insect kingdom!]]
|'''Producer Jon Peters''' on the fifth ''Superman'' movie in production around 1996/97, [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v{{=}}vgYhLIThTvk as related by Kevin Smith.] <ref>The spider would eventually be used in [[Wild Wild West|another Jon Peters produced film]]</ref>}}
 
Arachnophobia is probably the second-most popular phobia (after [[Monster Clown|coulrophobia]], that most tired of plot devices), and even non-arachnophobes have to admit that spiders can be pretty freaky. Therefore, the most popular form of [[Big Creepy-Crawlies]], and one of the most popular [[Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever|Fifty Foot Whatevers]] to attack has to be a [http://www.livescience.com/animals/news-spider-species-100111.html big spider]. (Don't click the link if you like to browse TVAll The Tropes before bed.) The bigger they are, the less likely there are to be more of them, but they're almost all so big that [[Square-Cube Law|they logically shouldn't be able to move or breathe]]. They will usually have hypertoxic venom, both spin webs and hunt for prey, and spit silk out of their mouths (most spiders in real life only focus on one trait).
 
Needless to say, they can be a bit of a problem for viewers that really are arachnophobic, especially in video games with them as a featured enemy. Many games get around this by making the spiders relatively cartoonish, or not having them correspond to any real life spiders. Granted, they can still be freaky due to the sheer nature of being giant spiders.
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They usually have little personality, beyond vague malevolence. Some of them can talk, but they're rarely very loquacious. Sometimes, they're just ordinary spiders who meet up with [[Incredible Shrinking Man|a protagonist who is small]], although it amounts to the same thing. Crossed over with [[Humongous Mecha]], you get the [[Spider Tank]].
 
Not to be confused with [[Demonic Spiders]], who are just difficult enemies (though sometimes a giant spider '''is''' a demonic spider), or [[Money Spider|Money Spiders]]s, which are just enemies that have money even though they logically shouldn't (though again, [[Money Spider|Money Spiders]]s ''can'' be literal spiders).
 
Compare [[Giant Enemy Crab]].
 
{{examples}}
 
== Anime and Manga ==
* The third chapter of ''[[Majin Devil]]'' is rife with them. Demonic dog-sized spiders with embryos on their backs that crawl out of pregnant girls hoohahs,tear their way out of their stomachs, or rip themselves out of hosts head.
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