9 Movie Characters Who Are Making It Cool to Be Smart Again

4. Peter Parker, ‘Spider-Man: Homecoming’

I know what you’re thinking: Peter Parker isn’t new, he’s been a film fixture for the last two decades. We’ve seen no less than six films starring the wall crawler. So, what makes this new iteration so much different? This time around Peter Parker is a full on genius. Toby Maguire played him as a quiet kid with a flair for science, but in that version, Peter Parker’s mechanical genius was simply erased. Andrew Garfield’s version, meanwhile, focused more on making Spidey a smart aleck and less on his technical aptitude. Meanwhile, Tom Holland’s character is first and foremost a smart kid. He goes to a technical school, he invents his own gadgets, and he’s ceaselessly inquisitive. More than ever before, Peter Parker’s brains are intact.