Deadline Hollywood Daily's Nikke Finke reported that Spider-Man 3 grossed a stunning $148 million domestically and an even more spectacular $225 million overseas putting the week's total haul (it opened on Tuesday in Asia) at a record-breaking $375 million! One possible reason why the film has resonated with audiences worldwide are the Christian themes at the core of the Spider-Man story. Time Magazine in 2004 made this observation in an article titled The Gospel According to Spider-Man. In a recent interview with Christianity Today, as with Superman Returns director Bryan Singer, director Sam Raimi explained his use of Christian themes in all three Spider-Man films. Mark Moring writes, "The film is rife with themes of love, friendship, pride, vengeance, confession, repentance, forgiveness and redemption. No kidding—it's all there … not to mention a critical scene in a church that I won't say much about here. In the studio's official press kit, Raimi sounds like a Sunday school teacher when he says that in this story, "Peter has to put aside his prideful self. He must put aside his desire for vengeance. He has to learn that we are all sinners. He has to learn forgiveness."

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Christians have been among those embracing the protagonist, in part because Raimi has been unafraid to clearly include biblical themes and spiritual imagery in the films.

Spidey 2 (2004) might well have been subtitled The Passion of Peter Parker, as the hero wrestled with whether or not he wanted to be a "savior" of sorts. And when he saves the runaway train near the movie's end—in a crucifixion pose, with a wound in his side and holes in his wrists, no less—and then goes through a symbolic death, burial and resurrection … well, let's just say it's quite a spiritual moment.

Raimi doesn't hold back from the spiritual imagery in Spider-Man 3, either, as the main character wrestles with a dark side he never knew he had. The movie's tagline is "The Battle Within," and the story is reminiscent of Paul's struggle with his sinful nature in Romans 7: "I do not understand what I do," the apostle writes. "For what I want to do, I do not do, but what I hate, I do."