The best-kept secret of the pairing is that they're creative siblings from the very start: artist Steve Ditko co-created both Spider-Man and Doctor Strange. Two of Marvel's most iconic heroes came from the same imagination in the same era — so their team-ups aren't just a crossover, they're a family reunion.
Peter Parker and Stephen Strange first met in Amazing Spider-Man Annual #2 (1965), "The Wondrous World of Doctor Strange," by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. The sorcerer Xandu hypnotizes two thugs into stealing half of the Wand of Watoomb from Doctor Strange's Greenwich Village sanctum; Spider-Man, tangling with the thieves, is drawn into Strange's world, and the two join forces to defeat Xandu and reunite the wand. It was a natural pairing, since Ditko was drawing both characters at the time, and it established the pattern of Spider-Man as the street-level hero who stumbles into Strange's mystical affairs.
Spider-Man and Doctor Strange remain longtime friends and one of Marvel's most durable hero-and-sorcerer partnerships: Strange is Peter's default call whenever a threat turns mystical, and the two have logged years together on various Avengers rosters. In recent comics Strange was killed in 'The Death of Doctor Strange' (2021-2022), after which his longtime pupil and lover Clea Strange took up the mantle of Sorcerer Supreme; Stephen was later resurrected in the pages of his own 'Strange' series. As fellow New York-based heroes they continue to cross paths, with Peter still treating Strange as his trusted authority on all things magical.
Stephen Strange was a brilliant but arrogant surgeon — until a car crash shattered the nerves in his hands and ended his career. Desperate for a cure, he searched the world and found the Ancient One. He came seeking healing for his hands; he left as Earth's foremost sorcerer, trading a scalpel for spellcraft.
As Master of the Mystic Arts and eventually Sorcerer Supreme, he defends our reality from threats no ordinary hero can touch — casting spells, conjuring raw energy, projecting his astral form, and travelling between dimensions. He's aided by mystic artifacts like the Eye of Agamotto and the Cloak of Levitation, working from his Sanctum Sanctorum in Greenwich Village.