History Main / ArtisticLicenseArachnids

** Skorupi and Drapion, both based on scorpions, each have half the amount of legs they should.

* ''Manga/InuYasha'': the first movie features a monstrous gigantic scorpion that not only has jaws, but also another head hidden in his stinger tail. Then again, it was a {{youkai}}.

* ''ComicBook/{{Grendel}}'': The comic likes to depict black widow spiders sinisterly sitting in the center of their orb webs, but real-life black widows are [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tangle_web_spider cobweb weavers]].

* There are recurring UrbanLegends about winged spiders, generally said to be native to some "obscure" (read: fictitious) part of the Middle East, Central Asia or Australia. One that gained a lot of traction in the UK and the Republic of Ireland in 2014 claimed a winged spider with the scientific name ''Volat araneus'' was migrating to the British Isles due to rising temperatures in its native [[{{Qurac}} Kamistan]] and the abundant population of its natural prey, the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steatoda_nobilis false widow]]. This particular rumor came from a self-admitted hoax article that had snippets taken out of context; in real life, no spiders are known to have wings, although gliding spiders were discovered in Panama in 2015.

* ''ComicBook/SpiderMan'': Spiders don't have most of the traits that the eponymous hero does. They're not particularly strong for their size, they're not very agile, and they certainly don't have a quasi-mystical spider-sense. What they do have are webs, venom, and being extremely hardy. The Wallcrawler only has the hardiness naturally.

-->The BlackWidow!

* ''Film/TheLordOfTheRingsTheReturnOfTheKing'': Shelob is, for all intents and purposes, a giant tarantula living high in the mountains above Minas Morgul and fairly faithful to her characterization from Tolkien's legendarium, with the dozens of webbed up corpses implying that film Shelob retained the endless hunger from her book counterpart. Shelob has a venomous stinger (which spiders don't have, as their venom is injected through their fangs, while stingers only evolved through flying insects such as wasps, or other arachnids such as scorpions), which she stabs Frodo with to paralyze him (he gets better) and tries to do several times to Sam.

* ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'': The above-mentioned Shelob has a stinger in the original book as well, though it's mentioned only twice (both times in passing) and unlike the movie plays no role in the action, so it's easy to miss.

* ''VideoGame/NightmareCreatures'': One of the many monsters you fight in the game are giant spiders, which turned entire streets in London into their nests. However, these spiders only have six limbs (four of which are used for attacking) and can walk upright on their two hind legs in a humanoid manner. Might be justified because the spiders, like all the other titular creatures, are lab-produced mutants.

A SubTrope of the above-mentioned SomewhereAnEntomologistIsCrying. A SuperTrope to YouHaveToBurnTheWeb, ProjectileWebbing, CobwebTrampoline, and CreepyCamelSpider. Related to ArtisticLicenseOrnithology, ArtisticLicensePaleontology, ArtisticLicenseMarineBiology, SomewhereAHerpetologistIsCrying and SomewhereAMammalogistIsCrying.

* ''VideoGame/AnimalCrossing'': Tarantulas and scorpions are two of the 3 bugs in the games that are extremely hostile towards the player and were the only bugs until [[VideoGame/AnimalCrossingNewHorizons ''New Horizons'']] that could make the player pass out upon stinging/biting them. If the player has a net equipped, they will chase after the player until they get stung, enter a building, or quit and reload the game, unlike their real-life counterparts, which aren't capable of doing that.

* ''VideoGame/AnimalCrossing'': Tarantulas and scorpions are two of the 3 bugs in the games that are extremely hostile towards the player and were the only bugs until ''New Horizons'' that could make the player pass out upon stinging or biting them. If the player has a net equipped, they will chase after the player unlike their real-life counterparts, which aren't capable of doing that.

** Related to the above, there's an oft-repeated myth that daddy long-legs have the most potent venom of any creature on Earth, but they're actually harmless to humans because their fangs are too small to penetrate our skin. Both harvestmen and the aforementioned Pholcid spiders get hit with this myth. In reality, the harvestmen completely lack venom glands, and their mouthparts are more like claws than biting fangs. While Pholcid spiders ''are'' able to bite and envenomate a human, their venom is only a mild irritant to us.

* ''Film/KingdomOfTheSpiders'': A swarm of super-aggressive tarantulas with extra-potent venom is blamed on...the spiders' food supply being eliminated by human encroachment. So, the lack of food made the spiders multiply explosively, change their behavioral patterns (attacking humans and livestock, encasing prey in webbing), and gave them super-potent venom? Not even a mutation by [[ToxicWasteCanDoAnything toxic waste]] or [[NuclearNasty nuclear testing]] handwave. Even if there were such an excuse given, the whole thing is laughably unrealistic.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheMask'' had the episode "Sister Mask" where the BigBad of the series, Dr. Pretorius, a {{Cyborg}} turned ''into'' a GiantSpider as a SuperPoweredEvilSide upon wearing Loki's mask, but there were several things that were very inaccurate:

* Arachnids don't have jaws, teeth, or tongues like vertebrates do. Spider fangs always point downwards, not inwards towards each other like insect mandibles, and aren't used to suck the juices from prey (they have a tiny mouth-hole, which is what regurgitates enzymes and does the sucking afterwards).

* Being arachnids, both scorpions and spiders have eight legs (the pincers are pedipalps, which are closer to mouthparts than anything), [[FourLeggedInsect but good luck finding a fictional one with the right number of legs]]. This is made all the more jarring because a simple Website/{{Google}} search would clear up this misunderstanding immediately.

* Arachnids normally have eight eyes, but they're commonly depicted in fiction as having only two, four, or six.
* The Solfugidae, an arachnid order distinct from true spiders and scorpions, are often incorrectly lumped with either order, leading to their common names "camel spiders," "sun spiders," and "wind scorpions". They're also frequently described as extremely venomous and aggressive to humans, both of which are false. See CreepyCamelSpider for more about them.

* Spiders are consistently depicted as being lethally poisonous, the venom is almost always of the "causes [[HollywoodHeartAttack heart attack]]" type (with an occasional appearance of the "[[TheParalyzer paralyzes whole body]], including lungs" type), and their venom always acts within seconds, regardless of species or other factors like the bitten human's health.

* Because of both SmallTaxonomyPools and RuleOfScary, a big arachnid that's not very dangerous in real life (such as a tarantula or an emperor scorpion) will be treated as if it is highly dangerous, making it a rough equivalent of the TerrifyingPetStoreRat. Tarantulas, and the biggest species of scorpions, usually have venom that will have little effect on something as big as a human, even if their bites and stings are often painful. The most venomous spiders and scorpions are typically quite ''small''. The big ones are chosen because the little ones won't show up well on a movie screen and, because if an animal with weak venom did end up biting anyone on the cast or crew, it would be less of a problem than if an animal with strong venom bit them.

* ''Manga/{{Arachnid}}'': Alice jumps all over the place when analogies to real-life arachnids are made. One chapter she's an Araenid (orb-weaver spider), the next she's a Salticid (jumping spider).

* Being arachnids, both scorpions and spiders have eight legs (the pincers are pedipalps, which are closer to mouthparts than anything), [[FourLeggedInsect but good luck finding a fictional one with the right number of legs]]. This is made all the more jarring because a simple Google search would clear up this misunderstanding immediately.

** A similar commonly stated myth states that a tarantula's bite is "no more painful than a bee sting". While it is true that tarantula bites are not ''dangerous'' to humans, they are still extremely ''painful'', especially in the larger species.

* Spiders are consistently depicted as being lethally poisonous, the venom is almost always of the "causes heart attack" type (with an occasional appearance of the "paralyzes whole body, including lungs" type), and their venom always acts within seconds, regardless of species or other factors like the bitten human's health.

* Because of both SmallTaxonomyPools and RuleOfScary, a big arachnid that's not very dangerous in real life (such as a tarantula or an emperor scorpion) will be treated as if it is highly dangerous, making it a rough equivalent of the TerrifyingPetStoreRat. Tarantulas, and the biggest species of scorpions, mainly have venoms that will have little effect on something as big as a human. The most venomous spiders and scorpions are typically quite ''small''. The big ones are chosen because the little ones won't show up on a movie screen and, because if an animal with weak venom did end up biting anyone on the cast or crew, it would be less of a problem than if an animal with strong venom bit them.

* ''WesternAnimation/CharlottesWeb'': Despite clearly being a spider, Charlotte has insect-like antennae.

* ''Film/DrNo'': First, Dr. No's [[TheDragon dragon]] tried to kill [[Film/JamesBond James Bond]] by putting a very large tarantula in his bed while he slept. Even if it bit him (it didn't), it would've just hurt a lot. Later, Honey Ryder tells Bond that she killed her landlord [[RapeAsBackstory after he raped her]] by putting a female black widow on his bed, and that it took the guy a week to die. She got very lucky: contrary to urban legend, black widow bites are rarely fatal to humans (they do hurt like hell, though, and can make humans very sick).

* ''Film/KingdomOfTheSpiders'': A swarm of super-aggressive tarantulas with extra-potent venom is blamed on...the spiders' food supply being eliminated by human encroachment. So, the lack of food made the spiders multiply explosively, change their behavioral patterns (attacking humans and livestock, encasing prey in webbing), and gave them super-potent venom? Not even a mutation by toxic waste or nuclear testing handwave. Even if there were such an excuse given, the whole thing is laughably unrealistic.

* ''WesternAnimation/Primal2019'': The fourth episode has a GiantSpider that can ''spit silk from its mouth'', among other inaccuracies.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheSecretSaturdays'': Munya is supposed to transform into a spider/human hybrid, but looks much more like a red [[ComicBook/IncredibleHulk Hulk]] with fangs, claws, and four spider legs poking out of his back.
** However, there is a bit of FridgeBrilliance, when one acknowledges the arguments often used against the existence of giant spiders. He wouldn't be able to function if he had a more spider-like frame, so his design instead focuses on the spider's main strengths.
* ''WesternAnimation/SpiderMan1967'': The spider ChestInsignia on the eponymous hero's costume has only six legs, when actual spiders have eight legs.

* ''Film/TheLordOfTheRingsTheReturnOfTheKing'': Shelob is, for all intents and purposes, a giant tarantula living high in the mountains above Minas Morgul and fairly faithful to her characterization from Tolkien's legendarium, with the dozens of webbed up corpses implying that film Shelob retained the endless hunger from her book counterpart. Shelob has a venomous stinger (which spiders don't have, as their venom is injected through their fangs, while stingers only evolved through flying insects such as wasps), which she stabs Frodo with to paralyze him (he gets better) and tries to do several times to Sam.

[[caption-width-right:350:Six legs, antennae, [[ComicallyMissingThePoint clearly that's an insect, not a spider]].]]

[[caption-width-right:350:"Six legs, antennae, [[ComicallyMissingThePoint clearly that's an insect, not a spider]]."]]

* ''VideoGame/WorldOfIllusion'': The spiders in the game have six legs instead of eight.

** Notably, while the film more or less treats her as another magical creature in Middle-Earth, it also downplays her nature as an EldritchAbomination, whereas in the book, she's described as capable of weaving webs of shadow that block out light and nearly as old as Middle-Earth itself.

* ''Film/{{Arachnophobia}}'': As you can tell by the name, this movie has several instances of incorrectly-depicted things about arachnids:

SuperTrope to YouHaveToBurnTheWeb, ProjectileWebbing, CobwebTrampoline, and CreepyCamelSpider, SubTrope of the above-mentioned SomewhereAnEntomologistIsCrying and related to ArtisticLicenseOrnithology, ArtisticLicensePaleontology, SomewhereAHerpetologistIsCrying, and SomewhereAMammalogistIsCrying.

!!Examples:

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]

[[folder:Film -- Animation]]

[[folder:Film -- Live-Action]]

SubTrope of the above-mentioned SomewhereAnEntomologistIsCrying and related to ArtisticLicenseOrnithology, ArtisticLicensePaleontology, SomewhereAHerpetologistIsCrying, and SomewhereAMammalogistIsCrying.

* Being arachnids, both scorpions and spiders have eight legs (the pincers are pedipalps, which are closer to mouthparts than anything), but good luck finding a fictional one with the right number of legs. This is made all the more jarring because a simple Google search would clear up this misunderstanding immediately.

** He only had two eyes for his [[GlowingEyesOfDoom Glowing]] [[RedEyesTakeWarning Red]] [[GlowingEyesOfDoom Eyes of Doom]], when arachnids have eight.

** He only had two eyes for his GlowingRedEyesOfDoom, when arachnids have eight.

* Due to factors including arachnid respiratory systems, exoskeleton limitations, and body temperature regulatory systems, it's simply not possible for arachnids to reach the sizes often depicted -- they'd either collapse under their own weight or suffocate.

** A similar commonly stated myth states that a tarantula's bite is "no more painful than a bee sting". While it is true that tarantula bites are not dangerous to humans, they are still extremely painful, especially in the larger species.