There is a fundamental difference between scifi and fantasy in that scifi is often achievable. Traveling to see the stars is something we as a society can strive to achieve. People who grow up with that dream never have to give it up and they become the scientists that push society forward in pursuit of that dream. The fantasy of superhero movies isn't possible. So what becomes of the kids who grew up dreaming of being Spider-Man?
>So what becomes of the kids who grew up dreaming of being Spider-Man?
Peter Parker is a science nerd. I'd bet plenty of people grew up to pursue science because they were inspired by the comics.
Also, the people who "grew up dreaming of being Spider-Man" also grew up watching Star Trek, and Star Wars, and probably reading SF novels, maybe playing D&D, etc. This is literally the demographic that was interested in math, science and computers (back when being interesting in computers was 'weird') in school while the "normies" were playing sports and banging cheerleaders and such.
When I was a kid watching TNG, I assumed that FTL propulsion and communication, shields, (non centrifugal) artificial gravity, and transporters were all plausible technologies, and that universal translators with CGI lip-sync was just a convenience for the sake of filming.
We’ve got the latter, the former was theoretically impossible when it was filmed — yet the impossible was still useful inspiration.
