New Dimir Hero Invites Busted Reanimator Combos to Standard

Last updated on October 7, 2025

Superior Spider-Man | Illustration by Carlos Dattoli

Not much has changed at the top of Magic's Standard metagame this weekend. As reported last Friday, Izzet Vivi Cauldron, Red Deck Wins, and Dimir aggro are the three top-tier decks, with Vivi and mono-red having the largest share of the meta and top cuts.

But if you dig a big deeper, there's a new archetype that's making the rounds… or, perhaps better said, a very old archetype that has resurrected in a brand-new deck: A novel Reanimator brew sits in a comfortable tier two under Cauldrons and Mountains, and has been brought back thanks to the excellent teamwork of two Universes Beyond cards: Superior Spider-Man, and Final Fantasy‘s Ardyn, The Usurper.

Your Best, Friendly Neighborhood Spider

Ardyn, the Usurper | illus. Russel Lu

It sounds a bit like a silly pun, but Superior Spider-Man (*) is indeed Standard's superior Spider-Man card: The only SPM card that (thus far) has found a four-of slot in a competitive Standard deck.

There's a lot of different Superior Reanimator builds. The majority lean into Sultai, although Grixis and Dimir also show up in MTGO Challenges.

Sultai's most common builds usually including full playsets of Superior Spider-Man alongside Overlord of the Balemurk and Bringer of the Last Gift, and often one copy of Valgavoth, Terror Eater:

Source: MTGTop8

Superior Spider-Man is great for reanimating your creatures even when there's a very high likelihood that your opponent is going to be playing one of the best graveyard hate pieces in Standard: Agatha's Soul Cauldron.

With that in mind, Ardyn, the Usurper may be a bit of a counterintuitive inclusion here because he does target. But Ardyn is not really a Reanimator piece as much as he is the knock-out punch this decks goes for when going for the throat.

“Yes, you can copy [Ardyn] you're absolutely desperate with Superior Spiderman,” explains u/Mattazzer, “but he turns your Bringer pile into an OTK. You cast Superior Spider-Man a copy of Bringer of the Last Gift. Bringer then returns everything, including Ardyn. At the beginning of combat, Ardyn brings back one of your utility creatures as a 5/5, and lets you swing with Bringer of the Last Gift and any other demons you might have (e.g. Valgavoth) as his effect applies to all demons, not just the thing he reanimates.”

Grixis Reanimator in Standard

Valgavoth, Terror Eater | lllus. Antonio Jose Manzanedo

Although Sultai Reanimator is thus far the most popular, some Grixis Reanimator variants have shown up.

“Sultai is the better reanimator pile with bringer but Grixis is the better deck if someone attacks your reanimator plan,” says u/BeBetterMagic when comparing both builds.

New brews still don't seem able to go toe to toe with Standard's Top Dogs, so it's unlikely that Reanimator will make too big of a splash before the current Standard metagame changes. But if you want something that may be able to punch up quite hard after the next Banned and Restricted announcement (which will very likely give Vivi a slap in the wrist) and you love cheating big stuff into play, Superior Spider-Man may be your friendliest spider in Standard.