Ned Leeds

"Hey, can I be your guy in the chair?" "What?" "You know how there's a guy, with the headset, telling the other guy where to go? Like if you were stuck in a burning building, I could tell you where to go, 'cause there'd be screens all around me, I can shoot around things, I can be your guy in the chair!"

- Ned Leeds and Peter Parker

Edward "Ned" Leeds is a student at Midtown School of Science and Technology. Upon discovering his best friend Peter Parker was Spider-Man, Leeds then focused on assisting his friend's heroic adventures as they attempted to find and defeat Vulture before he could sell high-tech hybrid weapons to the criminal underworld, while also hoping to use the Spider-Man to improve their own social standing at their school.

Friendship with Peter Parker
"Join me and together, we'll build my new LEGO Death Star." "What!"

- Ned Leeds and Peter Parker

Ned Leeds is a student at Midtown School of Science and Technology, and Peter Parker's best friend. He was also a member of the Academic Decathlon Team. At school, Leeds told Parker that he had got the Lego Death Star, and asked Parker if he wanted to help build it. Parker ended up distracted by Liz Toomes passing by, however, and unwittingly accepted.

Spider-Man Discovery
"You're the Spider-Man... from YouTube!" "No! No, I'm not! This is just a costume!" "You were on the ceiling!"

- Ned Leeds and Peter Parker

Shortly after, Leeds went to Parker's apartment. While Parker was not in due to the “Stark Internship”, his Aunt May allowed Leeds to wait in his room. Leeds then saw Parker enter through the window, crawling on the ceiling while wearing his Spider-Man Suit. He surprised Parker, who had to admit that he was Spider-Man, but got Leeds to keep it a secret. Over the next few days, Leeds bombarded Parker with questions over his abilities, and whether he had met other heroes like Captain America. Parker begrudgingly answered the questions, but became frustrated when Leeds blurted out in front of Liz that Parker knew Spider-Man. When they both got invited to her party, Leeds convinced Parker to make an appearance as Spider-Man to increase their social standing. Leeds was left waiting at the party when Parker had to bail to investigate an explosion that turned out to be an arms deal.

Assisting Spider-Man
"Evil lair?" "Dude, a gang with alien guns run by a guy with wings? Yeah, they have a lair." "Badass."

- Ned Leeds and Peter Parker

Having broken up the arms deal, Peter Parker had also discovered the Chitauri Energy Core. Leeds helped him to investigate it and saw that the alien core had been grafted to human technology. They avoided Herman Schultz who was tracking the power core and looking to recover it. Leeds also hacked into the Spider-Man Suit and discovered that the suit's abilities were limited by the Training Wheels Protocol. He disabled it, allowing Parker to access all of the suit's abilities.

Washington D.C. Trip
"Hey, how you doing? Don't worry about it. I got you." "Yes! Yes!" "Hey, Big Guy! Quit movin' around!" "Sorry, sir. So sorry."

- Spider-Man and Ned Leeds

Leeds joined the Academic Decathlon Team in Washington, D.C. for the finals. Parker was using the trip to investigate the Vulture, a villain who was responsible for the creation of the hybrid alien-human weapons. Leeds disabled the tracker inbuilt in the Spider-Man Suit that relayed his location to Tony Stark's assistant, Happy Hogan. Parker told Leeds to look after the power core and keep it safe. Parker ended up being trapped in a D.O.D.C. Vault and missed the finals the next day. Leeds participated in the finals, and the Midtown team won. Mr. Harrington took the team to the Washington Monument. At the top, the power core exploded, damaging part of the Monument and trapping several of the Academic Decathlon in an elevator. They were rescued by the arrival of Spider-Man.

Fighting Shocker
"What are you doing here? There's a dance." "Uh… I'm… looking at… porn."

- Monica Warren and Ned Leeds

At the homecoming dance, Leeds discovered that Parker left the dance. After followng his friend, Ned discovered Shocker nearly killing his friend. Trying to save his friend's life, Leeds intervened and distracted Shocker with one of Parker's web shooters, giving Spider-Man the advantage to web him against a bus. Upon recovering, Parker revealed to Ned that the Vulture is in really Adrian Toomes, Liz's father, to Leeds' shock. As Parker went after the Vulture before he could steal Avengers' equipment, Leeds was able to contact Tony Stark's security head, Happy Hogan, and locating Parker's phone, which was on Toomes' car. Ned used several computers in the school to help Parker in his mission, as well as to help him drive Flash Thompson's car, which Parker stole from Flash, to Ned's surprise. After Spider-Man arrived to the Vulture's lair, Leeds was caught by Monica Warren, one of the school's teachers. To cover for Parker, he claimed to be watching pornography.

Back to School Life
"It looked so insane. That whole-- Like, it was just crazy. He-- He was just, like... And you were like... And then I just hit him with the... It was so-- Oh, my God." "I mean, you saved me. It was awesome."

- Ned Leeds and Peter Parker

The day after Adrian Toomes' incarceration, Leeds and Peter Parker had returned back to Midtown School of Science and Technology and talked about their fight against the Shocker, while Parker then thanked him for saving his life. They quickly ran into Liz Toomes, who was moving to Oregon due to her father's request, to which Parker decided to talked to her. Leeds and Parker then participated in the decathlon meeting in an announcement of their new leader: Michelle Jones. When Jones stated that her friend's call her "MJ", Ned reminded to Jones that she told them that she has no friends, to which Jones stated that she didn't had. Sometime after, Leeds was interviewed by Betty Brant and Jason Ionello, anchors of the school's news team, as to his thoughts on Spider-Man's true identity. Leeds, defending his best friend's identity, responded that the costumed hero's identity was a mystery and would always be.

Field Trip
"Ned! Hey! I need you to cause a distraction." "Holy shit. We're all gonna die! There's a spaceship! Everybody hide!"

- Peter Parker and Ned Leeds

On a field trip, Leeds was listening to music, when Peter Parker tapped him on the shoulder to ask him to cause a distraction. Leeds ignored Parker, until he saw the Q-Ship descending on Greenwich Village, where he started screaming that an invasion was occurring, drawing everyone's attention, including the bus driver, allowing Parker to escape the bus and head towards the disturbance.

Personality
"What is like being famous when nobody knows it's you? It's crazy. Should we tell everyone?"

- Ned Leeds to Peter Parker

Ned Leeds is a highly intelligent science enthusiast, hacker, gamer, and geek, though he is also somewhat socially awkward, hence his close friendship with Peter Parker. Leeds is strongly displeased with being the school geek and wishes to become more popular. Initially, upon discovering that Parker is the Spider-Man, Leeds wanted to use his friend's alter-ego for rather selfish needs such as making himself and Parker more popular by claiming that Spider-Man was their close friend.

Leeds was very excited that Parker is a superhero and immediately wanted to be his "guy in the chair". After realizing that criminals could've killed Parker multiple times he began to take the Spider-Man more seriously and genuinely wanted to help Parker capture the Vulture, offering support whenever he could.

Abilities

 * Gifted Intelligence: Ned, like his friend Peter Parker, is an intelligent science enthusiast, and a member of the Midtown School of Science and Technology academic decathlon team.
 * Expert Hacker: Ned is a hacker skilled enough to bypass the Training Wheels Protocol installed in the Spider-Man Suit by Tony Stark himself.

Equipment

 * Spider-Man Suit: While attempting to locate the Vulture, Leeds tried on Peter Parker's mask for his own amusement.
 * Web-Shooters: Leeds used one of Spider-Man's Web-Shooters to keep the Shocker from using his Gauntlet to kill Spider-Man.

Family

 * Father
 * Mother

Allies

 * Midtown School of Science and Technology
 * Peter Parker/Spider-Man † - Classmate and Best Friend
 * Michelle Jones - Classmate, Decathlon Leader and Close Friend
 * Liz Toomes - Former Classmate and Former Decathlon Leader
 * Betty Brant - Classmate and Close Friend
 * Charles Murphy - Classmate
 * Cindy Moon - Classmate
 * Abe Brown - Classmate
 * Sally Avril - Classmate
 * Tiny McKeever - Classmate
 * Seymour O'Reilly - Classmate
 * Jason Ionello - Classmate
 * Roger Harrington - Teacher and Decathlon Supervisor
 * Monica Warren - Teacher
 * Barry Hapgood - Teacher
 * Wilson - Coach
 * May Parker
 * Happy Hogan

Enemies

 * Flash Thompson - Classmate
 * Adrian Toomes' Crew
 * Adrian Toomes/Vulture
 * Herman Schultz/Shocker
 * Randy Vale

Trivia

 * In the comics, Ned Leeds is a reporter for the Daily Bugle who married Betty Brant, and was brainwashed into believing and acting as the criminal known as the Hobgoblin.
 * The MCU version of Ned Leeds shares similarities with Ganke Lee, the best friend of Miles Morales from the Ultimate Universe. Their most notable similarities are their physical appearances, and their shared obsession with superheroes and LEGO. This was referenced in the comics when Ganke adopted the alias of "Ned" to hide his true identity from Danika Hart.
 * His surname is never stated nor listed in the credits of Spider-Man: Homecoming; however, the cast and crew documentaries included with the home video release of the film confirms his surname to be "Leeds".