Honestly, I don't see how "realistic" (or rather using today's equivalent to lightning and science goo, as far as not being well understood by the public) is mutually exclusive from "interesting".
After all, it's not really the method itself that is ever the most intriguing component to a hero's origins, but rather the circumstances around it and the storylines that unlock from it that are. Yes, Spider-Man got his powers after getting bitten by a radioactive spider. But it's only through Uncle Ben's death that a hero was born.