Spectacular means impressive and striking to look at. A spectacular view, spectacular failure, spectacularly good.
It works for disasters as well as successes — a spectacular failure is a memorable one, and the word is about scale rather than merit. As a noun a spectacular is a large stage or television show. The Latin means a sight or show.
1adjectivespectacularImpressive and striking to look at.
“From the top of the tower, the views of the city are spectacular.”
spectacular is a quality of impressiveness.
Latin spectaculum means a sight or show, from spectare, to watch. Spectator and spectacle come from the same watching.
Proto-Indo-European
*speḱ-
Latin
spectaculum — a sight, show
English, today
spectacular
From Latin spectaculum (“a sight, show”) + -ar.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA