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There’s something utterly charming in how crudely these shows used to be animated. Before motion comics were ever thought of, there were shows like 1981’s Spider-Man, which is essentially animated in the same manner. Cheesy plotlines, bad voice acting and cringe-inducing dialogue abound. But I still liked it, mostly.
Spider-Man at least had the tendency to showcase the wall-crawler’s humorous side. And he frequently used science, of the dubious Saturday morning cartoon variety, to take down his adversaries. It’s also nice to see Dr. Octopus, the Vulture and various other rogues in his gallery looking appropriately schlubby, old or just generally like their comic book counterparts. (One of the things that bothers me about the 90s animated series is how frequently the characters were pumped full of steroids and made to look nothing like their comic counterparts.)
But the show did have a problem with investing us with memorable characters, larger story archs or any true sense of danger or stakes being at play. Storylines never continue from one episode to the next, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but that lack of continuity really hurts the show in the long run. You see, we’re never given any reason to care about any of the characters. The bad guys all kind of merge into one after a while, and most show up once and never return, so we only have their gimmickry to set them apart. As a comic book fan, I knew their histories, but someone new to mythos would be a little lost. We all know Spider-Man is going to win in the end, but the stakes could have been raised to make us care more about our hero, the villains, someone, anyone. A little history behind the whole proceedings would have gone a long way. The only episode which really tried this out was “Arsenic and Old Lady,” which had Aunt May under mind-control repeatedly trying to kill Spider-Man.
And if that episode write-up didn’t sound bonkers enough for you, how about the one where Mysterio takes over and controls much of New York through his disco (club and music) of murder? Or the one where Lizard hides out in the zoo, tries to take over the sewer to make it into a swamp, and breed his own army of reptilian and amphibious creatures to take over the city? For some reason the only repeating villains are Dr. Doom (who I associated far more often with the Fantastic Four, or being a general mass crossover-level villain) and the Kingpin, who is not a bad choice. Magneto also shows up for one episode, the animation on him is particularly awful, and the writer clearly had no clue on what to do with him. (Ironic considering that the episode “The Prison Plot” from Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends did such a great job utilizing the character.) The utterly bonkers storylines are very family-friendly safe, which is kind of a nice change of pace after growing up with the dark/tortured run of super heroics in shows like X-Men or Batman: The Animated Series.
I think this high camp charm is what made me enjoy the show. It’s not perfect, or even very good, but it is amiable enough to spend some time with it. It also, mercifully, only lasted for one season of twenty-six episodes, so getting through it all isn’t too hard. Look for cameos from Captain America, Medusa, Sub-Mariner and Ka-Zar to add to the fun.
