Spectacular Spider-Man

I don’t usually watch TV shows, and I was hesitant to try this one because I don’t like the style that’s popular in cartoons these days, but I’m obsessed enough with Spidey that I gave this one a shot and it is the best thing EVER. Quite possibly my single favorite representation of the spiderman storyline ever put together. It really feels like it was all planned out better than it ever has been, the way all the plot threads truly fit together, and the characters have all been adjusted just right to make everything unfold in a logical manner instead of a haphazard comic book manner (even the 90s cartoon never fully jumped this hurdle). For example: it turns out Felicia Hardy’s father was the man who killed Uncle Ben? WHAT! BEAUTIFUL.

I don’t particularly like the art but it’s not absolutely terrible, and some of the characters actually look great (Mary Jane, Harry, Aunt May) which makes up for the ones who look infuriatingly stupid (Peter, Liz Allen, Eddie Brock, Venom, Eddie Brock).

I just finished season 2 and I’m dying for a third one to be made. The way they handled the Green Goblin was just unbelievably brilliant. I had really believed they made it Harry before it was Norman, just to throw us off, and then when it appeared to be neither of them at the end I was actually genuinely stumped! Finally I decided the Norman riding with Harry in the chopper at the end had to be a robot or a (bleg, please no) clone and the goblin really was Norman all along, so I was pretty close at the end there, but somehow it completely escaped me to think it could have been the Chameleon, which, I mean, DUH. It seems so obvious in retrospect.

There’s so much more that can be done with this in a third season. I REALLY hope they have the balls to kill Gwen. That would make this series so unbelievably potent and awesome.

pity post

it’s ok, nobody has posted in any other threads since I made this one either

I haven’t given it a chance yet! I still plan to check it out, I’ve heard good things. Thanks for the words TK.

I have watched a few episodes of the current Wolverine/X-Men show, it’s not too bad

i haven’t seen the xmen cartoon, but i don’t know if i’d be interested/want to.

I’m skeptical of it but I was of Spectacular too so I guess you never know!

I watched 2-5 episodes, was pretty blah to me. Looked childish imo. The art style was a new twist, but it lacked something.

All that’s aired here is the first season, but I loved every episode of it. I dislike this minimalist-stylized character design style that all the US cartoons have nowadays as well, and I don’t feel this series is any better for using it, but that aside, the writing, VA work, storyboarding, and animation is really top notch.

Like you said, all the plot points are very well throught through. Peter’s dialogue has all the wit and charm it should, and Josh Keaton does an excellent job voicing him. The pacing feels much more even than it did in the 90’s show, as well, and unlike the awful movie trilogy, Peter’s personal issues outside of being Spider-man come of as realistic and relatable, rather than angsty and overdone.

Can’t say as though I’m some huge Spidey afficianado or anything, but of all the comics I’ve read, the 90’s cartoon, and the movie trilogy, this is definitely the best representation of his storyline that I’ve seen yet.

I watched 2-5 episodes, was pretty blah to me. Looked childish imo. The art style was a new twist, but it lacked something.

I hope you’re not judging it just by the art. Like I said, I don’t like the art style at all, but everything else about the show is so good it doesn’t matter.

It IS a real shame this thing is drawn the way it is. If I could get this cartoon drawn in the 90s style but with a more accurately represented Peter, I think it would be perfect in every way possible.

I dislike this minimalist-stylized character design style that all the US cartoons have nowadays

This is exactly what it is. It just looks like they can’t be bothered to draw anything but the most basic lines for every character. That combined with the insistence on drawing some characters with retardedly exaggerated features (Eddie Brock. UGH) makes it pretty blegh.

But people who have listened to me blather about why I won’t watch Transformers Animated should know how much of a testament it is to the quality of this show that I still love it!

Rofl my brother watches this, I have watched a few episodes and it was pretty decent.

I always loved the other cartoon that was shown on Jetix/Fox Kids "The Amazing Spiderman" I think it was called. I watched that right through and I loved the ending where Spiderman teamed up with several spidermen from other dimensions to save the entire universe.

The animation style somewhat kills it for me – I tried watching this, as well as the relatively new Transformers Animated, and whilst both had interesting story arcs I just kept feeling I was being treated as a child with the very basic, almost ‘loony toon’ animation style used. And that mole that Peter has, whilst probably canon, keeps putting me off too.

On a complete contrast with this, I thought ‘Wolverine and the X-Men’ was fantasic. I’m a huge fan of the early 90’s X-Men series and thought that after the somewhat mediocre movie trilogy and the horribly kiddie oriented X-Men Evolution, which kinda got good when it was too late (it got canned), we’ve now got a decent X-Men series again. And at least they’ve animated it properly…

whilst probably canon

It’s not. They just put it there, I guess because he is a teenager.

The animation style somewhat kills it for me – I tried watching this, as well as the relatively new Transformers Animated, and whilst both had interesting story arcs I just kept feeling I was being treated as a child with the very basic, almost ‘loony toon’ animation style used. And that mole that Peter has, whilst probably canon, keeps putting me off too.

On a complete contrast with this, I thought ‘Wolverine and the X-Men’ was fantasic. I’m a huge fan of the early 90’s X-Men series and thought that after the somewhat mediocre movie trilogy and the horribly kiddie oriented X-Men Evolution, which kinda got good when it was too late (it got canned), we’ve now got a decent X-Men series again. And at least they’ve animated it properly…

X-Men Evo was good, everything just moved kinda slow… I do agree with you on the crappy animation for Spectacular Spider-Man though. They should have also removed that turd on Peter’s face. I do however approve of the story.

On a complete contrast with this, I thought ‘Wolverine and the X-Men’ was fantasic. I’m a huge fan of the early 90’s X-Men series and thought that after the somewhat mediocre movie trilogy and the horribly kiddie oriented X-Men Evolution, which kinda got good when it was too late (it got canned), we’ve now got a decent X-Men series again. And at least they’ve animated it properly…

xmen evo as pretty good. i agree that it went a little too slow and got good too late, but overall, i enjoyed it.

i have to completely disagree with you on the animation of wolverine and the xmen. i think it looks kinda shitty. not as bad as other cartoons, but certainly not as good as like, the 90s cartoon. also, i don’t know if i can get into wolverine and the xmen, but that’s for personal reasons….

xmen evo as pretty good. i agree that it went a little too slow and got good too late, but overall, i enjoyed it.

i have to completely disagree with you on the animation of wolverine and the xmen. i think it looks kinda shitty. not as bad as other cartoons, but certainly not as good as like, the 90s cartoon. also, i don’t know if i can get into wolverine and the xmen, but that’s for personal reasons….

I just thought it should have been called X-Men ‘Devolution’ throughout the first series, it was more in line with "Saved By The Bell" than a good old action cartoon, and I didn’t like what they did with Nightcrawler in particular -take a rather deep and contemplative character and turn him into a teen buffoon, der blue fuzzy guy.

I meant in relation to Spectacular Spiderman and it’s ilk, Wolverine and the X-Men is done well, though as you say I also prefer the character portrayals in the 90’s series. I also thought I’d have difficulty getting into Wolverine and the X-Men too, as I dont like they way they’ve been making the X-Men Wolverine centric over the last 10 years (on screen media anyway), though he doesn’t dominate much at all really in this.

I dont like they way they’ve been making the X-Men Wolverine centric over the last 10 years (on screen media anyway)

YES!!! THANK YOU!!!! you, sir, have a good head on your shoulders.

*cough* You only say that because you’d rather see a certain Female/flaming bird be the poster child of the X-Men.*cough*

Wolverine’s always been popular, he has a pretty solid fan base, and Marvel’s just making fans happy.

lol, jeff, that’s not like, the major reason. i just think that enough is enough and they should focus more on good characters.

and SE focuses mainly on FF7, Cloud, and Sephiroth to keep all the fanboys happy, and that gets annoying too

I won’t say you’re wrong but it’ll keep happening until they get a new fan favorite. I hope it’s gambit, or Magneto. They should totally do a Magneto escaping from Nazis with his child powers movie.

they’re already ahead of you. if origins:wolverine does well (which i think it will), they will go ahead and start production on origins: magneto

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-Men_Origins:_Magneto#X-Men_Origins:_Magneto

also, if you scroll up to the wolverine section, and read the last sentence, you’ll see fox is developing spinoffs for deadpool and gambit. basically, they’re gonna keep making movies until they run the series into the ground.

or they might just keep making movies until the series… uh… like, is still the same or something ?_?

wot?

I mean I don’t see why they would have to run it into the ground. I don’t get it. So far they’ve made 3 movies and 2 have been good, and the bad one at least had a juggernaut bitch reference in it. Most people seem pretty stoked about the next one. So far I’d say their track record is pretty good!

And I feel that, as a general rule, the quality of Marvel’s movies is only going up. Iron Man was truly brilliant, Wolverine Origins looks great, the recent Hulk was light years better than the older one.

He’s just mad because of a lack of Phoenix references. And when Phoenix was referenced she was made short work of :-P.

All in all, I’m pretty happy w/ Marvel’s movies. Needs more Apocalypse though.

i have a plot for xmen 4 that involves apocalypse and certain other characters. ^^

also, tk, man, idk. origins looks kinda stupid, especially considering it has gambit and that whore emma frost, and they have no business being there, afaik

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