Spider-Man: The Animated Series
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Spider-Man Original run November 19, 1994 – January 31, 1998.
Spider-Man is an American animated television series featuring the Marvel Comics superhero Spider-Man, which ran for five seasons (65 episodes) starting November 19, 1994 and finishing January 31, 1998. The series was written by John Semper, Jr. and produced by the Marvel Films Animation. It is generally acclaimed to be the most accurate TV adaptation of the famous superhero in terms of art and general atmosphere. The plot, however, was heavily modified. This incarnation of Spider-Man stands out because the narrative was focused on drama instead of action like most cartoons for older children of the period.
The series tells the story of a nineteen year old Peter Parker at his first year at Empire State University, and his alter-ego the Amazing Spider-Man. As the story begins Peter has already gained his powers, is single and a part-time photographer for the Daily Bugle. The show features most of Spider-Man's classic villains, including the Green Goblin, The Lizard, The Scorpion, Doctor Octopus, Mysterio, The Rhino, The Kingpin, The Shocker, The Vulture, and The Chameleon, as well as more recent villains such as Venom, Carnage, and The Hobgoblin. Over the course of the series the single Peter Parker contends with the romantic interests of Mary Jane Watson, Felicia Hardy and her alter ego, The Black Cat. (Gwen Stacy does not feature as a potential love interest, because she was dead in the comics. She eventually appears as Peter's wife in an alternate reality.)
Marvel's earlier animated success, X-Men: The Animated Series, was produced by Saban, but Marvel had ambitions to produce their own shows through their newly-formed in-house company, Marvel Films Animation. Spider-Man was the only series to fly under this banner. This show is the second longest-running Marvel show ever created, after X-Men: The Animated Series, which lasted for six years, five seasons and 76 episodes.
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[edit] Creation
Stan Lee, Avi Arad, and Bill Kerstetter are the executive producers of the show. Stan Lee as one of the creators of Spider-Man had quite an interest in seeing Spider-man portrayed faithfully from the comic books. Lee claimed to check "every premise, every outline, every script, every model sheet, every storyboard, everything to do with putting the show together." To ensure the stories were told faithfully, Lee and producer John Semper recruited writers who had experience from the comic books to work on scripts, among them was Gerry Conway and Marv Wolfman.
Producer Bob Richardson desired to give the show a "contemporary live-action feel" by merging CGI and traditional animation. Richardson described the outcome to be more "NYPD Blue than The Smurfs."
One of the obligations of working with Fox was to make the show educational by introducing weighty issues that could be resolved that is appropriate for children. Semper argues that Spider-Man is more adept at this because the show takes place in real world New York making it able to tackle problems "closer to home."
[edit] Animation
Concept Art for Spider-Man.To reproduce the New York's style background illustrators undertook a large amount of visual research, using photo archives from above New York, particularly rooftops. Maps were consulted for references and buildings were faithfully reproduced. It has been reported that when the animation cell depicting Manhattan's Pan Am Building were scrapped after being complete it was because the California-based art staff learned the Midtown landmark had gotten a new sign more than a year earlier.
The animation staff were directed to populate the city with cars and crowds on the street level. Semper believed that was one of the limitations of earlier Spider-Man animated projects.
Originally Marvel Films planned to make the backgrounds completely CGI while Spider-Man 'webslinged' around New York, yet due to budget constraints were forced to use traditional cel based animation while occasionally using CGI backgrounds.
[edit] Censorship
By 1994 heavy censorship was being enforced by Fox because certain shows like Power Rangers were being banned for excessive violence in some countries. So in a bid to make Spider-Man: The Animated Series as politically correct as possible, the producers of the show were instructed to abide by their extensive list of requirements [1]. Among the notable restrictions were:
- Not mentioning "Death", "Die", "Kill" or other words with a strong negative meaning. Death was to be avoided, leading Semper to skirt around the issue, killing characters off-panel or in unrealistic ways, and "destroy" and "destruction" were frequently employed as synonyms. For example:
- Mary Jane and the Green Goblin fall through an interdimensional portal instead of falling to their deaths.
- It is stated that the Punisher's family was "caught in a crossfire between rival gangs", and the same applied to the wife of the Destroyer.
- At one point, when the Goblin returns after seemingly perishing, Spider-Man says, "You?! But I thought you were-" and the Goblin cuts him off with, "I'm not.. but you'll soon be!"
- Many realistic guns were not allowed, and no firearms could shoot bullets, so instead they fired lasers complimented by 'futuristic' sound effects. This often led to preposterous scenes in which ordinary policemen wielded bizarre, futuristic pistols. However, in Episode 3.09, Robbie Robertson's son Randy finds a real-looking gun in his father's desk, though it is never fired on screen. However, in Episode 56, when Keane Marlow is telling the story of how he lost his wife, the bank robbers were firing a pistol and a semi-automatic.
- Spider-Man was not allowed to hit anyone with his fist, with one exception in Episode 39 (The Spot) in which he used his spider-sense to guide a punch through a dimension portal and knock out the Spot.
- No crashing glass. However, in Episode 43, when Spider-Man and Doc Ock were battling in Felicia and Anastasia Hardy's home, Ock accidentally smashed a glass window with one of his tentacles.
- No children in peril.
- No vampires were allowed on the show. This created complications with the use of the characters Morbius the living vampire and Blade the vampire hunter. Consequently, Morbius only drained victims through suckers on his hands, rather than by biting them in the traditional vampire style on the neck, and rather than blood, his sustenance was referred to only as "plasma.". However, the word blood was acceptable in non-vampire contexts.
- Spider-Man was not allowed to harm any pigeons when he landed on rooftops.
- Cletus Kasady a.k.a. Carnage was not a serial killer in the series, he was just a madman. Carnage never actually used his symbiotic blades to harm anyone, he was either stopped or dodged. He also absorbed people's energy rather than killing them outright. However, he has made a few references to attempts to murder. For instance, when Baron Mordo stated to him that he needed a few more life forces, Carnage said "Only a few? Too bad!". He also referred to his process of draining life force as "feeding".
- Venom was not allowed to make any mention of eating someone's brains
There are, however, notable exeptions to this rule. Examples:
- When Spider-Man and Mary Jane Watson confront Hydro-Man in Episode 2.03 for the last time, Hydro-Man vaporizes when he touches hot ground, and never returns.
- Due to the unstable DNA structure of the clones of Mary Jane Watson and Hydro-Man, they vaporized and died.
- An alternate-reality Spider-Carnage commits suicide by jumping into a black hole.
- Several other characters, including Mysterio, were implied to have died in explosions or off-screen.
It should be noted that the restricted words were sometimes mentioned regardless of Fox's censorship. For example, in "The Insidious Six", Scorpion states that he'd "kill to work for the Kingpin". Another variation appears in "Hydro Man", where a waitress says the word in pig latin to Mary Jane.
[edit] Release Availability
Cover for Return of the Green Goblin.Spider-Man was one of the most popular shows on Fox Kids, ranking with and even above other hits such as Power Rangers, Digimon, and X-Men. Even after the series ended, it still had an impact on the entertainment industry, boosting sales of myriads of Spider-Man merchandise and popularity.
Despite the fact that this particular series was produced over a decade ago, the success of the Spider-Man and Spider-Man 2 movies has sparked more interest in new fans, allowing it to continuously run in reruns thanks to its new owners: Disney. Notably the episodes air in their chronological order, not Fox's original air dates. Therefore, the reruns are all in the correct order.
Select episodes have previously been released on VCD by Magnavision Home Video.
Only a few select episodes have been released on DVD by Disney. So far there are no plans from official release of season box sets. The DVDs that have been released are:
The Ultimate Villain Showdown released 30 April 2002 during the run of the Spider-Man movie. Return of the Green Goblin released 29 October 2002 Daredevil vs. Spider-Man released 11 February 2003 Spider-Man vs. Doc Ock released 29 June 2004 The Venom Saga released 7 June 2005
Critical acclaim Writer / Producer John Semper Jr. won an Annie Award in 1995 for "Best Individual Achievement for Writing in the Field of Animation" for the episode "Day of the Chameleon".
Spider-Man: The Animated Series was nominated for an Image Award in 1996 for "Outstanding Animated/Live-Action/Dramatic Youth or Children's Series/Special."
Spider-Man: The Animated Series was the top rated animated show in Germany, Portugal and Spain.
In the UK the premiere episodes averaged 2.5 million viewers.
In early 1996, the show was launched in Hong Kong, Indonesia, the Philippines, Australia, Israel, Mexico, Russia, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, and South Africa, and it became a hit in those countries as well.
[edit] Trivia
Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Spider-Man (1994 animated series)In order to meet Wikipedia's quality standards, this article's trivia section requires cleanup. Content in the trivia section should be integrated into other appropriate areas of the article. This marks the first time Venom and Carnage appear in a Spider-Man cartoon, along with The Black Cat. The series is notably lacking an origin episode at the outset to explain how Spider-Man got his powers. This was done because the series was expected to premiere alongside the Spider-Man feature length film in 1994, written by James Cameron. The film script included an origin story and, to prevent redundancy, the Animated Series did not include it. In part to make up for this, a third season episode, Sins of the Fathers, Chapter II: "Make a Wish", contains an extended sequence in which Spider-Man explains his origin, although there was an earlier episode, "The Menace of Mysterio", where Peter remembers why he became Spider-Man. The Cameron movie was intended to feature the villains Electro and Sandman, and so as a result they were completely left out of plans for the series. When the movie eventually fell through Electro was added to one of the later episodes, but the Sandman remains one of the most prominent members of Spider-Man's Rogues Gallery not to appear in the cartoon. In "The Alien Costume, Part One", after acquiring a shape-shifting costume, Peter Parker suggests he looks like the "guy from Aerosmith." Joe Perry, the lead guitarist for the band Aerosmith, composed the theme song for the show. The sagas "The Spider Wars" and "The Secret Wars" are adapted from the controversial "Spider-Clone Saga" and "Secret Wars" storylines which ran through the comics. Fox aired "Night of the Lizard" months before the other Season 1 episodes as a special sneak preview. In the comics, the Insidious Six are called the Sinister Six. However, the censorship team felt that sinister was too strong a word to be heard by children so the production company changed it to insidious. This is somewhat ironic, as the character Mister Sinister appeared in the X-Men TV series around the same time. Of the six members of the Insidious Six, only two of the members of the Sinister Six make it into the team's roster: Doctor Octopus and Mysterio. The Shocker, The Chameleon, The Scorpion and The Rhino substitute for the Sinister Six's absent members - Sandman (who doesn't appear in the series at all), Electro (named Max Dillon in the comics, but shows up in Season Five as Rhienholdt Kragov, the step-brother of the Chameleon and the Red Skull's son for the series), The Vulture (who joins the Six to take Mysterio's place in Season Five) and Kraven the Hunter (the half-brother of the Chameleon in the comics). The cast of the X-Men Animated Series were flown to Los Angeles from Canada for their respective roles in episode 2.04 "The Mutant Agenda." The season 2 episode "Blade the Vampire Hunter," which originally aired on February 3, 1996, marks the very first appearance of Whistler, Blade's mentor. The character Lewald that appeared in episode 2.04 "The Mutant Agenda" is named after the story editor on the X-Men cartoon (Eric Lewald). In "Sting of the Scorpion," Spider-Man explains to Jameson that if Scorpion opens a nuclear reactor, he'll destroy the city. When Jameson asks how he knows this, Spider-Man states, "What do I look like? The Tick?!" He is obviously referring to the title character from the superhero parody show that was airing on Fox Kids during the same period as Spider-Man. The character Madame Web is voiced by Stan Lee's wife, Joan Lee. In episode 3.02 "Make a Wish," the little girl, named Taina, asks if Spider-Man is from a dying planet whose parents sent him as a baby on a little space ship, to which he responds, "I think you have me confused with someone else." It is clearly referencing DC Comics character Superman. The episode was loosely based on "The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man," from Amazing Spider-Man #248 (1984). After the September 11 2001 terrorist attacks, ABC Family heavily edited the episode "Day of the Chameleon" to remove the World Trade Center buildings, parts of the New York skyline, and a helicopter crashing into a building, exploding, and falling to the ground below, among other shots. This resulted in the first scene being virtually implausible to comprehend as it was originally intended. Dialogue was re-looped to match the new, shorter version. Some production credits from the episode are missing as well, due to their being on screen during the omitted footage. They also removed the last two episodes of the second season since one of them featured the two buildings. Another noticeable edit can be view in season three's "Enter the Green Goblin" episode. In the original, the goblin glider slams into a building with Spider-man riding on top. In the newly edited version, the scene is cut, and Spider-man emerges from a hole in the side of the building. It is believed this scene paralleled the September 11th events far too much for a modern audiences' tastes. Another, albiet subtler, edit occurs near the end of episode 21, when it is revealed that Kraven and Punisher's last battle with the "Man-Spider" was in fact inside the parking garage of the WTC, and that Kraven had deduced the location by smelling some webbing left at a previous battle and detecting remnant soot in it from the terrorist bombing of the early 90s. The whole sequence of Punisher finding out where they are (he'd been temporarily coccooned by Spidey) and Kraven's explanation of how he knew where to look for them was cut, though the battle scenes within the garage are left intact, since obviously they could belong to any parking garage until the final revelation. Syndicated versions of the pilot episode, "Night of the Lizard," omit a sequence in which the Lizard accidentally slams into his wife with his tail when turning. Fox originally aired many of the seasons out of order. The show's original plan never included the Green Goblin. Norman Osborn was originally going to become the Hobgoblin until the idea was scrapped by Stan Lee's intervention. Aunt May was originally going to have a cat named Warren. Voice actor Julie Bennett replaced Linda Gary as Aunt May after Linda's death. For seasons 2-4, the series used a novel system of one large story arc per season, developed by John Semper. As a result, each of the individual 65 episodes (starting with season 2) were called "chapters." Each chapter had a unique theme, reflected in it's name, that paralleled the main plot of that season, for example: "Neogenic Nightmare" - Spider-Man's mutation runs out of control, causing him to at times lose his powers completely (making it difficult to fight enemies), at others turning into a Spider-like monster (being hunted by the likes of the Punisher). He must also deal with Michael Morbius, a student who has a similar- albeit Bat-themed- mutation. "Sins of the Father" - These episode's begin to explore problems caused by fathers, such as Daredevil's vendetta against Wilson Fisk, the Kingpin, who killed his father (Fisk's son, and relationship with his own father, feature here too); Robbie's issues with his own son, who falls under the sway of Tombstone; and, most notably, the transformation of Norman Osborn into the Green Goblin, and how his son Harry is affected by this. "Partners in Danger" - Spider-Man's reputation for teamwork is examined, with him frequently partnering with the Black Cat, as well as others like Kraven the Hunter and the Prowler. Martin Landau was the voice actor for The Scorpion, but after winning an Oscar he was no longer available for later episodes, and was replaced by Richard Moll, who some fans found better to take up the role as Scorpion. Stan Lee makes an appearance in the series finale. The voice actors later reunited to reprise their respective roles for the Spider-Man ride at Universal's Islands of Adventure theme park in Orlando, Florida.
[edit] Merchandising
A number of video games were produced:
Spider-Man: The Animated Series for Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo. Spider-Man Cartoon Maker by Knowledge Adventure. Electronic versions of classic Spider-Man comics were released by Marvel that included narration by Christopher Daniel Barnes and featured animation and theme music from this series.
Novelisations of select episodes were also released.
A extensive toy line that ran over 8 series and included a staggering amount of play sets and vehicles.
There was a wide variety of themed merchandise produced such as lunch boxes, cereals, clothing etc.
Also, McDonald's produced a themed line of toys for their world-famous Happy Meal.
