SPIDER-MAN (1981-82)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *cosmological, psychological*

I vaguely remember seeing this solo SPIDER-MAN cartoon-- the first such cartoon since the sixties version-- but what memories I had were pale indeed compared to my more vivid recollections of the contemporaneous SPIDER-MAN AND HIS AMAZING FRIENDS. And this is surprising, since both shows came from Marvel Productions-- according to this essay, a re-branded version of the DePatie-Freleng Studio-- and both shared many of the same writers, artists and production people. Nevertheless, SPIDER-MAN comes off as if it was thrown together by people who barely "got" the concept of Spider-Man and hadn't even read the comics much. 

It does have the virtue of making one appreciate the Grantray-Lawrence season of Sixties Spidey. That program erred on the side of silliness sometimes, but at least it was intermittently funny. None of the writers on the show showed any ability to get Spider-Man's signature sense of humor, and even the dialogue of his foes-- this time borrowed from many other Marvel books, not just Spidey's-- is tedious in the extreme. Someone on the writing staff apparently thought featuring Doctor Doom would help boost the series, since the Latverian Lord appears in five separate episodes-- and he proves a bore in all of them. The action scenes are just as limited as those of the sixties series, but Grantray-Lawrence managed some occasional high points. 

In fact, the producers' choice of support-cast seems uncannily reminiscent of the sixties show. Aunt May appears only sporadically there, but she gets considerably more screen time in this 1981 effort, with her main schtick being that she can't abide Peter Parker's masked identity. This is a notion taken from the comics, but it soon becomes repetitive. The first year of the sixties show utilized only very simplified versions of Betty Brant and J. Jonah Jameson, and '81 SPIDER-MAN does the same, but with almost zero style and charm. Betty is the closest thing Peter gets to a romantic interest in the show, but most of the time he follows the usual Clark-and-Lois routine of pissing her off when he ducks out to play superhero. (Oddly, in the very last episode, Spider-Man enjoys a little quick canoodling with none other than the long-tressed Medusa, who's not on his list of main squeezes in any comic.) Jameson is far more frustrating, since he's meant to be comedy relief, and he's grotesquely unfunny.

Only two episodes rated as passable entertainment. One is a crossover in which Spidey's foe Kraven steals the saber-tooted tiger Zabu, thus honking off Zabu's partner-in-peril, the Tarzan-esque Ka-Zar. The other story involves the hero seeking to thwart the larcenous activities of The Black Cat. The animators seemed to exert themselves a little more to delineate the appeal of the curvaceous cat-burglar, and the writers even threw in a cute joke where Spidey tries to access a phone booth, but has to cool his heels until its occupant, a guy in glasses and a blue suit, takes his leave. "That guy looks familiar," thinks the wall-crawler. But other crossovers, whether of heroes like Captain America and The Sub-Mariner or villains like Magneto, are usually dull. The show also boasts what may be the most forgettable theme music of any Spidey teleseries, though I've no plans to make a full comparison in the near future.