Ultimate Spider-Man Episode 1 Great Power Review
Well I didn’t hate this Spider-Man cartoon but I think that it’s going to be a few episodes before I really make any kind of real assessment of it and whether or not the style of this cartoon will grow very thin of me. It does kind of have quite the act to follow with the awesome and sadly short lived Spectacular Spider-Man cartoon.However, I was entertained for a half of an hour with this first episode and half of the battle is always won when I am entertained. The style of fourth wall breaking and just rather cartoonish animation might not sit well with the “grr, I have to have my comic books serious all of the time, how dare you be amusing” crowd, but hey, that’s just the breaks.
I think that knowing what I was getting into it and you hit all of the high points for Spider-Man, so it’s not like you didn’t know what you were getting yourself into. J. Jonah Jameson tearing down Spider-Man, the dual nature of Flash Thompson being both Peter Parker’s tormenter and Spidey’s number one fan, Mary Jane, Harry, Norman Osborn obviously approving Peter a bit more than his own son, and all that. Peter’s guilt about Uncle Ben, his Spider-Man time interjecting into his responsibilities of Peter Parker, all that sort of thing.
One sticking point is the gadgets and I’ll talk a bit more about this when I review the second episode, but they’ve got to be really careful because that’s going to turn a few fans. Web shooters are fine obviously, but you got to really be careful. Nick Fury I think was well characterized, references to legendary Marvel heroes like Iron Man and Captain America, who I’d imagine will be showing up in this episode.
I think that the best way to describe this cartoon is kind of some weird mixture of the Teen Titans and X-Men Evolution cartoons, with obviously all of the elements of Spider-Man thrown in from all across the board. And the leaning on/breaking the fourth wall, well I was a huge fan of the original Ninja Turtles and damned if that cartoon wasn’t shameless of breaking the fourth wall.
Nice action, nice set up, battles with the Frightful Four(well technically three with Trapster out of the way), with Thundra, Klaw, and The Wizard made me laugh and that one kid cheering when the Frightful Four was going to demolish the school had me in stiches, because you would very much get that reaction in a real school. And Spider-Man tricking Flash into getting into the locker. And who doesn’t like Stan the Janitor. Norman Osborn and Dr. Otto Octavius setting up something for the future, with Osborn’s sinister plot for Oscorp to own Spider-Man.
The end with Nick Fury welcoming Spider-Man to SHIELD and hoping that he “survives the experience” was a great callback.
Some great action, great set up and entertained me. I tend to be a bit more light on the early episodes because I know a show needs a few episodes to find its feet, so 8/10 for the first part. You can watch Ultimate Spider-Man Episode 1 Great Power if you have Disney XD on demand and new episodes of Ultimate Spider-Man air every week on Disney XD at 11:00 AM Eastern Time.
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