The 1994 Fox Animated Spider-Man show

[McFarlane's Green Hulk]

What's the status on seeing this released on DVD...similar to the X-Men cartoon?
What's taking it so long?

[RockyBanks]

What's the status on seeing this released on DVD...similar to the X-Men cartoon?
What's taking it so long?

I don't know if this will be happening anytime soon, with DVD sales plummeting all around, and home video collections going the way of the dodo.

The good news: the complete series is available on demand through Netflix (along with virtually every other Spider-Man TV series).

[Spidey_Legend]

Spiderman: The Animated Series has a better Alistair Smythe than the comics.

It was a shame about the high censorship:

-Not beggining for Spider.
-Not Sandman.
-Not True Electro.
-Not thwrowing punch.
-Not killing acts or even words
-Not allow to put the sinister word.
-Problems with budgets, the reason why only Storm appeared in Secret Wars instead the X-Men VS Mr. Sinister.
-Not allowed to Guest Star Ghost Rider, Hulk or She Hulk because Fox doesn't have the rights to use them.

Despite all the agains, without the animation wich was poor handle, I think they do the best.

[wc662]

I grew up with this right alongside X-Men TAS. Guitar music and RADIOACTIVE SPIDER-MAN was annoying. X-Men TAS had way better intro. 60's Spidey song was better.

[mills]

What. The song was awesome. I loved tbis show. Introduced me to awesome characters like Morbius and Bade growing up. I cant wait to have these on dvd

[Spidey_Legend]

What. The song was awesome. I loved tbis show. Introduced me to awesome characters like Morbius and Bade growing up. I cant wait to have these on dvd

And has The Spot, Rocket Racer and The Prowler, just must added Frog Man and Hypno Hustler and no one should dare to question this TV Show.

[Ballard Blues]

I'll never understand how this series never gets a proper volume or set release whenever Spider-Man gets remotely active in the general media; 3 movies, a reboot, a newer cartoon; who exactly owns the rights to this series and why are not jumping at the opportunity to sell this to those who would undoubtedly buy it? Disney, 20th Century Fox or Sony Pictures? It doesn't seem right that X-Men: TAS finally gets a DVD release (something I never thought was gonna happen) and Spider-Man: TAS is still sitting in the wings, albeit completely available on Netflix now (unless something's changed). I can petition this to Shout! Factory or something ;_;?

Like a lot of other people, this series, Batman and Superman (and even that Wildcats cartoon) really opened me up to comic books; my fam was pretty avid about the genre beforehand, but Spider-Man really spurred me to make a collection of my own (even if that took the 2002 film to actually get me visit and comic book store and toss money at the register). And as a part of my childhood there is a certain and extreme bias that tends to keep it in high regard as its in "the happy place" (childhood) aside from the general opinion that I truly think its a fantastic show. Ironic part about this is, my parents would never let me watch this cartoon (or the aforementioned ones) because of its violence. I had to sneak around their backs, keep the volume down low and watch it in secret, which was pretty much a custom until I hit twelve. "Night of the Lizard" was episode that got a lot of airtime as a result of my brother's VCR recording, there's not a scene I don't have memorized from that episode and it really holds up a decade or two later.

Trying not to go on a nostaglia binge here...

That aside, re-watching it again, there are serious signs of its aging like any cartoon of it's age (the jagged animation, the 3D models of New York City (all of which never looked so horrible until retrospect hit) and the abusive reuse of sequences in reverse or otherwise), but I think it still holds up relatively well and is a solid series regardless. I myself will never understand why so many male cartoon protagonists had to be of the male body building type in the 90's --- that is one thing that seemed extremely weird to me even as a kid --- as a way to justify "this guy's a superhero!", especially when most of the time Peter's body in the Spider costume tended to contradict his physique in civvies; but at the same time I complained Spider-Man was borderline malnourished in Spectacular and Ultimate. On the upside, I did love how buff Black Cat looked in this series. The voice acting and the score (which, now that I think about it, is ridiculously similar to the score by Udi Harpaz, Amotz Plessner and Shuki Levy for Digimon, which is all kinds of cinematic awesome) are probably the most endearing parts of the series for me, aside from the writing. I could listen to Christopher Daniel Barnes monologue as Peter all the day before I got tired of his rambling; it's a "thinky" kind of voice and he's definitely got the right tone for narrative, especially when he gets dramatic (ah-la, Night of the Lizard inner monologue) for lack of better word. He's definitely "my Spider-Man" in the sense that he embodies the voice I relatively hear Peter speaking with unless I'm reading Ultimate Spider-Man (vol 1 and 2); it was such a blast hearing him the recent Spider-Man games. Edward Asner nails Jameson, is probably my favorite performance next to Barnes and great deal of the reason why I really enjoyed J.K. Simmons' performance in the Raimi(sp?) films. Then there's the late Roscoe Lee Browne as Kinpin; now there's a man who can endow scum with sophistication and cunning.

Both areas have their points of, er, silliness (with this being then-scariest thing to hear as a kid, now I can't listen to it without falling out into a fit of giggles because it reminds me of this. Jim Cummings 'scared' grunts in that episode never help), the music less so than the voice acting. Joe Perry's theme song is still my favorite Spider-Man theme ever, I wish I could find a clearer version of it without the FX on YouTube :/.

The censorship issue really is the biggest hinder of the series; what other series were allowed to do or say (given either period of time or the leniency of whomever enforced the rules of said censorship) Spider-Man seemingly wasn't (Plasma = Blood. That will never not bother me). In on a odd way, I think the censoring had the animators fall back on doing more creative things with Spider-Man's fighting technique in regards to acrobatics and web-slinging (and they did some pretty neat stuff with choreography in this series), other times it had me wondering why he just didn't clock a sucker and stopped using his face as a shield. And then there's the laser guns; where they seemed commonplace in X-Men, they were downright outta place in Spider-Man, a seemingly "down-to-earth" superhero that didn't go "out there" unless confronted with the likes of Venom, Madame Web, the aforementioned X-Men or S.H.I.E.L.D. That's one of the things I appreciated about The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest; granted it aired a year later, but it was allowed to feature guns heavily, primarily under the stipulation of showing the consequences of using them (according to the producers), which is something I wish they'd let them do in this show.

All of that aside, the biggest problem I always seemed to have was the pacing of some of the arcs; a lot them took forever to end, some I never knew ended, or ended so abruptly I wondered why they were afforded two or three parts. The interconnecting worlds of other Marvel superheroes was great, even it wasn't always to Spider-Man's advantage (i.e., a lot of the appearing superheroes kinda made Spider-Man seem unnecessary in his own show). I think the "Mutagenic Nightmare" arc was the last time a cartoon kept me guessing what would happen with a protagonist because of a lack of internet access; when he ended up as Man-Spider, I didn't think they would cure him. The killer clinch will forever be the fact that Mary Jane was never reunited with Peter onscreen during the series and it got cancelled. I realize Spider-Man Unlimited was supposed to be a "sequel" to this animated series, but the drastic shift in animation, storytelling and uh, voice actors/acting, always divorced it from being anything other another Spider-Man cartoon that was vaguely related to this show in the vaguest sense that I'm related every person on the planet because I call them "brother" or "sister".

It's bothersome, the little dings in regards to its animation, censorship, and it's untimely cancellation, especially when you think about it. I'd say just about everything except the ending can be easily overlooked given all the positives of the show (for me anyways).

So..., yeah, I have a lot of "feels" about this show and wish to hug it to my chest the same way I can with ReBoot and Beast Wars. It needs to be on DVD already.

[Rosebunse]

What. The song was awesome. I loved tbis show. Introduced me to awesome characters like Morbius and Bade growing up. I cant wait to have these on dvd

My fascination with Morbius from this show is what got me into comics in the first place.

I like 616 Morbius better though. His pathetic hopelessness is awesome LOL

[sephiroth61787]

What. The song was awesome. I loved tbis show. Introduced me to awesome characters like Morbius and Bade growing up. I cant wait to have these on dvd

It was the first Spider-Man cartoon I watched as a kid. The theme was done by Joe Perry. I like it as well. Hopefully, Disney decides to release the series in some format. They can be taken down at any time on Netflix. I'd rather have DVD's.

[Aziz Abbasi]

After enduring the fun silliness of Ultimate Spider-Man, I guess I will watch this show again later

[Kevinroc]

The whole series is streaming on Netflix these days. Have fun.

[Venomous Mask]

Why did they have to have Carnage say "man" after everything?

[Ballard Blues]

^Wasn't that a definer of a serial killer characters back in the 90s? To sound like something of a "sufer dude" unhinged, kinda like in Point Blank?

[Venomous Mask]

^Wasn't that a definer of a serial killer characters back in the 90s? To sound like something of a "sufer dude" unhinged, kinda like in Point Blank?

Good point. Still, the way he said it was really annoying.

[Ballard Blues]

Hey, you'll get no argument from me on that end (I agree).