Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends Episode Nineteen: The Education of a Superhero

The Education of a Superhero

First Aired: October 1st, 1983

Synopsis: A villain named the Gamesman uses a mind control device to command a bunch of people, including secret government agent Iceman, to go to Central Park. An avid gamer named Francis Byte is seemingly the only one unaffected, but he ends up unexpectedly being sucked into the arcade game he's playing instead, which gives him the power to switch between his human form and that of Videoman. After a brief fight with Spider-Man, who thinks that he killed Francis, Videoman experiments with his powers and declares that he'll become a superhero. Meanwhile, Spider-Man and Firestar manage to find Iceman in the crowd of hypnotised people and snap him out of his control. Gamesman retaliates by telling the crowd, now consisting of 300,000 people, to attack the Spider-Friends. Videoman unexpectedly appears, and after going out of his way to save his love interest, Louise, tries saving the Spider-Friends, but is absolutely useless. Gamesman, however, sees an opportunity to use Videoman, and kidnaps Louise.

With how useless Videoman's been, it's not surprising that the Spider-Friends tell him to leave the rescue of Louise to them. When Gamesman starts sending out hypnotic signals again, Iceman and Firestar go to stop people being affected by them, while Spider-Man tries to track down the source of the signals. Videoman gets the same idea, and finds Gamesman, who immediately tells Videoman that he has to hack a satellite for him or Louise will get killed. Videoman bluntly agrees since he doesn't recognise cliches or when not to trust a villain. Spider-Man manages to pull Videoman in before he can hack the satellite, and tells him not to do it, before leaving with the Spider-Friends to stop Gamesman. At Gamesman's base, Iceman and Firestar are taken out by traps, and Spider-Man's not in much of a better situation. Videoman gets bored of waiting and hacks the satellite, but is shocked to discover that Gamesman isn't upholding his end of the bargain. He quickly helps Spider-Man and frees Firestar and Iceman, and with competent heroes around, Gamesman is quickly defeated. In the aftermath, Videoman is shipped off to the X-Mansion, since he clearly needs training before he can become a superhero.

Miscellaneous Notes:

• When Spider-Man first encounters Videoman, he says, "I'm taking you in...whatever you are!", in spite of the fact that he's fought two separate Videomen before.
• In spite of the above statement, Spider-Man somehow immediately recognises Gamesman, even though this is his first, and as far as I can tell, only appearance.
• When Spider-Man, Iceman, and Firestar are infiltrating Gamesman's base, the eyes of Spider-Man's mask glow, as is the standard for this show to demonstrate that his spider-sense is tingling. Unexpectedly, Iceman then says, "Put out that light! He'll see us!", which is absolutely nuts. What happens when his spider-sense tingles when his mask is off?
• In a prime example of new powers as the plot demands, Spider-Man tells Videoman to free Firestar and Iceman by using his hot and cold rays. When Videoman protests that he doesn't have them, Spider-Man simply says, "Ever tried?" Lo and behold, he does have them.

Review: To start with, we've got a pretty forgettable villain, whose costume looks like an amateur cosplay. I can appreciate that there's a slight attempt at giving him a theme - in his base he attacks the  Spider-Friends with holographic chess pieces, and there are playing cards on the walls - but it's all very lackluster. We've also got to contend with a plot that has the heroes running all around the place, changing where they are at the drop of a hat for the sake of the plot, and a lot of obstacles put in their way which really shouldn't challenge them as much as they do.

So, it's a bad episode, right? Well, yes and no. Most of this episode is pretty forgettable, and I can't say that I'd want a return of the Gamesman any time soon. But the big redeeming feature of this episode is Francis Byte and the way that every single thing he does is a screw-up in some way. There's him agreeing to help hack a satellite so that Gamesman can hypnotise the world (with the immortal line, "You can put the entire world in a trance if you want...just let Louise go first!"), but that's really just the tip of the iceberg. We've also got him trying to attack civilians and police helicopters while the heroes yell at him to stop, getting impatient with waiting and hacking the satellite, telling Spider-Man (who he later says is his idol) that he completely trusts Gamesman...is there any way this guy could fuck things up less?

While I wouldn't want an entire episode (or, god forbid, a spin-off) watching Francis be a dunce, this episode manages to have enough of a balance that it's pretty entertaining when it's happening. The parts not featuring Francis and his magnificent mistakes aren't the greatest, but I guess it's appropriate given how useless Francis himself is.