Going into the 1967 series, Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, and Spider-Man: The Animated Series, I had a few basic ideas about what they were about and what to expect. For the first time since the 1981 series, I'm pretty in the dark about what Spider-Man Unlimited will be like beyond the general premise, which...man, I don't want to be negative here, but it's not a great premise for a Spider-Man series. (For those unaware: Spider-Man goes to Counter-Earth and...fights the High Evolutionary's beast men, I think? And some of his rogues' gallery are beast men?) I've mentioned before that I'm not a big fan of Spider-Man dealing with concepts that are too fantastic, and between him travelling to another planet and running into the mutated beast men that are there, that sure doesn't sound like it's up his alley.
What was the idea behind this series, really? Was it decided that beast men would make great toys, and Spider-Man was a good way to get kids to watch the show? Was an Adam Warlock show pitched and then someone decided that Spider-Man would be a better fit for the lead? Was everyone high off their minds on drugs at the time? I can understand how any of these ideas would get pitched, but going so far as to be approved and then actually developed feels like a stretch.
I really don't have a lot to say here since the show is so obscure - and given that I haven't heard a lot about it, I'm guessing that as much as I'd like it to be the case, it's probably not going to be a hidden gem - so let's focus on some positives before I do a quick analysis of the opening. Spider-Man's costume for this looks absolutely rad, and from what little I've seen of it there's a lot of moody lighting here, which is a cool stylistic choice. Spider-Man being on another planet is a pretty unique take on the character, so we might see more of a focus on his scientific side, or even just get some cool concepts while there. It's not all hopeless.
Credit where it's due - the very start of the opening, showing Spider-Man's origin as a series of comic book panels, is fantastic. The art looks good, it's succinct without needing any words to tell you what's happening, and there's a rad idea of the spider biting him being represented with a tiny mushroom cloud on Peter's hand. Or maybe it literally happened in this world; it's not like I've watched anything beyond this opening yet.
As the opening continues we see a few shots where the Spider-Man costume is shown with golden circuits all over it, which I hope isn't metaphorical. To be honest I'm not super hot on Spider-Man's suit in the Marvel Cinematic Universe having every single gadget, ever, but this show's already established that it's willing to send him to the other side of the sun, so sure, let's lean into the high-tech nature and give him an advanced suit. I doubt it's going to be the worst thing in this show.
From beyond there my interest starts to wane, as we get a lot of shots of beast men and one wide sweep of a lot of characters - are they the supporting cast? Random civilians we're supposed to care about? Yawn. Some of the characters look like they might be the Counter-Earth versions of the Vulture and Green Goblin, but it could just as likely be coincidental designs. At the end of the opening, I'm unsurprisingly most intrigued by Spider-Man and what I've learned about him, while the Counter-Earth stuff is a bit boring. Still, the art style looks nice, so anticipate me praising that a lot, I guess?
Join me next time as I start my journey into one of the most forgotten Spider-Man series, with "Worlds Apart, Part 1". I'll be looking forwards to hearing your thoughts as I go.
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