Spider-Man: The New Animated Series Episode One: Heroes and Villains

 Heroes and Villains

First Aired: July 11th, 2003

Synopsis: Empire State University is planning to destroy the nearby Villeroy Towers building, where many students live, without any compensation. Peter Parker takes photos of a protest and discusses the issue briefly with a disgruntled cleaner, before heading off to take photos of some jewels at a museum for the Daily Bugle. They're stolen by a man in powered armour named Turbo-Jet, but are found at Villeroy Towers the next day. With the reward money for them being found going to the students' protest fund, Turbo-Jet is assumed to be a Robin Hood-esque figure. Elsewhere, Harry Osborn is asked by Oscorp to deliver an announcement about the new science centre that will be built where Villeroy Towers is, as they're the ones behind the whole thing and think that a student making the announcement will help quell the protests. They also show Harry a telescope that was owned by Galileo that will be auctioned off. Later that night, Spider-Man sees Turbo-Jet steal a rare book and tries to convince Turbo-Jet that what he's doing is wrong - partially on account of the collateral damage he's been causing - but Turbo-Jet doesn't listen and leaves.

At a protest the next day, Harry tries telling Peter and Mary Jane that Oscorp are behind the demolishing but is overheard and the three are chased off. At Villeroy Towers, the cleaner that Peter was talking to at the start of the episode is revealed to be Turbo-Jet, who refuses to go to a protest meeting since he thinks it's all hot air. He meets with a mysterious man who gives him money and requests that he steal the telescope next. Spider-Man shows up and tries to stops him, but Turbo-Jet gets away in a way that makes it look like Spider-Man stole the money. When it's time for Harry to make the announcement for Oscorp, he presents Galileo's telescope at which point it's immediately stolen by Turbo-Jet. Spider-Man stops him with his webs and reveals that the telescope is a fake, and exposes Turbo-Jet as not actually working for the students of Villeroy Towers. He runs off with Mary Jane as a hostage, but Spider-Man stops him using his webbing. In the aftermath, he talks to Mary Jane but she says that there's someone else. The next day, it's revealed that the real telescope was auctioned off so that the students could use it as a relocation fund, and Peter makes out with Mary Jane.

Miscellaneous Notes:

• The internet is shockingly undecided on the order the episodes in this series go. IMDB says that the first episode is The Party and it aired on the 11th of July, 2003, but Wikipedia says that the episodes were out of order, this is the first, and The Party (the eighth episode, according to them) aired on the 8th of August in the same year. I'm going with Wikipedia's details, since it says that production delays screwed up the order and that the DVD fixes them, putting this episode as first. IMDB also has a note saying that the episodes are ordered incorrectly, supporting this, so I figure I should try and watch in the intended order.
  
• In this series, Peter's spider-sense is depicted as a sort of blue ripple that goes out from his head. It's pretty neat, and I think it suits the medium well. (Side note, I love that every series I've seen has chosen its own way to depict his spider-sense).
• I haven't really commented on much of the voice acting in any of the shows I've covered so far because there hasn't really been a lot to say - it's been pretty good, for the most part - but here, Spider-Man's being voiced by Neil Patrick Harris. I like Neil Patrick Harris as a person and an actor, but his voice doesn't really suit Spider-Man that much, I've gotta say. 
• On a related voice-acting note, there's a random cop here who's voiced by Edward Asner, the voice actor of J. Jonah Jameson from Spider-Man: The Animated Series.
  
• To my great surprise, this series has heavy involvement from a name I'm fairly familiar with, namely Brian Michael Bendis. In general, I find his writing to be a bit up and down and absolutely understand why a lot of people don't like him, but honestly, I think he's written enough decent stuff that he averages out to an above-average writer for me.
• Harry Osborn does some casual day-drinking in this episode - specifically a martini - right before his meeting with Oscorp. What an alpha move.
• Harry mentions that Spider-Man killed his father, which does imply that this really is set in the same continuity as the Sam Raimi films. Mary Jane also mentions that she and Spider-Man have kissed in the past.
• When the news is delivering the report about the jewels being found at Villeroy Towers, Peter's helping Harry to set up a TV, and says that "The screen should be at a twenty-degree angle for optimal viewing." Jesus, I know that Peter's a nerd, but nobody has ever spoken like that ever.
• Because this show is, you know, 3D animated, the block of money that Turbo-Jet receives from his mysterious contact is literally just a perfectly smooth giant green block, which is absolutely hilarious to me for some reason.
• The news reporter shown on screen is given the name of Alison Tomita - a possible reference to either of the John Romitas?
• Mary Jane is in the camp of considering Turbo-Jet to be a hero, and she compares the collateral damage he causes to a police officer running over a civilian in a high-speed chase and shrugs it off. What the fuck, MJ?
  

Review: It's hard to say how I feel about this episode. I see what it's trying to get at with Turbo-Jet, showing that he's willing to go to extreme methods for his selfless goals, but it seems kind of indecisive about him. On the one hand, it does show that the money he's acquiring is going towards Villeroy Towers, which is good, but it also shows him to be a jerk who doesn't really think that protests are going to accomplish anything. But then if he believes that then why does he still put the money towards the protest group? And him being a jerk - the very thing which gets the crowd to turn on him in the climax - kind of isn't that bad? If I was being saved from my place being demolished and the person who was responsible for it was a jerk - ignoring Turbo-Jet's other flaws and his methods - I'd consider that a small price to pay. I don't know; did the show utterly botch the message, or did I miss something?

Morality aside, the episode also has a bit of a pacing problem. Turbo-Jet stealing the rare book and Spider-Man discussing philosophy with him feels like padding, since we've already established his modus operandi, and there's a bit where Harry, Peter, and Mary Jane are in class and we get a scene of Harry asking them to come to the announcement, as if they weren't already planning on going. Come to think of it, what was the point of the scene where the protesters discover that Oscorp are behind the demolishing? It certainly doesn't cause any more conflict in the episode. There's also a scene where Spider-Man talks to himself and films it, which I guess kind of gets his thoughts out to the audience but it's a really weird way to do it.

Overall, this episode is a mix of good and bad, but I think that overall it skews slightly more towards good. Turbo-Jet's simple powers of super-speed and a tractor beam thingy work well in a fight against Spider-Man, and Harry Osborn, at least, is included in the episode in a fairly seamless way. It definitely needs to be tightened up a bit, but if the whole series ends up being this level of quality then I can survive it.