Spectacular Spider-Man Episode Seven: Catalysts

Catalysts

First Aired: April 26th, 2008

Synopsis: Spider-Man is at a fancy party fighting the new supervillain the Green Goblin, and thinks back to how his evening started. Earlier that night Harry was at the Fall Formal and popular since he was hosting the afterparty, but Peter arrived with Mary Jane to everyone's shock. Harry was jealous at the attention, and things were made worse when his date Glory's ex, Kong, convinced her to get back with him. As a result Harry ran off an drank from a vial labelled Globulin Green. At the Daily Bugle, J. Jonah Jameson was getting ready for a fancy party that he was taking his son John to since John's going into space next week. They showed up at the party, which was being hosted by Tombstone, but it was soon attacked by the Green Goblin, using the Goblin Glider he'd stolen from Oscorp and with some thugs of Tombstone's that he'd turned. Jonah managed to get a call to the Bugle and request that Peter show up, since this is exactly his sort of scene. When the call got through to Peter he headed off, and shortly after arriving as Spider-Man, ended up where the episode started.

Spider-Man and the Green Goblin's fight leads them out of the party and around Manhattan, but although things are tense when Spider-Man runs out of webbing, he has replacement cartridges and is able to refill his web-shooters. Spider-Man eventually manages to capture the Green Goblin in his webbing, but the Goblin reveals that there's a bomb back at the party set to go off. Spider-Man swiftly returns there and tells everyone to leave, then searches for the bomb with a surprising assistance from Tombstone. John Jameson, halfway down the stairs, realises that the bomb is in the chandelier, since the Goblin was hanging around it before, and returns to tell Spider-Man. Spider-Man manages to get rid of the bomb before it detonates, and Tombstone finds the whole situation of Spider-Man saving him amusing. The Green Goblin is missing when Spider-Man returns to where he was left, and he returns to the Fall Formal assuming that he's missed everything. To his surprise though, Mary Jane is still there, waiting for him so they can have another dance.

Subplots:

• Daily Bugle reporter Ned Lee suggests investigating Spider-Man's identity, and although Jonah disapproves, Robbie secretly gives him the go-ahead.
• Glory Grant mentions to Mary Jane that their school is the top-ranked theatre magnate, and Mary Jane is intrigued.

Review: Something that Spectacular Spider-Man does, better than any other adaptation that's come out since the comics, in my opinion, is a solid Green Goblin mystery. Unlike a lot of other adaptations, where the mystery is obvious (COUGH SPIDER-MAN UNLIMITED COUGH) or not even a mystery, here there are some genuinely good hints and twists that make you rethink who it may or may not be. The direction it ultimately goes in is consistently entertaining, and this episode is a great start to the mystery.

The Goblin aside, the other highlight here is Mary Jane. She doesn't actually get a lot of lines, and it's hard to tell why she likes Peter so much given she barely knows him, but she's great anyway. When Sally Avril taunts her she asks Randy to dance with her, she's got no qualms with Peter running off to do photography, and her waiting for Peter at the end of the episode is really sweet. I don't really remember a lot about her in this show, so I'm really keen to rediscover what ends up happening next.

Outside of that, there's lots of great, small moments here. Spider-Man prompting the Green Goblin's thugs to get out of the building before the bomb goes off is exactly what he'd do. Tombstone staying back to help look for the bomb shows that while he may be a criminal, he does have his own sense of honour. Jonah has the funniest line of the episode; after running back up the stairs with John, they have to head down again, and he asks "We're going back down? Urgh, now you're just torturing me." There's a lot here that's entertaining, and I can't find any flaws without nitpicking. So I won't. This episode is great, and I highly recommend it.