Marvel's Spider-Man Episode Three: Osborn Academy

Osborn Academy

First Aired: August 26th, 2017

Synopsis: The Jackal is running away with technology he stole from Tony Stark, while Spider-Man chases after him. Spidey's on the phone with Harry Osborn, who wants Peter to be there for the reception of Osborn Academy. As the chase after the Jackal continues the Jackal takes a blonde teenager hostage, whom Spider-Man saves, but once he's done so she gives him advice on how he could have utilised his resources better. Jackal gets away and Peter heads to Osborn Academy for a tour. Max Modell, Miles Morales, and Anya Corazon are also there for a tour, and shortly after Peter arrives the blonde teenager arrives, turning out to be Gwen Stacy, another Horizon student. They watch some interviewees apply for the school, and one duo - Herman Schultz, using technology he dubs Shocker, and Clayton Cole, calling his technology Clash - are told that only one of them will be accepted into the school. They soon start fighting using their technology, and Peter is knocked out of the window. He changes to Spider-Man and returns to the school.

Shocker and Clash take their brawl outside, but as they fight the Jackal appears and uses the Stark tech he stole to drain their equipment. He then takes it for himself, but Spider-Man arrives and is told of the weaknesses of the technology by their inventors. He coats himself in webbing to absorb the force of the vibrations the technology can create, then destroys it. Jackal drops Clayton and Herman, intending to kill them, and they apologise to one another for fighting. Spider-Man saves them, but the Jackal escapes in the process. In the aftermath, Norman Osborn says that no charges will be pressed since he pitted them against each other, and he accepts Herman for his school. As Spider-Man leaves, Harry's suspicious of him, but Norman says that he'll look after him. He also reveals that he stole Harry's experimental technology from Horizon, so that Harry won't need to start over from scratch. Later that night, Harry and Peter meet up, and agree to never turn on each other as Shocker and Clash did.

Subplots:

• Gwen Stacy goes to her uncle Raymond's house at the end of the day for dinner, and he is revealed to the audience to be the Jackal.

Miscellaneous Notes:

• Among the other interviewees we see applying for Osborn Academy are John Jameson (surprisingly, a teenager here, albeit one interested in astrophysics), Flash Thompson, and Alistair Smythe.
• Both Shocker and Clash are depicted using their technology to fly/hover for short periods. I'm not a big fan of it - I prefer their powers to be simple, yet effective nevertheless.

Review: The thing that sticks out the most to me about this episode, in terms of flaws, is definitely the Jackal. I'm not that big on him in the comics - he was great in the original, Gerry Conway Clone Saga, but lost a lot of his appeal when he showed up again decades later - but I do like him when he's more of a schemer and a mastermind. Anyway, the point I'm trying to get at is, I'd rather he be slowly built up to rather than just dropped into the opening scene, apropos of nothing. I'd prefer for him to be crafty, to not be physically fighting Spider-Man that often, and for the reveal of him as Gwen's uncle to be something that has more impact than it does here. Everything about him here just feels hasty and impatient, and it's a pity, because we're starting him with a blank slate here - he could easily have had a much stronger debut episode.

Jackal aside, I liked this one. Yeah, I'd rather that Herman Schultz and Clayton Cole be full-on supervillains, robbing banks or whatever, but presenting them as friends who quickly overreact and lash out at one another is realistic, especially seeing as how they're teenagers. Them forgiving each other once faced with their deaths helps make them sensible, too, and the triumph of them mending their friendship and not being pressed for charges is undercut immediately by Norman accepting Herman over Clayton. It's not really emphasised, but Herman accepts this and doesn't say that he'll only join if Clayton can too, or anything, giving the whole thing this almost tragic tone.

Speaking of Norman, he's fantastic - he wants the best for Harry, hence setting up an entire school and stealing his stuff from Horizon, but he also makes it clear to Harry that he's got high expectations from him. It's a brilliant mix of loving and sinister, and I'm very keen to see more of him. I'm also pretty impressed with Gwen in her first appearance, nonchalantly giving Spider-Man advice on how he should do things, and proving herself to be just as much of a science nerd as Peter is. So, yeah, chalk this one up as another good one.