Date of airing: September 30, 1995 (FOX Kids)
story by: John Semper, J. M. DeMatteis
teleplay by: Michael Edens
directed by: Bob Richardson
Well, this was an episode of the animated X-MEN series (which is on my very long to-watch list), salted and peppered with a Spider-Man story, running under the Spider-Man title, even though it clearly is an X-Men story. I guess this episode might have been the result of a note process between John Semper and FOX Kids (if there were any note sessions during this part of the series production), because FOX promoted SPIDER-MAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES as part of their animated X-Men franchise, so it seemed natural that both shows would cross over eventually, share characters and stories, and maybe even writers. Although I do not know anything about the X-Men series to tell whether or not the voice cast of that show appeared in this series as well.
I did not mind the crossover, and I did not even mind that the X-Men got a little too much screentime in this episode while the story turned into a plot to eradicate mutants (this is more than just an X-Men premise, it may have been the origin of the 2000 X-MEN movie), but I do mind a little that it happened in the second season. Maybe it would have been a better idea to expand Spider-Man’s world into that of the X-Men in the first season, to get into the notion of Spider-Man potentially being a mutant, trying to find out more about the genetic changes within him after he was initially bitten by a spider and developing superpowers. That way, the show could have established that it was co-existing with that of the X-Men, and the producers could have built the crossover connectivity much sooner than that. But then again, maybe the idea to connect TV shows like this was too wild to be executed? After all, the idea proved to be a money-making machine when Kevin Feige created his movie universe. But before that, how many writers and producers had the idea to let various TV shows live in the same universe, with constant crossovers, but were rebuffed by studio executives who found the idea “ludicrous?”
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| Beast behind blue bars. |
In a way, Spider-Man was pretty much thrown into the world of the X-Men here, with the writers trying their hardest to keep this a Spider-Man episode, simply by throwing Hobgoblin into the mix and making this episode feel like an uneven mess – as if two episodes were thrown into the mixer and the result is this half hour. I wondered if this episode had been more cohesive without Hobgoblin being the “shadow villain” for Landon’s activities and efforts to eradicate the mutant race by kidnapping and killing Beast. Would it have been a better episode without Wolverine being an idiot hothead, running after Spider-Man, even though the evidence suggested that someone else was at play when it came to Beast’s disappearance? Plus, why would Wolverine be so violently aggressive towards Spider-Man, considering the wallcrawler may be a mutant as well? Sometimes, it does not look good when your greatest hero in a group of great heroes only thinks of violence when it comes to solving a mystery. Wolverine was not my favorite character in this episode. In fact, I would not mind if Spider-Man soundly defeats him in the next episode and the Canadian is so humiliated that he leaves the country and is never seen again.
At least it was an entertaining episode, since Spider-Man was close to making friends with the X-Men, creating the idea that he could fight with a team for once, instead of being alone all the time. Yes, Wolverine might have hated his guts, and Beast just saw the potential of convincing Spider-Man, a seemingly lost soul that he might be a mutant (making the X-Men more important in the greater story arc), but some of the other X-Men saw Spider-Man as one of their own, probably even liked him as a superhero and would have loved to work with him in some way or shape. I can imagine that Spider-Man could make friends with some of the X-Men, possibly the younger ones in the team (Rogue, probably), considering Spider-Man is one of the younger ones as well. If the X-Men decide to stick around past the story arc the writers have created for the series, maybe a couple of episodes about a partnership between two factions of superheroes were in the cards.
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| A spider and a wolverine are getting it on |
Meanwhile, Landon was trying to be the villain by wanting to eradicate the mutants – I am already interested to know what he will think of Spider-Man foiling his plans, especially after the wallcrawler saved his butt from Hobgoblin in this episode. It is also interesting to learn whether the mutation Landon wanted to eradicate was just an evolutionary mutation or an accidental one as well. I mean, was Landon about to eradicate an entire genome (which he would do how exactly? This isn’t Y: THE LAST MAN...), or just superheroes who consider themselves X-Men? It would be nice to know if the Marvel universe wanted to separate evolutionary and accidental mutation with this storyline, or if both can be considered the same. That means everyone going through genetic changes that create superpowers can be considered a mutant, but that would make every non-tech-based and non-extraterrestrial superhero a mutant, and I am not sure Marvel wanted that, both in the comics, as well as the TV shows. Which begs the question of whether or not Spider-Man will become one of Landon’s victims as well, and the X-Men have to come in and save the day because Spider-Man is too busy to become an actual mutant in this storyline.
