Spider-Man has always been one of Marvel's most popular characters.  Not because he is the strongest or smartest hero, but because he is the most human.  He faces the same problems everyone has, and that makes people able to relate to him.  He has super powers, but not the rent money.  Like the comic book, MTV's Spider-man:  The New Animated Series makes sure the emphasis is on the person beneath the mask.

This two disc set contains all 13 episodes from the first season of the show.   This show is rendered entirely on computers, and it's a bit of a mixed bag.  Some aspects I really like, and others I dislike immensely.

One of the tricks of the trade that animators frequently use is to spend more time and money on certain shots.   The theory is that if you make some parts look really, really good, people won't notice that you skimped on other aspects.  Mainframe, the company who did the computer animation, took this idea to heart, and it didn't work.  The scenes of Spider-Man webbing across town and fighting, heck in most of Spider-Man's scenes, he looks excellent.  His movement is fluid and lifelike, his costume is well lit, and he has a lot of detail.  That's practically the only thing that looks good.  Every other character, especially the non-villain ones, look horrible.  The movements are really jerky and unnatural.  When people move, it looks like they are having seizures instead of gesturing.

The backgrounds are poorly rendered.  Their surfaces look very uniform.  The whole side of a building will be the exact same color, with no shading or texture.  They look like painted cardboard boxes more than buildings.  The same goes for other background fixtures like cars and trains.  Even Mary Jane's clothes are bad.  She wears that exact same outfit in every single episode.  They didn't even bother to change the color of her top.  They should have put a little more effort into other aspects of the show.

There is such a huge disparity between the Spider-Man animation and all the rest, that it's jarring.  After watching for a while, you get used to the low budget animation, but when Spidey webs across the screen you realize how bad everything else looks.  I think that the show would look a lot better if the animation had been more even throughout.

The stories are also mixed.  The overall plots are pretty entertaining for a children's show.  They have a mixture of classic Marvel villains and the writers came up with some truly interesting foes too.  The problem is that a lot of the minor plot points are really dumb.  In one episode a villain is in street clothes, but when Spider-Man appears he takes off his coat to reveal a very bulky set of armor that wasn't visible under his jacket.  Whenever someone passes out while driving a car (I think it happened twice in this first season) their foot presses down on the accelerator.  It's minor things like that, sloppy mistakes for the sake of getting to the action a little quicker, that harm the show.

One thing that I found slightly unusual, is that all the shows are very close together in quality.  Out of a season of shows, there are usually one or two that really stand out, and a couple that stink.  Not so with this series.  They are all very similar, no great shows, but no really horrid ones either.

The acting is not that great, but not bad.  I didn't think that Neil Patrick Harris, who voices Spider-Man, was able to pull off the lines of snappy banter that Spider-Man is always spouting while he fights.  The timing and inflection was just off.  Besides that he does an acceptable job.

One nice thing about this package is the audio commentaries.  I usually save discussing those until the 'Extras' section, but this is a little different case.  This season has commentaries over all 13 shows by various members of the cast and crew, and even Stan Lee himself.  These alternate audio tracks are all excellent.  Hands down the best commentary I've heard on a TV show.  Each episode tackles a different topic, and together they encompass every aspect of making a CGI animated show.  Very informative and interesting.   Executive Producer Audu Paden acts as host.  He guides the conversation, makes sure that people stay on topic, and insures that there are not any long gaps of silence.  I'll discuss the content of the commentaries along with each episode.

One very strange thing that occurred on this set is that the shows are not in the order that they originally aired.  They aren't in the order they were made either.  I'm not sure why they mixed them up, but they did.  The shows in this set, in the order they appear on the discs are:

Heroes and Villains:  Empire State University, where Peter, Mary Jane, and Harry attend school, is trying to buying a low income housing development so that they can build new science facilities.  A new villain, Turbo Jet, steals valuable objects and gives some of the money to the people fighting the sale.  Spider-Man tries to stop him, but the people start to rally around Turbo Jet and turn against Spidey.  Not the best episode.  I thought the villain was rather lame.  It just didn't click.  Grade:  C+

Commentary:    Spider-Man scribe Brian Michael Bendis and director Tim Eldred join Audu Paden and discuss how the series evolved from The Ultimate Spider-Man comic book, the theory of writing about Spider-Man, and the whole writing process.
 
Royal Scam:  Spider-Man is tricked by the Kingpin into stealing a computer chip that will allow him to steal billions of dollars from encrypted satellite bank transfers.  Spidey realizes his mistake after he hands the chip over, and must find a way to get it back.  Grade:  B

Commentary:  The look of the show is discussed on this chapter.  From visual influences to character designs and background details.

Law of the Jungle:  The Lizard makes his appearance.  Peter is working for Dr. Connors, who is working a method of tissue regeneration based on the DNA of lizards.  He lost his arm years ago in an accident, and desperately wants to grow it back.  When the serum he creates looks promising, he injects himself and turns into the Lizard.  Can Spidey stop him before he kills Harry?  Grade B-

Commentary:  Morgan Gendal and a few other writers talk about how they get their ideas, how the script evolves, and the process of writing in a group.

Sword of Shikata:  A wealthy collector of rare animals hires a new villain, Shikata, to capture Spider-man alive.  I really liked this villain.  Everything about her worked well.  One of the best episodes.  Grade:  A

Commentary:  Stan Lee joins in and talks about the development of a villain.  What makes a good bad guy and how they should act.   They cover everything from the initial idea, to visualization , colors, costumes, motivation, etc.  A great commentary.  Any budding writer should be sure to listen to this discussion.

Keeping Secrets:  Spidey is after a new villain who has been pulling a lot of robberies in the city, Talon.  Things get sticky when he learns her identity:  she's Harry's new girl friend.  I didn't like this villain too much.  The plot seemed a little old.  Grade:   C-

Commentary:  Voice editor Susan Blu, writer Marsha Griffin, and Spider-Man voice actor Neil Patrick Harris talk about voices.  What type of sound you want for a character, how the author writes a person's dialog, and how the actor interprets the words.

Tight Squeeze:  Peter Parker is in a group of hostages captured by three ex-KGB agents who have purchased state of the art battle suits.  The only demand they have is to see Spider-man.  Can Peter save himself and the hostages without revealing his secret identity?  A slightly better than average show.  Grade:  B-

Commentary:  This time a group walks you through the process of directing a cartoon.  From story boards to roughs and beyond.

Head Over Heals:  A friend of Peter's, Christina, has invented an ESP device that will allow her to read minds.  When she tries it on Peter, the device short circuits, and Christina finds herself in love with Spider-Man.  O much so, that she tries to force Spidey to love her.  By getting rid of Mary Jane.  The plot has been a little over done, but they did it well.  Grade:  C+

Commentary:  More on directing.  The limitations of the series, and how to come up with a uniform directorial style.

The Party:  One of my favorite Spider-Man villains from the comics makes his appearance.  When Peter's friend Max is initiated into a fraternity, things go horribly wrong.  Max doesn't die, instead he turns into Electro, and tries to get revenge on the students.  I didn't like the way they designed Electro.  His look was very different from the comics.  He was blue instead of his classical yellow for one.  Aside from that, a good effort.  Grade:  B
Commentary:  Some of the management and creative team from Mainframe discuss computer animation.  Modeling the characters, facial animation, lighting , and the final rendering are all discussed.  Very informative.

Disc Two:

Flash Memory:  Flash Thompson, the jock who is always picking on Peter, has a new drug tested on him by Dr. Zeliner.  It makes him much smarter, but it is also killing him.  If the drug can make a dunce like Flash a genius, what would it do to a smart kid like Peter Parker?  The doctor decides to find out.  A more character driven show.  More intimate than the other episodes.  Grade:  B-

Commentary:  This commentary talks about the nuts and bolts of the animation process.  How a show gets animated, and how the work is delegated.

Spider-Man Dis-Sabled:  While covering a new event, Peter accidentally films Silver Sable in an assassination attempt.  Sable wants the tape, and will kill MJ and Harry to get it.  Another Marvel comic villain.  Not one of my favorite villains, but they wrote he well.  Grade:  B-

Commentary:  How Mainframe managed to create the series.  How many animators they had, how much time was allocated per episode, and how they created a set of limitations (number of sets, characters, etc could be included in any given episode) so the writers and other creative people would know what they could and couldn't do.

When Sparks Fly:  When Electro returns, he wants to transform the new woman in Peter's life, Sally, into a being like himself so they can live together forever.  The was a good episode.  Better than the first one.  Grade:  B+

Commentary:  Everything you wanted to know about post production:  Editing, adding music, etc.

Mind Games Part One:  An armor car is attacked, and two being with strong mental powers, the Gaines Twins, escape.  Spider-Man is able to capture them, but Kraven the Hunter is tracking Spidey, and when MJ gets in his way he kills her!  I didn't like this one too much.  I saw the clichéd end from a mile away.  Grade: C-

Commentary:  Stan Lee and writer Steven Kriozere talk about how this two parter evolved and came about.  Not as interesting as Stan's first commentary, but still good.

Mind Games Part Two:  Spider-Man confronts Kraven and tries to kill him for murdering Mary Jane.  This part was much better.  The fight between Spider-Man and Kraven was excellent.  Grade: B-

Commentary:  The same people discuss the second part.  More of a standard scene specific commentary.
 
 

Audio:

You have the option of a 5.1 Dolby Digital or a DTS mix.  Both sound great!  The DTS especially.  There are very cool sound effects, like Turbo Jet's suit powering up, that bring the sound track to life.  The explosions and crashes are very dynamic.  The only flaw I found is that the commentary track was recorded at a much lower level than the regular audio tracks.  If you switch from the commentary to DTS, it's really loud.   Overall a great sounding DVD.

Video:

The DVD case says that these shows were mastered in High Definition.  I was surprised there were so many errors.  The is a big video glitch about six seconds into the first episode, that is easy to see.  The fine lines on people's faces will grow and shrink when they aren't moving, and there is a good amount of aliasing especially in the background.  There is also significant banding (non-smooth color transitions) in many scenes, especially the sky.  I was really disappointed that there were so many problems.

The Extras:

This set is jammed packed with extras!  There are a lot of great bonuses spread over the two discs.  In addition to the excellent commentaries I've already discussed, there are the following:

Spidey Notes:  This is an option you can turn on while watching a show.  Like the ADVidnotes from Excel Saga, they are texts notes that pop up on the screen while the show is playing.  Most of them are informative, like pointing out that Talon is stealing an MTV movie award during one episode.  Some of them are repeated, like pointing out who the voice actors are, and a few are lame attempts at humor such as "Spidey is having a bad, bad, day."  Even taking that into account, it's a neat feature.

Featurettes:

     Making of Spider-Man:  A 23 minute show that explains a lot about the production of the show.
     Spider-Man Tech - Creating Models:  A 12 minute feature that looks at the CGI process.
     Spider-Man Tech  - Animating Performance:  A 14 minute look at how they match the animation and mouth movement to the dialog.
     Spider-Man:  The Music:  How they came up with the sound track and incidental music.  7 minutes.

Outtake reel:  Very funny minute and a half gag reel.

Building with Layers:  They loop a segment of animation, and you can see what each layer look like by using the multi-angle feature on your remote.  This was pretty neat.

Initial Mainframe Pitch:  The one minute film that Mainframe made to audition for the job.  It looks better than the series does.

Abandoned "Spider-sense" test:  An early animation test that has a very different look for the show.  Very much inspired by McFarland's art on the comic book.  I really like it.

Rough Animation:  A minute long example of what the animation looks like before it goes through the final rendering.

There is also a production artwork gallery, and cast and crew text profiles. A great set of extras.

Final Thoughts:

This show isn't great, but it's pretty good.  The episodes never really get better than average, but they don't get worse either.  The extras really make this disc for me.  The commentaries were simply outstanding, and all the featurettes were great.  Overall, a very nice package.  Spidey fans should definitely check it out.  Recommended.