1994 Spider-Man episode #30-“Attack of the Octobot” Review

Because when you think of heart-pounding action, you think of a Rasta-Cab Driver and a little girl!

Credits
Story By: John Semper
Written By: Meg McLaughlin
Music Composed By: Shuki Levy and Kussa Mahchi
Animation Services By: Toyko Movie Shinsha (TMS)

THE PLOT: Amnesiac due to Doc Ock’s laser beam, Spider-Man is tricked into working for the multi-armed menace. With the help of New York’s Finest…cabbies, can Taina save the day in time?

LONG STORY SHORT: With the day saved, Spider-Man returns Taina back to her house where he reveals his secret identity to her. They promise to be best friends for as long as they live…

MY THOUGHTS…: When reviewing a television show for a renowned website such as Spider-Man Crawlspace, there comes with the job a certain sense of decorum and responisibility with it. It’s a sense that you really can’t go all out in hyperbole to fully express your feelings be they positive or negative, typically negative, no matter how much people may get a kick out of it. To pull the curtain back, the review I did for episode #12 of Spectacular Spider-Man has since been slightly altered upon both suggestion and personal reflection. And it was for the better. That episode was also at the time was also the lowest graded episode in the series of reviews I’ve done, certainly for that series itself. So far in the run of the 1994 Spider-Man series, the lowest graded episode was a tie containing the two-part Tablet of Time storyline. Whatever my feelings were at the time, I felt that I had control over my emotions and was able to convey my thoughts in a fairly respectable manner. I’m going to try and attempt to do that once more.

Because this episode sucks.

That’s as far as I’m willing to go, because I don’t want it to come off that this episode completely colored my opinion of the show as a whole or me bashing the writers. Despite the fact that this is solely an opinionated review, this does reflect the Crawlspace. So typical internet hyperbole with its vast amount of memes and abbreviations employed by men in their mid to late twenties will have to be forgone when doing a review.

This episode still sucks. 

1) This is a personal dislike which doesn’t really reflect on the writer’s choice, especially since it’s based off of a Lee/Romita arc, but I do not like stories where the character’s lose their memory. There are many reasons for this, with much of them lying with the fact that in real life people who have amnesia rarely regain their memories, but the thing that always gets me is that the show is forced to be padded out with scenes of the character struggling to retain their sense of identity. I just don’t like it, and I didn’t really like it in the comics either. The only time I felt it was done well, or at least effectively was in Batman: the animated series, and that’s probably due to the villain not being a member of the rogues gallery and not trying to turn Batman to his side. That’s what always happens in these kinds of shows. The hero forgets who he/she is, and the villain tries to play up the friendly BFF. Again, it was in the comics, but at the same time it was in the comics during the 1960s. Not exactly Emmy Award winning storytelling in the 90s.

2)Kingpin is utterly wasted in both parts. Why does Ock even go to him, since he’s a loner and plans to use whatever he steals for science anyway? They don’t even make mention of the Sinister/Insidious Six, so it’s played almost as if the two character have no previous history. Which again begs the question of why Ock went to the Kingpin, if he never planned on delivering the goods to him in the first place? Why?

3) Mouse is the most ridiculous character in comic book cartoon history. Seriously man, I remember as a kid laughing at some of the things she said, including winners such as “IT TAKE MORE DAN A BIG BAD FISH-MAN TO GET RID OF DA OLD MOUSEY!” and “WE SAW DE SPIDA-MAN AND DE OCTOPUS TOGETHER!”, but I completely forgot how messed up her accent (which had to have been forced) sounded. There’s no way that her voice was genuine, which proves that they should have just gone with an actual Jamaican voice actress, so as not to continuously and repeatedly distract the hell out of the audience. She honestly took me out of the show due to the way she sounded, and she yelled everything she said, even if she was whispering or talking low. It was just awful. As a character, she was only mildly annoying, but her voice just doomed her from the start. If she sounded at all believable, it would’ve been alright. But no, it sounded dumb.

4)The Mouse and her Amazing Friends. I will admit that it was clever for her and Taina to have the Cabbie dragnet all over town be used to follow Spidey and Doc Ock, but it was really dumb that the boss of the district made all of this happen due to double the amount of fare. Maybe it’s just me, but it rang to the tone of “ONE MILLION DOLLARS” *pinky point* It just didn’t seem like a good reason to have the New York cabbie system act like spies. That was lame, but it blew my mind when they all got in the same cab and busted through the door of Ock’s lab. I…what? What are they going to do, stump him by playing “Cash Cab”? I know that they were loyal to Mouse, but they could always have, you know, called the cops. It’s one thing to have an eight year old tell a cop about superheroes and him not believing her, but three grown men?

5) Tiana beating Doc Ock by squeezing him through the use of his Octobot. That speaks for itself.

All that being said, this episode did have a couple of small things going for it. For the most part, the animation was pretty nice throughout. The models looked cleaner than the last episode’s. That isn’t a dig at that style, just a comparison. When the re-used animation popped up however, it was very, very obvious. So that almost takes the compliment back.

I liked the scenes with MJ, Aunt Anna and Aunt May if only to keep them relevant. Aunt Anna made sense being there since they were all neighbors, otherwise I’d question the whereabouts of Harry. I also kind of liked the scene with Jameson, however I found him to be a bit too serious. That was a chance to really play up Jameson’s comical side, yet it fell flat. It was funny when he credited Taina and Mousey as “reliable sources” though.

But at the end of the day, this episode is just poor. It’s mostly padding with Doc Ock fighting robot tanks and Spider-Man crawling up a wall, and the rest is just very annoying. Taina herself was included in the latter parts, although after all these years she’s slightly less annoying than I thought she would be based on my memory. Don’t get me wrong, she is annoying. But she’s also a kid, and a fairly believable at that. And if you dislike her, take comfort in the fact that she’s terminally ill…you evil person.

This is by far the most irritating entry of the series so far, and hopefully one of the few in the near future that will recieve the following. Here’s to better episodes.

1.5/5 “MARY JAAANE!!!”s

Best Quote Contender:

Spider-Man: *After being surrounded by armed guards* “Now gentlemen, I’m sure you’re all wondering why I called this meeting…”

All images taken from marvel.toonzone.net