Spider-man the '67 Collection is a 6-disc collection of classic Spidey cartoons. While early Spidey fans will no doubt love this collection, I'm dropping one Atomic Blast for three reasons: 1. An aggravating use of recycled animation on discs 5 and 6 where you might see the same sequence five or six times in one episode. Also, entire episodes are recycled with different voice-over stories. 2. They claim that all episodes are remastered but a few are not (rumor is Disney pushed it out the door to coincide with the release of Spider-man 2). 3. The are no extras! How sweet it would have been to see film footage or interviews with the animators and voice actors.   # 10 — In the episode “Sub Zero for Spidey,” ice-covered aliens from Pluto (with the power to freeze anything instantly) land in New York City to kidnap a professor. At the end of the episode, the Plutonians need to retreat to their spaceship which is parked in a river. Do they freeze the river to get across? Not exactly. They steal a motorboat. # 9 — A villain called the Phantom of Fifth Avenue has the power to shrink anything. Pretty powerful! I mean you could take over the world, right? Except he uses his power to shrink valuable items in a store and hide them in a doll house on display. His "valuables" include a toaster, sewing machine and a vacuum cleaner. # 8 — In “The Menace of Mysterio,” Spidey is attacked with smoke bombs. Suddenly, he pulls out a gas mask! Where was he hiding that in his costume?! # 7 — When Spidey finds himself in the Florida swamps battling the Lizard in “Where Crawls the Lizard,” he uses his web shooters to create a pair of water skis. Then he spins a propeller behind him that somehow spins as fast as a real prop! # 6 — In the episode titled, “Swing City,“ a villain uses his power to lift the entire island of Manhattan high into the air. As Spidey swings underneath the city, we see lots of destroyed water and gas conduits and broken subway tunnels. But at the end of the episode Manhattan is simply lowered again into the water. # 5 — In “How to Trap a Spider,” Electro, the Green Goblin and the Vulture team up to do what they cannot individually – beat Spider-man. But Spidey gets them to turn on each other by using one of his lesser-known spider powers – the ability to exactly mimic someone else's voice! # 4 — When his old foe Electro tries to overload New York City, Spidey decides to set a trap by creating a blackout in a section of the city. To do this, Spider-man goes to the city’s power plant and locates the master control room. There are 3 small switches – one for Times Square, one for the East Side and one for the West Side. Spidey simply flips the switch and all the power in Times Square goes out. # 3 —  In the episode titled, “Diamond Dust,” a criminal battles Spidey in a museum. He fires a gun at the wallcrawler that shoots (of all things) white latex paint. The paint completely covers everything in the room including a suit of armor located right in front of them. After a few seconds the paint completely fades away (???). When they can’t find Spider-man, it turns out he somehow donned the suit of armor without them knowing it! # 2 —  When Spider-man fights the Lizard in the Everglades, Spidey not only makes an entire boat out of his webbing – but a working outboard motor too!! ... and the # 1 cheesiest Spider-man moment —  When banks are robbed by an invisible villain named Dr. Vespasian, Spidey turns to the bank manager to set up what you might call a very elaborate trap. It calls for a giant frozen custard machine to be built in the ceiling of the bank vault. When Dr. Vespasian returns, Spidey is there to make him into a living sundae! (The best part is when the cops take him away. They don't free him from the ice cream, they simply cart the giant sundae into an ice cream truck. I'm pretty sure police brutality includes induced hypothermia!)

Spider-man: The '67 Collection (2004)

We’re going to deviate slightly from B-movies just this once to pay homage to the greatest radioactive superhero of the atomic age, the Amazing Spider-man, in this review of Spider-man: The ’67 Collection, the complete 6-disc set of all his classic cartoons featuring that catchy theme song. And we’re going to review it Atomic Monsters-style.

The year is 1977. It’s a warm, spring afternoon and I race from the school bus as fast as my stripe, multi-color polyester pants can carry me. I reach my parent’s oversized, metal mailbox, swing down its large door and stare into the black, cavernous void. Nothing! I tell myself not to panic -- mom must’ve gotten the mail already. So I chug up the steep driveway (as I have for the past 4-6 weeks) and there on the kitchen table it sits. Never in my previous 10 years of life had I ever received my own package that I ordered all by myself and paid for with my own money.

Within moments, I’ve opened the official Spider-Man web shooter complete with red and blue elastic wristband and a suction cup-tipped dart tied to a string just like the real Spider-man’s! I admit the suction cup was silly, but necessary to simulate real web-sticking ability. How else was an 85-pound boy going to swing from room to room? But I was no chump. Before I risked my neck swinging, I first had to test the dart's suction power.

I donned the web shooter, tying one end of the gleaming white string to the mechanism and the other to the loop at the back of the dart. Slowly, I pushed the dart back into the spring-loaded chamber where it successfully locked into place. I took careful aim at the kitchen wall, gently pressed on the button featuring Spidey’s face aaaaaaand…the dart bounced off the wall. No stick. I don’t remember the exact number of times I tried this but I’m estimating around 240. The only thing it did stick to was a mirror. Success! Now, if I’m ever cornered by Dr. Octopus and I’m trapped in a DISCO I’ll be able to escape. Providing my archenemies give me time to wet the suction cup with a little saliva first.

As the hour passed, I was getting the sense that this web shooter may not be all it’s cracked up to be. I decided to give it a real test outside! I ran to the back of the house to my favorite climbing tree. It was a pine and the bottom trunk spread out in three sections creating a sort of foot stool. The branches above stemmed off perfectly every couple of feet. As I climbed, I wondered how Spider-man removed pine sap from his gloves, because this was going to stain my hands until high school. But of course – he stays in the city! Smart thinking.

After reaching a considerable swinging height, I stood on a limb (embraced by other limbs) and took careful aim at a branch in front of, and a little above me. I could hear the web shooter sound effect in my head from the Spider-man cartoon as a fired a perfect shot, the dart wrapping the string around the branch just as I planned! As I grabbed hold of the string with both hands preparing to swing as Spidey would, something occurred to me: No way is this cheap piece of plastic going to hold me. So for the rest of that afternoon I would use my imagination to swing around New York City, help someone in need, then unravel string from a tree branch.

I remember going back in the house for supper, kind of bummed out and my mom said, “Why don’t you take it school and show your friends?” Yeah, that’s just what I need – “friends” daring me to swing from high altitudes on kite string. But having nothing better to do I did take it to school and you know what? I WAS A GOD! I remember passing it around to the other guys in my class and we took turns shooting it at each between desks. The toy, not being electronic, meant we also took turns making the appropriate sound effects with our mouths. I was "the man" all day! Well, in reality, probably about 20 minutes.

Review: “The Power of Doctor Octopus”
We're just going to review the first episode (and for my money, the most fun) featuring Spidey battling the infamous Doc Ock. It opens with Peter Parker on assignment for J. Jonah Jameson. It’s late at night and Pete’s driving down a mountain, going around and around like driving down a giant ice cream cone. Waitaminute! Mountain? There are no mountains near New York City! However, Pete does mention J.J.J. has sent him on a “wild goose chase” in search of rumored mysterious lights so maybe he’s nowhere near New York City?

This NYC police officer seems a little out of his jurisdiction patrolling a mountain for reported "disturbences."

Suddenly, a rockslide blocks the road ahead of Pete! To avoid a collision, he swerves, sending the car off the edge of the mountain. Fortunately, his car is caught by a tree. Changing into his Spider-man costume he uses his webbing to lower the car safely to the ground – directly in front of a cave entrance emitting “mystery lights.” Meanwhile, who should stop by but Betty Brandt, Pete’s friend from the office and J. Jonah Jameson’s secretary. As she skulks around in the dark looking for Pete, a mysterious hand touches her shoulder. “Excuse me, miss?” Betty lets out a classic B-movie scream! It turns out to be…a New York City police officer dressed in his blues! Where IS this mountain anyway?!

When Betty explains she’s searching for her missing friend, the policeman says, “Ok, but be careful.” AND THEN LEAVES HER BY HERSELF! He leaves while pondering aloud, “What’s a nice girl like that doing way out here?” I don’t know – why don’t you do some POLICE WORK?!

A net of chains -- the first of many traps that drop from the ceiling of Doc Ock's cave!

Meanwhile, somewhere else on the mountain (the OTHER side, maybe?) Spider-man has found the entrance to the hidden laboratory of Doctor Octopus! The cave is filled with computers (where’s the power coming from?) I love this episode because all the action takes place at the entrance of this cave. No sooner does Spidey step through the door when suddenly a net made of chains drops down and scoops up Spidey, holding him tight.

Doc Ock sends a sort of ransom note to J.J.J. to print in the Daily Bugle stating he will “demolish the area charted.” Meanwhile, Spider-man manages to break free from the net and battle Dr. Octopus. Ock breaks Spidey’s web and our heroic web head opts for a hasty retreat. He runs for the entrance but Doc has ANOTHER trap prepared! This time a giant, open-bottom cage drops from the ceiling! I thought the net of chains hung up there!

Next, a steel cage drops on Spidey. Does this cave have things hanging from the ceiling like a TGI Fridays?

Now, when I was a kid I loved these traps, but now I wonder: When Doc Ock was building his lab did he think, “I’ll need to build a boobytrap over the door. I know – a giant, steel cage! Hmm, it’ll never fit through the door so I’ll have to build it inside. I’ll need solid steel bars and an Acetylene torch…welding mask…maybe some bolts. When or if I get it done, I’ll need to hoist it from the ceiling of this cave. It's too high to reach with my mechanical arms -- I'll probably use a wench. I wonder how you use one of those things? And when I drop the cage, will it trap my victim or miss slightly and crush their head? Maybe I should just run a trip wire attached to some beer cans."

Betty eventually finds the secret entrance as well and is soon imprisoned by Doctor Octopus. He takes this opportunity to explain his evil plan in full detail. And it's a little…confusing. According to him “electronic impulses will penetrate every water, gas and electric line in the area…” Uh, what’s an electronic impulse? He continues, “This will create shockwaves (It will?) that will demolish everything!” (Everything!?) Finally, Spidey puts it in perspective for us: “That gizmo makes the atom bomb look like a firecracker!” (Oh! Why didn’t he just say so in the first place!)

Spider-man then frees himself from the jail. On Doc Ock’s control panel there are many levers and somehow Spidey knows which one controls his cell door. He shoots his web on a certain lever and pulls it, causing the door to open (Lucky for New York that lever wasn't the shockwave-maker!) Just as Spider-man thinks he has the upper hand, Ock pulls one of his many levers and ANOTHER trap from the ceiling is sprung! This time its an ENORMOUS concrete block the size of a garage! HOW MANY THINGS DOES OCK HAVE TIED UP THERE, ANYWAY!?

I know Dr. Octopus has super-strong, mechanical arms but really...how did he ever fasten this humongous block of concrete to the ceiling?

Next, Ock goes to another of his machines – a giant, floor mounted lazer cannon! I can’t imagine what the electric bill for this cave is going to be! Spidey avoids the lazer blasts by climbing to the ceiling. The CEILING?! Spidey, that's where all the traps are! Have you learned nothing? Sure enough, another trap awaits. Apparently with his spider-sense on permanent vacation, he fails to notice his foot is placed inside the blades of a ventilator fan! Ock notices this and turns on the fan. Rather than cutting off his foot, the blades somehow grab hold of Spidey’s leg spinning him around in circles before throwing him to the ground. Laying motionless, it looks like Spidey’s met his maker.

Of course he’s merely unconscious and when he comes to, Spidey discovers he’s handcuffed to the cage just like Betty. AND HERE COMES MY FAVORITE PART: As Ock is preoccupied watching his explosions on TV, Spidey whispers to Betty, “I’ll spin my web fluid into your handcuff locks and when the fluid hardens, it will serve as a key.”
Wait…WHAT?! A key?! A blob of webbing is going to turn the lock like a key?! I know it’s just a cartoon but holy cow! But Spidey knows his webs and sure enough they’re both free. Betty makes a run for it and this time she makes it outside.

And I would've thought shooting a web into a handcuff lock would only make a sticky handcuff lock.

Enraged, Ock attacks again but this time Spidey webs his glasses. Ock shares his feelings by yelling, “This blasted web…it’s all over my glasses! I can’t see!” Spidey ends the fight by webbing his body to his mechanical arms. The End.

I noticed something both funny and very interesting about the way these scripts were written: they over-explain everything. And I think it’s why my 3-year-old daughter, who right now pays no attention to other TV cartoons, enjoys Spidey so much. For example, there’s an episode in which Spidey’s arch-foe The Lizard emerges from a swamp scaring some fishermen. Rather than just running away, they yell, “What is it?” The Lizard hilariously introduces himself stating, “I’m a lizard man!” (and just in case it still isn’t clear, he continues) “…half-man, half-lizard!” At this, my daughter repeats to me in amazement, “Daddy! He’s a lizard man!” And the rest of the story is told that way too. Spidey doesn’t dodge bullets without adding, “Be careful, Spidey…one wrong move and it’ll be curtains for you!” I started thinking, when we Spidey fans say we watched these cartoons when we were 8 or 9, I bet we starting listening to them when we were much younger (the web-spinning an obvious bonus). And it could be why they were so endearing to us.

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