Maxance Vincent
Warning: The following article contains spoilers for episodes one and two of Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man.
Marvel is back in full swing (pun intended) a month after the release of the disappointing What If…? – Season 3 with an animated reinterpretation of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Spider-Man in Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man. The first animated series focused on the web-slinger developed by Marvel Studios, showrunner Jeff Trammell spins the MCU origins by following Peter Parker (voiced by Hudson Thames) in an alternate timeline from the hero we know and love, played by Tom Holland. Some events and moments, we realize, are similar, but the overarching narrative is vastly different.
In fact, the ending scene of its first episode, Amazing Fantasy, appropriates the tracking shot of Parker, DVD player in hand, and listening to Alt-J’s “Left Hand Free,” entering Aunt May’s (Kari Wahlgren) apartment from Captain America: Civil War. Noticing a fancy car outside, he realizes a guest is talking to his aunt. But instead of being Tony Stark/Iron Man, which, in the sacred timeline, further propels the events of the airport battle in motion, it’s Norman Osborn (Colman Domingo). You see, earlier in the episode, Peter, through the mantle of Spider-Man, saves Norman’s son, Harry (Zeno Robinson), from a group of thugs.
We’re still in his early days as the superhero, but sightings have become more frequent, and Spider-Man has since grown in popularity, helping others when they need him the most. Obviously, Norman wants to use Peter (and the Spider-Man mantra) for his own nefarious gains, through that is an aspect rife to be explored in subsequent episodes. For now, however, the first episode shows how he got bit by a spider, with Doctor Strange (Robin Atkin Downes) inadvertently sending a symbiotic spider to Parker’s timeline while he fights off an alien.
It’s a relatively fun way to reinterpret Peter’s bite. A great action scene primes audiences for the show’s mixture of 2D/cel-shaded animation straight out of a “living comic book” on the artificial world Trammell and episode director Mel Zwyer visualize. For now, I’m not entirely sold on the animation style, but perhaps I’ll warm up to it once more episodes are released (in bulk) on Disney+. Moreover, the spider is still roaming free…likely creating more Spider-people. Whether or not we will see some of them this season remains to be seen, but Marvel’s Brad Winderbaum has already confirmed that the series has been greenlit for two more seasons, so the potential here is endless.
The first episode takes its time to set up friendships between Peter and Nico Minoru (Grace Song) and a burgeoning love that the titular character has for her childhood crush, Pearl Pangan (Cathy Ang). However, she’s in a relationship with Lonnie Lincoln (Eugene Byrd), a man Peter initially hates but eventually warms up to once they become lab buddies, and he realizes how intelligent and aspirational he is. We see more of Spidey helping the neighborhood and not just catching bad guys. He encourages a burglar, who feels deep remorse for her action towards a pizzeria (aptly named “Pizza Time”), to return to a righteous path. After apologizing to the restaurant owner, he lets her go, having learned a lesson she will never forget.
Rather, the series’ overarching narrative is introduced in its second episode, The Parker Luck. Osborn, having been impressed by Parker’s academic record, wants him to join Oscorp for an extracurricular internship, which will occur after his school hours. Not knowing his hidden agenda, he immediately accepts and goes to Oscorp the following day, where he meets Amadeus Cho (Aleks Le), Jeanne Foucault (Anjali Kunapareni), and Asha (Erica Luttrell), all interns who have shown great potential in their respective parts of the world.
It does feel slightly strange that this is the first time we see Oscorp in the MCU, with zero mentions of the company in the live-action title other than Willem Dafoe’s apparition in Jon Watts’ Spider-Man: No Way Home. However, he’s from an alternate universe, so I’m not sure this counts. On the other hand, Domingo portrays the character with an immediate menacing tone (coupled with a green suit. That’s massive foreshadowing), giving the impression that Parker shouldn’t trust him. However, not knowing who Norman Osborn truly is, he acclimates himself to his new work environment under the tutelage of Carla Connors (Zehra Fazal) on an energy project.
Peter, sadly, has difficulty balancing his life as a high school freshman student, a science intern, and Spider-Man, as illustrated in a setpiece where he storms out of Oscorp to help save innocent victims from a fire that broke out in a building complex. However, once he’s there, he realizes it’s a setup and that an arsonist known as “Butane” (Jake Green) has been hired to burn the building down. After a rather exciting fight sequence, Peter subdues Butane and notices something oddly familiar….yet, before he has any time to think, he’s summoned back to Oscorp.
Even worse, Norman wants to see him. That’s something that should never happen under any circumstance. Why do you think this has happened so early? Well, he shouldn’t have changed in his Spider-Man suit at Oscorp…where cameras are everywhere. He’s in trouble now.
The first two episodes of Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man are now available to stream on Disney+.
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