Executive producers: Avi Arad, Will Meugniot
Story by: Michael Reaves & Will Meugniot
Story editor: Michael Reeves
Series premiered sat-2-oct-1999, was canceled, and re-premiered sat-2-dec-2000
Produced by Marvel Studios
Distributed by FoxKids Network
Philadelphia: sat-10:00, wtxf-29-fox
Photographer PETER PARKER and publisher JONAH JAMESON of _The Daily Bugle_ are attending a prelaunch conference given by Jameson's son, space shuttle astronaut COL.JAMES JAMESON. Sometime earlier, the Elita-One (did I hear that right? A reference to "The Transformers"?) probe sent through a new orbiting WARP RING had discovered a hidden Earthlike world exactly opposite in Earth's orbit (promptly dubbed COUNTER-EARTH), and Jameson's commanding the first (one-man?) crewed mission to it.
Parker notices two suspicious figures, who pause at the foot of the launch gantry and dissolve into piles of black and red goo. It's VENOM and CARNAGE, two shapeshifters evolved from an alien symbiote once used by Parker as his costume. Moments later the SOLARIS ONE is taking off, and SPIDERMAN manages to climb the gantry and lasso it. Then he almost slides off the starboard solid rocket booster. Then he has a fight with Venom and Carnage, who claim they're in search of "THE SYNOPTIC". Then he falls off and they tear off a hatch to enter the ship. Then the world listens as Jameson (and co-pilot?) go "AAAUURGH!" as they're engulfed with black goo.
Noticing Spiderman (and his web parachute), Jameson naturally blames him. Things are bad for the webcrawler for the next week, though he can't resist the siren call of public service. Then some masonry fortuitously falls on his head and he accepts his own assumed-death.
Back at their strangely roomy apartment, Peter and MARY JANE ("Tiger" and "MJ") have a heart-to-heart, and he wonders if he finally has an excuse to give up the mantle. Then the TV news relays a brief message from Col.Jameson, who warns that Counter-Earth must be stopped.
Six months later, the Solaris Two mission is ready to launch. Peter Parker (special photojournalist placed there by Jameson) slinks away and activates his new nanotech-based costume ("borrowed" from the lab of REED RICHARDS, "Mister Fantastic" of The Fantastic Four), then stows aboard the vacant shuttle (convincing a hovering NICK FURY of the supranational law enforcement organization S.H.I.E.L.D. that he has to clear his good name). Spiderman launches, then transmits a message explaining his motives (and adds a comment from Parker to explain his absence). He enters the warp gate.
Reappearing above Counter-Earth, the shuttle's captured by a tractor beam. Spiderman's angled retro evasions merely lead to a fatal approach trajectory towards a city of skyscrapers, from which he's saved by four flying robots, who announce he's under arrest by authority of LORD TYGER and THE HIGH EVOLUTIONARY. He announces his name and flees. He's pursued by four humanoids on flying pink robosteeds who finally corner him politely (because with a name like that, he might be a "BESTIAL") and chivalrously introduce themselves: THE KNIGHTS OF WUNDERGOR, consisting of the aforementioned Lord Tyger, plus LADY URSULA, LADY VERMIN and SIR RAM (respectively, a humaniform tiger, bear, rat and ram).
"To paraphrase John Paul Johns, I have not yet begun to flee!" he quips, bouncing through the airborne traffic, noticing all the pilots are animals. "What is this, the Manhattan Island of Doctor Moreau?" Down on the surface, he finds normal humans crammed into slums. Then he's captured. Then he's brought to a lab, where the image of the aforementioned head-honcho, the High Evolutionary, exhorts them to penetrate his suit and discover his identity -- which Sir Ram is all-too-ready to do with a whirring pizza- cutter... TO BE CONTINUED.
... Still on the slab, Spiderman gets the obligatory villian justification speech. Fleeing the human propensity for violence, the alien eventually to be known as the High Evolutionary arrives on Counter-Earth, but discovers only more of the same. Frustrated, he spends 50 years in his "grand experiment" of creating the Bestials and reforming the planet with them at the top.
Spidey breaks his bonds and escapes Sir Ram's lab, to be met by the Human Revolution outside. They evade the Knights and take him to their lair to meet their leader -- none other than Col.Jameson, who demands proof that this is the genuine article (since he's changed his costume). In the background, Lady Vermin (who has a crush on Spiderman) trails them.
Meanwhile, a couple of bestial dock guards notice a submarine. It surfaces, and Carnage and Venom ooze out, infecting them with spores of the Synoptic. (Their chests instantly grow mole tunnel-like ridges, splitting their shirts.) The symbiotes are playing a double game -- the High Evolutionary wants them to find Spiderman, but doesn't realize they're also working for the Synoptic.
Revolution HQ is suddenly invaded by rappelling bestials -- Jameson identifies them as the High Evolutionary's Enforcers, but in fact they're all Synoptic infectees. One of the revolutionaries (apparently an animate pile of mummy wrappings -- how does he fit with the subjugated human population?) unravels and escapes through the grilled flooring. Venom and Carnage wrestle Spidey, who activates the "anti-symbiote devices" alluded to last episode -- high-intensity sonics that not only drive the two back into the drain, but also cure all the bestials.
Jameson insists the base has been compromised and the bestial prisoners must be killed. Spiderman stops him (on humanitarian grounds) with the argument that Lady Vermin and the symbiotes already know where it is, and the Revolution has to evacuate. Jameson reluctantly agrees, but BROMLEY (an explosives maniac with a British accent who lost his family) storms off in a huff.
Outside, they try to convince Spiderman to join the Revolution, because he's the only human on the planet not tagged with a subdural tracking chip. He refuses -- he came to rescue Jameson and nothing else -- but they give him some clothes so he can blend in and evaluate the society himself.
Shortly afterward, an aircar collides with an enforcer robot, which malfunctions and prepares to zap a young boy playing in the street. Peter Parker stops it but burns his hands. The boy's mother, DR.NAOKO YAMADA- JONES, bandages them and (at her son's urging) allows Parker to board in their spare room, two weeks for free, until he finds a job.
Some of the problems are scientific. Some are with the story logic. Some of them are relevant to new viewers not familiar with Spiderman or the larger context of Marvel Comics superheroes.
If "Spider-Man Unlimited" is connected to the prior series, "Spider-man" (1995-?), Marvel Productions (the comic company's animation arm) is not making it obvious. Not only have the voice actors and character designs changed, but so has the animation crew -- SMU seems to use the group that did "X-Men" (1992-98). Their (inferior, IMHO) style involves clashing fauvist colors with solid black blobs on the shadowed sides of objects. I dunno, maybe the former group is off doing "Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century."