Al n' Ann's Collectibles

Spider-Man The '67 Collection
Buena Vista Home Video- 6 DVD set Released just in time to capitalize on the newest installment in the Spider-Man movie saga, is the 6 DVD set that collects the whole series of Spider-Man cartoons that ran on ABC from 1967- 1970. There are almost 20 hours of repetitive cut away scenes of Spider-Man swinging, talking, walking, and doing whatever Spider-Man does. In 1967, the animation was not done like it is today; there was a repetitive use of backgrounds and animation scenes to help keep production moving and costs down, and boy do the make the most of Spidey's big scenes. Oh look he's swinging right, oh now he's coming in high from the right, oh my goodness he's crawling up the wall backwards, and goodness it's the dreaded double web shot-swinging between two buildings thing he does (I'm failing to mention the final scenes in most every episode- Spidey swinging off into the distance. It would give me no greater pleasure to say that I love this DVD set, but I don't, at least I don't love all of it. It's funny, I can remember watching it when I was a kid and the same dreaded feeling came over me watching this set as it did then; when they tried to make it so that each show went from two episodes to a single one, things start to loose their spidery goodness. I thoroughly love the first three DVDs in the set, each one consists of the two episode gems, that with the animation and story lines of the time were perfect, the final 3 DVDs consist of the single episodes that are drawn out and take away from the experience, but they do have their upside. Maybe it's just me and my being a history major, but to watch these cartoons and remember the era when they were made, you can totally see the influence that the late 60's had over the designs and the stories. The crazy villains and the even stranger color palate totally emulate the times. The best way that I can think of to describe the last 3 DVDs are "trippy"; there's magic, aliens, Pardo (the crazy cat eye guy), and other villains that were created for the series, that are just seething with a 60s vibe. The final 3 DVDs do not incorporate a whole lot of Spider-Man's rouges, which is kind of sad, but like I said, if you think of when these episodes were made, it makes it a little easier to take. As a whole I would say the set, is good, it's not one of the greatest, but for bringing up memories of eating grilled cheese while watching reruns on some UHF channel while growing up, it's pretty nifty. I like that they have a feature where you can play all the episodes in a row without having to select them one by one, although it would be nice if there was a way to not hear the Spider-Man theme over and over and over and over and over again. The episodes have been digitally re-mastered and the sound is presented in Dolby Digital. The set is Region 1 encoded and captioned for the hearing impaired. Words of warning though, do not sit down and try to watch all the episodes in a short period of time, just don't do it. It's too much for a person to take. There goes a Spider-Man.--Kevin

Al n' Ann's Collectibles

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3819 W. Main St.
McHenry,IL 60050

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(815)344-9696