Episode #26: Final Curtain Original Airdate: November 18th, 2009
When Peter Parker breaks up with Liz Allan to finally be with Gwen Stacy, nothing goes as planned. Likewise for Spider-Man, who finally unmasks the Green Goblin, revealing him to be--No, wait! Stop! I promise I won’t tell a soul!
Credits
Written By Kevin Hopps
Directed By Victor Cook
Music by Lolita Ritmanis, Kristopher Carter, Michael McCuistion
Animation By Dongwoo animation
Voices
Josh Keaton as Spider-Man/Peter Parker
James Arnold Taylor as Harry Osborn
Vanessa Marshall as Mary Jane Watson
Steve Blum as The Green Goblin/The Chameleon
Jeff Bennett as Bernard Houseman
Alan Rachins as Norman Osborn
Lacey Chabert as Gwen Stacy
Grey DeLisle as Sally Avril
Daran Norris as J. Jonah Jameson
Alanna Ubach as Liz Allan
Kevin Michael Richardson as OsCorp Security Guard
Kath Soucie as Martha Connors
Deborah Strang as Aunt May Parker
James Arnold Taylor as Harry Osborn
Alanna Ubach as Liz Allan
Greg Weisman as Donald Menken
Review: Stu - Alas, here we are. The season (series?) finale of The Spectacular Spider-Man. Excited? I bet you are, I was.
With the gang war now concluded we open with all the hoods now under the rule of The Green Goblin, while Spider-Man beats down the Gob Squad one group at a time while he continues his search for Harry. At the end of The Uncertainty Principal many a viewer was sceptical as to whether or not Harry was indeed The Green Goblin as the episode revealed. The signs were all there – his powers came from the Globulin Green formula, which caused blackouts, meaning he had no knowledge of ever being the Goblin, much like Norman back in the 60’s when his character was still interesting. I remained cautious but accepted the fact that Harry was The Goblin for many reasons. Looking back, I think it’s because I wanted Harry to be The Goblin – he wasn’t that interesting a character beforehand (with the exception of MTV Spider-Man and the movies, Harry has always been a difficult character to like). The main reason however, was simply because this version of Norman was the bad ass evil big bad that the comics have been trying to create since they foolishly raised him from the dead back in the mid 90’s – to me, he didn’t need to become The Green Goblin. The steps taken to cover the fact he wasn’t The Goblin were all there – Norman present at one of The Goblin’s attacks and the old Christopher Reeve equation – Norman and The Goblin were nothing alike, Osborn being a sombre calculating genius and GG being a complete and utter psychopath, far removed from the restrained Norman Osborn.
The episode kept me guessing until the very last second thanks to the inclusion of The Chameleon and twist after twist. This is truly not only the greatest version of The Green Goblin we’ve ever had but without question the best version of Norman too – we’ve had this Osborn vs. Spider-Man feud shoved down our throat for years now in the comics with few highlights since his resurrection (A Death In The Family, despite it’s mediocre conclusion, and the 12 part Marvel Knights storyline which actually tried to do something different and was commended for it). They’re still at it with the current American Son storyline with some nonsense about Osborn being the director of SHIELD – how the writers have managed to take an idea that’s failed in the comics time and time again and made it worked in such a spectacular fashion in this show is a tribute to how good they actually are. It’s not just the writers in this instance – director Victor Cook brings his A game in their amazing aerial battles throughout a booby trapped New York and I couldn’t review a Goblin related episode of Spectacular without praising Steve Blum on his portrayal of the maniacal villain. I can’t recall ever commenting on Alan Rachins interpretation of Norman Osborn but I can’t stress enough how brilliantly cold he is in the role – whether dealing with Spider-Man, The Big Man or Harry, he masterfully plays the character. Keaton returns with his typically flawless Spider-Man – 26 episodes in and I honestly can’t recall any casting blunders. Jamie Thomason has yet to falter in this show.
The episode also brings about the end of Peter’s relationship with Liz, after he finally admits to himself that he loves Gwen instead. It was good to see some closure here and I look forward to the aftermath of this - Peter’s next day at school with the in crowd would make an excellent opening to a hopeful third season. With Harry aware of Peter and Gwen’s predicament and purposely placing himself in there way, there is still much potential out of this relationship, as well as a potential love triangle. As long as they don’t do something silly (like Gwen finding out Peter is Spider-Man) then there’s plenty of mileage left here even though this is a satisfying conclusion – Peter works better single, after all.
And there we have it, all 26 episode of Spectacular Spider-Man concluded, and we are still without an announcement of season three. With Hobgoblin, Scorpion (who was announced in this episode, someone actually remembered Gargan was a PI before he was a supervillain) confirmed and a possible follow up to the gang war I can only hope we see this show continue for a long, long time. If we do only get 26 episodes, we should find some happiness in the fact that it was simply spectacular throughout. At time of writing, the Spectacular Spider-Man stands as Marvel’s finest animated effort and surpasses most of DC’s finest efforts – the only shows in Spectacular’s league really, is Batman: The Animated Series itself. With more episodes, it may just surpass it. We can but hope!
