Spider-Man: The Animated Series Episode Reviews

The Prowler
Review and Media by Stu

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Episode #51 - The Prowler
Original Airdate - August 2nd, 1997

Hobbie, a man with a troubled past, is released from prison with the help of Wilson Fisk and seeks to get revenge on his former boss, Iceberg. Fisk allows Hobbie to use a special suit to give him super-human powers as the Prowler, but with one caveat: that if he removes the suit, it will detonate!

Credits:
Story By: John Semper
Written By: Terence Taylor
Music Composed By: Shuki Levy and Kussa Mahchi
Animation Services By: Toyko Movie Shinsha (TMS)
Guest Starring: Christopher Daniel Barnes as Spider-Man/Peter Parker, Saragota Ballantine as Mary Jane Watson, Roscoe Lee Brown as The Kingpin and Tim Russ as The Prowler/Hobie Brown

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Review: There comes a time in a reviewers life when he has absolutely no idea what to say about how he feels about it. This usually happens when;

A) It's hard to explain how utterly awesome the episodes is,
B) The story was a little confusing or so full of plot holes you aren't entirely sure what's going on, or
C) It's too damn boring and almost depressing to talk about.

The Prowler falls firmly under the C category. The new character was a little too corny for my liking, and he came across as a guy blaming his problems on everyone else. He was fairly unlikeable. This isn't even the main problem with the episode though. This episode is just ... pretty boring. The animation wasn't too bad, but the script had some of the cheesiest lines of the season and tthe story, while interesting, falls flat.

For a season finale, I expected a little more. The episode was pretty close to the comics, except for the inclusion of The Kingpin, but man, he was in dire need of an update for the 1990s. Todd McFarlane managed it (by making him look like Spawn no less) but everything about Prowler seemed a little lacking.

To top it all off, the ending completely sucked. I mean, as in, the worst ending this show did. It never even explained if Prowler got out the suit or not, nor did anything else with Fisk's part of the story. They literally just left and that's it. Nothing really gets resolved. Lame. A mediocre ending to a mediocre season.

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