Saturday Morning Fever #3 – Spider-Man ‘67

Just in time for Spider-Man:Homecoming, join Fire & Water Webheads Chris Franklin (Super Mates), Rob Kelly (Film & Water) and special guest Brian Heiler (Pod Stallions) to discuss Spidey’s first foray into other media, the 1967 Spider-Man animated series!

 

Brian’s Plaid Stallions: http://www.plaidstallions.com/

Derek William Crabbe’s History of Comics on Film: http://hocof.blogspot.com/

Spider-Man 67 music by Ray Ellis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCF8JU30gXI

Have a question or comment?

  • Leave comments on our FIRE & WATER PODCAST website: http://fireandwaterpodcast.com/podcast/saturday-morning-fever-3-spider-man67/
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Opening theme by Luke Daab: http://daabcreative.com

This podcast is a proud member of the FIRE AND WATER PODCAST NETWORK:

Clip credits:

Clips from Spider-Man (1967) starring Paul Soles, Paul Kligman and Peg Dixon.

Theme from Spider-Man (1967) Bob Harris, Stu Phillips, and D. Kapross, lyrics by Paul Francis Webster. Also performed by The Ramones

Score from Spider-Man (1967) by Ray Ellis

17 responses to “Saturday Morning Fever #3 – Spider-Man ‘67

  1. FYI: Spidey voice actor Paul Soles is still working at age 86 in the CBC comedy web series “My 90 Year Old Roommate.” Earlier this year he won the Best Actor prize at the Canadian Screen Awards. Episodes are available via youtube.

    Paul Soles can be heard discussing his time as the web-slinger on the Comic Book Central podcast.

    http://comicbookcentral.libsyn.com/episode-90-paul-soles

    1. I remember Paul Soles in the 70s as one of the CBC’s stock go-to guys whenever they needed a host or a funny guy. He hosted an afternoon chit-chat magazine show called Take 30, along with Adrienne Clarkson, who ended up becoming the Governor General of Canada, the official Head of State.

      Soles also was on a CBC Panel show called This Is the Law. In funny, short films reminiscent of Buster Keaton or Chaplin, Soles would somehow demonstrate some archaic out of date offense from Canadian law, which always ended in him getting arrested. Then the panelists would have to guess what law he’d broken. One of the panelists was Hart Pomerantz, who produced many an 80s sitcom in Hollywood. Lorne Michaels may have been on it as well.

      1. Thanks so much for bringing up This is the Law. I’m hoping to hear back from Paul via his agent any day now about an interview, perhaps once convention season winds down. Could you recommend a Canadian publication that might like to host such an article? I’ve tried to dig into Paul’s extensive body of work, including the many goodies mentioned in these comments!

  2. Like most everyone, I watched this all the time as a kid. The goofiest part WAS the web-swinging, with Spidey either swinging off the sky with no building in sight (as in the extraplanetary stuff), or seeing a crime nearby as Peter (I remember a museum burglary particularly well) then swinging around town for about a minute before returning to it (the swinging used as a transformation vignette).

    Brian was a great guest!

  3. Thanks for the shout out Rob and Chris! I enjoyed listening to you all reminisce on the ’67 Spidey ‘toon. It’s sort of nice to know that DVD set is sought after since I grabbed it when it first came out. Also, I would love a CD full of stock Super Friends music and probably to Brian’s horror, a CD full of stock music from Sunbow cartoons (including Spidey and his Amazing Friends). Of course I also have Transformers nostalgia to account for that….https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNQGXrLdJfw…but it is also the same ‘Def Jam’ playing when Pete, Bobby Drake and Angelica Jones go to the ESU School Dances, too.

    1. I got the DVD set when it was first released too…thank goodness! Didn’t know about the Sunbow CD. I have enough of that music rummaging around in my head without listening to it again on CD, thanks! 😉

      Chris

  4. Fantastic episode!! Chris, you did a phenomenal job with all the edited clips!! And listening to you three made me realize I must not have seen many episodes of this cartoon. Growing up, SPIDER-MAN AND HIS AMAZING FRIENDS was my jam. And I watched the old VHS tapes of the old Marvel cartoons quite often. I’m also a fan of the 90s Spider-Man cartoon. My blind spot for this cartoon was surprising, but I loved hearing your discussions. Fascinating how they repurposed old episodes of other shows. Had no idea, but makes perfect sense from a business perspective. Again, great episode guys! Loved it!

  5. Thanks for the excellent episode, gentlemen. The whole time I was listening, I was trying to recall if my first exposure to Spider-Man was through syndicated runs of the 67 series, or through his live-action appearances on The Electric Company. Either way, your reminiscences brought back many fond memories.

    I also have to second Chris’ recommendation for the Spectacular Spider-Man animated series, which came out in 2008. In particular, I think the series did a great job of capturing the hard-luck aspect of Peter Parker’s life. Also, this is my daughter’s Spider-Man. We would watch this together every Saturday morning (along with Justice League Unlimited), when the series reran as part of the Vortexx block on The CW starting in 2013. She was crushed (as was I) when the entire Vortexx block went off the air in 2014. Even as recently as last week, she mentioned how much she still misses watching Spectacular Spider-Man.

    1. ^I wish we had brought up the Electric Company Spidey segments in this episode. I’d guess I was seeing those at the same time as the 67 cartoon. But of course those segments had no comic book villains, no Peter Parker…so basically, you met Spidey’s costume there, and that was about it!

      Spectacular Spider-Man was also my son Andrew’s favorite media version of the character, even though he watched DVDs of ’67 and the 90s toon. He still watched the complete box set often. It’s a great show! I can’t believe I temporarily forgot the name, especially with the theme song blaring so often in my house!

      chris

      1. One thing Electric Company Spider-Man had going for him is that he was the first super hero to costar with Morgan Freeman, who sometimes narrated or even appeared in those segments. In that regards, he beat Batman to the punch by several decades.

        Also, I now have the Spectacular Spider-Man theme song stuck in my head.

  6. Loved hearing this episode, and especially the multitude of sound clips from the cartoon. If anyone knows where this is being aired nowadays, or if a streaming service features it, I’d love to know.

    I confess to some surprise at your characterization of Bud Collyer as having such a deep voice. Perhaps it’s because my own voice is quite deep (not that anyone reading this could know that), but it’s never been the impression I’ve had of Collyer. While I’m well-versed in the Superman radio show, the later cartoons in which he voiced Superman represent a gap in my knowledge, which may explain some of it, but I *am* extremely familiar with Collyer as host of the original version of “To Tell The Truth,” which started in 1956 and which he hosted for the next 14 years. In it, Collyer’s natural speaking voice isn’t too different from his radio “Clark Kent” voice. Hardly the deep tones he uses for Superman.

  7. Mark, the episodes are up on YouTube right now. Not sure if they are up there legally, or if they will stay for long, but I think about all of them are out there now.

    So it sounds like Collyer’s “deep” voice was a “put on” as well, and not his natural voice. Outside of his Superman work, I’m not familiar with his work, despite being aware of his game-show hosting. As Brain pointed out, by the time he got around to the Filmation toons, it seemed that he’d been smoking quite a bit in the interim years. 🙂

    Chris

  8. I listened to both this and the Franklin family review of Homecoming in quick secession, so pardon me if my comments blur those two episodes.

    Spider-Man is another eternal concept within my conscious existence, and it’s highly probable Spider-Man ’67 contributed to that. I remember it coming on very early in the morning on local UHF, so it was a rare treat for when I managed to rise before the sun. It also ran in early afternoon syndication in the early ’80s, which is where I remember seeing it most. The earliest Spider-Man foes had cycled out of regular comic appearances by then, so that was likely my introduction to many of his original rogues. I learned the concept of “The Witching Hour” from one of those episodes, possibly one of the supernatural Green Goblin ones. I’ve always preferred Hobgoblin in the comics, possibly because he dabbled with magic where Norman Osborn was pure tech and insanity. I prefer the weirdness of a witchy Goblin. I dug the show, but because of access and greater contemporaneous relevance, I have stronger loyalties to the live action TV “movies” and the Marvel Animation series.

    If we’d stopped at the Adventures of Superman theme, we’d have never gotten the Williams’ iconic score, and I quite like Hans Zimmers as well. Ditto stopping with the Batman ’66 theme and never getting Elfman. I can’t remember the score from any of the Sony Spider-Man movies, and I certainly enjoyed hearing the orchestral take on Spidey ’67, but I still like the Amazing Friends score (and the Fox theme has its fans, I’m sure.) No need to draw a hard line on which theme gets played forevermore. It would be swell if they used the Electric Company theme to open the next movie (another seminal childhood exposure.)

    1. I agree Frank that composers shouldn’t stop writing new music for our heroes. We would have lost a lot of great music for sure. But I think if one particular theme is hugely popular and by consensus and becomes part of the character, don’t deny it. Just work it in somewhere, like Giachinno did here.

      Chris

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