After having watched every preview clip and read every extensive review that had been released before the debut, I was fully expecting a well-produced show for kids that was watchable, if a little muddled. I was surprised to see that it actually fell well below these expectations. So far, this show is a mess.
USM is the end result of multiple writers and producers all with completely different ideas and approaches aiming towards a single target from multiple angles and trajectories, all expecting to hit it simultaneously. Has that kind of approach ever worked well for anything? Because I'm not sure why they were expecting it to work for Spider-Man. You can feel the committee-driven production process as it drifts deftly from mostly unfunny comedy to unconvincing drama. It tries to be Teen Titans and Brave and the Bold, but completely ignores the fact that those shows took very stringent approaches to get their intended comedic effect. If anyone ever questioned why those shows did things like disregarding civilian identities altogether, USM provides the answer.
There were attempts at depth, but the series just can't stay grounded enough for it to work, leading to the "show, don't tell" issue that others have brought up. That was a huge problem with Aunt May in particular. Maybe that kind of thing will improve later, but the serious elements feel more like afterthoughts that they just couldn't bear to leave behind at the conceptual stage. Maybe I wouldn't have minded seeing Norman Osborn and Flash Thompson stripped of all their depth if the show had been a straight comedy, but the end result we get with them is really a let down.
The art style is really... bland. It's more detailed than TSSM's designs, but the actual quality of the designs is a mixed bag. As with that show, most of the quality we see is in Spider-Man's design and the villains he fights. The characters are quite unexpressive, which I found to be very noticeable with Peter when he was out of the mask. The backgrounds look pretty good. They stand out the most.
They say this show is focused almost exclusively on kids, but I sense that it wasn't the intention and the final product just kind of turned out that way. I suspect that a lot of things in this show didn't turn out the way they wanted. They clearly wanted to make a show that was distinct from the 90s cartoon and Spectacular, but as a result they created something that will alienate a huge chunk of Spider-Man's periphery demographic. (Those fanbases are more similar than they'd like to admit, as they're both mainly composed of men in their 20s and 30s.) I will watch a couple more episodes, mainly because I'm very interested in seeing how the show holds up with Paul Dini isn't writing it, but I doubt I'll be sticking around much longer.
