Still, Marvel liked the result enough that they immediately partnered up with the same studio, Grantray-Lawrence Animation, to create a Spider-Man cartoon with a higher budget ... but not that much higher, hence why they had to get rid of the webs on Spidey's torso. They simply couldn't afford to animate all of those extra lines (or, it seems, pay someone to make sure the spider logo had the correct number of legs).
Marvel Animation
The first season had Stan Lee as a story consultant, which is probably why the cartoon version of the Green Goblin is closer to Lee's nutty original conception of the character as an ancient demon found in a sarcophagus (artist Steve Ditko just ignored Lee's idea and drew him as a human in a suit). In the show, the Goblin is obsessed with black magic and summons demons to give him satanic powers, but they turn him down upon seeing Spider-Man whoop his ass. Another character whose motivation differs somewhat from the comics is the Rhino, a pure soul who simply wants to steal enough gold to make a golden statue of himself, but that Spider-Fascist won't let him.
Marvel Animation
Besides other classic villains like Dr. Octopus, Mysterio, Electro, and the Lizard, cartoon Spidey also fought all-new ones like Parafino the wax museum owner, Dr. Magneto (no relation), a giant robot of unexplained origin, a 15th-century conquistador, some aliens from Pluto, and a gang of diamond thieves in gorilla suits. Still, at this point, the show was relatively faithful to the source material. Every episode showed Peter Parker trying to fight crime while dealing with typical teenager problems and hiding his secret from his elderly aunt and his pictures-of-Spider-Man-obsessed boss.Â
Marvel Animation
The show was a hit, as was its instantly recognizable theme song -- pretty soon, the words "Spider-Man, Spider-Man, does whatever a spider can" began displacing "Na na na na na na na na na na na na na Batman" as the most iconic superhero lyrics ever. There was just one problem: they ran out of money. And that's when things got weird.Â