Spider-Man pulls out the bologna in the third episode of the '70s TV show.
Spider-Man co-creator Stan Lee is on record as saying he disliked the live action TV series from the '70s, partially because it took the humor out of the character. That humor was evident in the TV movie that started the series and, to a lesser degree, the first two episodes of the series, but as of the third episode I can start to see what Lee meant. It seems CBS was rapidly sapping the humor out of the show in a bid to draw in adult viewers - because adults don't like humor, apparently. After watching the TV movie and the preceding episodes, The Curse of Rava is jarringly dour from the moment it begins.
The odd story crafted by Robert Janes and Dick Nelson involves the exhibition of a statue of Rava, the Kalistani god of death, at Bolt Museum. Spider-Man's alter ego, Daily Bugle newspaper photographer Peter Parker (Nicholas Hammond) is quite aware of this exhibit, because the paper's editor-in-chief J. Jonah Jameson (Robert F. Simon) is Chairman of the Board of Trustees at the museum and Jameson's wife is a major investor in it, so Jameson is adamant that the exhibit open on schedule despite the protests by Kalistanis and Rava followers who believe it's disrespectful to their god.
Leading the charge in this anti-Bolt Museum crusade is a Rava worshipper named Mandak (Theodore Bikel), who uses telekinetic powers to make people believe that Rava has cursed the place. He sends objects flying around a room and smashing through glass displays, he makes parts of the building crumble, he causes the half-ton statue itself to fall over and crush someone. When he's unhappy that series regular Captain Barbera (Michael Pataki) of the NYPD won't let him take the statue back to Kalistan, he sends the man's own car after him.
With the help of fellow college student Trina Pandit (Adrienne Larussa), who is of Kalistani heritage and catches the unwanted attention of Mandak, Peter learns that the Rava cult were the fiercest warriors in Kalistan, the members believing that death in battle was the way to a place of honor in the afterlife. The high priests of Rava used to rule Kalistan, until the cult was overthrown around seventy years earlier. This is the first time the Kalistan government has allowed the statue of Rava to leave their country, and if the current high priest can get his hands on it and take it back to Kalistan he'll be able to declare a civil war and attempt to regain control of the country.
So that's quite a scenario for Spider-Man to have to keep from playing out, but the Spider-Man scenes in this episode aren't particularly impressive. His biggest on screen accomplishment is when he saves Barbera from getting smooshed between his car and a dumpster. Barbera is thankful that he didn't become a Barbera sandwich, and Spidey quips that he pulled out the bologna. That's pretty much the highlight of the hour.
Directed by Michael Caffey, The Curse of Rava is a very low-key chapter in the TV Spider-Man saga. It moves along quickly enough to be a decent watch, but it's sure not something that will get you hyped about Spider-Man. He's one of the greatest superheroes we've got, but you couldn't tell it from watching this.
I didn't watch this show when I was a kid, I first watched it around 2016-2018, during my early twenties and I was pleasantly surprised with it.
ReplyDeleteOf course, I prefer the first season a bit more over the second one. The removal of Captain Barbera and the toning down of Jameson kinda hurt the second season a bit for me, but I still enjoyed it nevertheless. I feel like Michael Pataki was just an overall joy as the irascible Captain Barbera, and Robert F. Simon was pretty much perfect as Jameson in the first season. His tirades and constant disappointment towards Peter made for some really enjoyable moments (and of course they throw a few dismissive comments towards Spider-Man for him to give a few times, which they completely did away with in the second season).
Also, I know there are no comic book villains here, but just like in the 50's Superman and the 70's Hulk shows, although they used standard down-to-earth villains, they picked wonderful, extremely dependable actors to play them (you give a villain role to the likes of Theodore Bikel, Geoffrey Lewis, Robert Alda, Lloyd Bochner, Dick Erdman, Nicolas Coster, Andrew Robinson, William Smithers and Nicolas Coster and you'll never be disappointed, because they'll always deliver the goods).
So yeah, I didn't expect much from this show before I watched it, because all I heard was that the only good part was Nicholas Hammond's Peter, and even though he is pretty much perfect in the role of Peter (I honestly like him way more than the other live-action versions of the character), there's a lot more in this show that really made me enjoy it.