Review of ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN from someone who expected to hate it

I'll start off by giving a little background to my preferences. I LOVED Spectacular Spider-man. To me, it is the de facto Spider-man cartoon and possibly the best one there will ever be. Complain about it's character designs (yes, character designs, not animation) all you want, but it's heavy focus on character development and intriguing storytelling put it a major step above the 90's cartoon (which I grew up with but found melodramatic and even a bit boring at times).

When Spectacular was canceled, I was heart broken. When I found out it was canceled simply to be replaced (and not for something like low ratings), I was disgusted. When I found out the new cartoon was going to heavily focus on teaming Spider-man up with other heroes, I lost all hope. Sure, I enjoy the occasional team-up, but I want a Spider-man cartoon, not a Spider-man and friends cartoon. Needless to say, I went into Ultimate Spider-man with very low hopes.

Now that I've watched the first 2 episodes, I have to say I don't hate it AS MUCH as I thought I would. Because I could ramble on forever in huge paragraphs, I'm going to break down the key aspects of the show below.

CHARACTER DESIGNS: Yes, I do think the character designs are a step up from Spectacular. Some of the scenes are just really pleasant to look at. I loved when Spidey was on his way to the SHIELD helipad at night. It just looked fantastic.

ANIMATION: The animation was okay. Nothing special. The beauty of Spectacular's less than stunning character designs was that it allowed for really amazing animation. Ultimate's was okay, but not quite as satisfying.

CUT SCENES: Sometimes I felt like I was watching a mixture of Scrubs, Lizzie McGuire, and Saved by the Bell. I was okay with Peter Parker's John-Dorian-like daydreams and even found a couple of them amusing. However I wasn't a huge fan of the Lizzie McGuire-ish cartoons of Peter's thoughts, too kiddy for my taste. I could do with or without the Zack Morris style freeze frame commentary too, but I can deal with it.

CHARACTERS: This is where the show let me down a bit. I wish they had gone with Gwen Stacy as opposed to Mary Jane as Peter's best female friend. I really missed the sexy mysterious MJ from Spectacular. I'm also not a fan of the new Aunt May. Although her active lifestyle does provide a good excuse for Peter coming and going so much unnoticed, I just prefer the frailer Aunt May from Spectacular. Curt Conners being a part of SHIELD? Not a fan of that either. Prefer him as Peter's mentor/professor. The one change I did like was Harry Osbourne being well liked and popular, I always wondered how a kid that rich wouldn't be in Spectacular.

TEAM-UPS: This is where the show really let me down. I don't hate it as much as I thought I would, but I still hate it. I don't like Spidey being a part of a team of heroes (and from the looks of the upcoming episode descriptions, the show will mostly be team focused) and I hate that they're even at his school now. The beauty of Spectacular was that Peter's secret weighed heavily on him because nobody else knew, with all these people to confide in now I see this being less of an issue in Ultimate. I also see less time being spent going into Peter's personal life among his friends. It already seems like it's only going to be mainly MJ and Harry, where as in Spectacular we got to know a lot of different students, which I really enjoyed.

THE TECH: Even though it was written somewhat nicely into the series, I still hate the tech. Spidey doesn't need a motorcycle and I don't want him to have one. Just came off as a toy commercial to me during those scenes.

OVERALL: Overall, the series was a bit better than I expected. But keep in mind I had incredibly low expectations going in. Character design is great, animation is okay. I could do without the kiddy cut scenes and tech, and although I don't mind SHIELD being present in the series I wish it wasn't so prominent so we could get more into Peter Parker's life as a normal kid and solo super-hero. I will probably continue to watch the show, but if I could bring Spectacular back, I'd do it in a heartbeat. I don't see Ultimate reaching the same level in it's current direction.