Spider-Man: Maximum Venom is coming to Disney XD on April 19, and we’ve got some things to say about the premiere episode.
Call me a Spider-Man-aholic. Going on almost two decades of loving different iterations of Marvel’s most popular superhero, I’ve seen the web-slinger evolve in so many different ways. Through 3 different live-action versions of the character from Sony and the Marvel Cinematic Universe, all the video games that have either accompanied them or stood on their own, and a new wave of animated series, it’s clear that nearly everybody on the planet knows about Peter Parker and his sticky alter-ego.
All that being said, one of the newest shows centered around Spider-Man has a new season about to start, and I was lucky enough to enjoy the first episode before its upcoming TV premiere!
Marvel’s Spider-Man: Maximum Venom, which premiered on Disney XD in 2017, really takes the story of Peter Parker’s high school experience and amps it up to new levels of crazy. His adventures working his way through Horizon High (a magnet school for science geniuses) and fighting classic comic villains either solo or with the Avengers is unlike any iteration we’ve seen before.
The animation is fresh, the quips are non-stop, and all the favorite comics heroes make their mark. The first episode of the show’s third season, entitled Maximum Venom, continues our young hero’s story a little something like this.
WARNING: Major spoilers are ahead, the episode will premiere on Sunday for anybody who wants to be surprised!
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Maximum Venom Promises Maximum Fun
Before you dive in, here’s a quick video recap of the symbiote storyline of Marvel’s Spider-Man through its first 2 seasons, which will play heavily into the double-length premiere episode:
The high school that Peter attends, Horizon High, is so much more advanced than any of his schools shown before, with an entire project graveyard and a new hard light hologram training room. The holograms let Spider-Man (Robbie Draymond) train against some of his classic villains from both the comics and the movies: including Vulture, Electro, Sandman, and Venom. I love how much of the comics and movie history the team behind the show throws into this series, making it not only an exciting adventure for the kids, but a fun look back into the long and storied Spider-Man legend that adult fans love so much.
Peter’s relationship with his school headmaster Max Modell (Fred Tatasciore) is on full display in the episode, as Modell shows his progress on the B-252 Venom symbiote. Modell created a new version of it that isn’t alive, but seems to be completely controllable. As we’ve learned through this very show and the live-action performances provided by Topher Grace (Spider-Man 3) and Tom Hardy (Venom), this is still an incredibly dangerous idea, but Modell asks Peter to be his assistant on the project to see it through.
We only get little bit of Peter’s home life with Aunt May (Nancy Linari) in the extended episode, although their dynamic provides a couple of my favorite moments. As May laments Peter’s lack of a real social life outside his schoolwork, she mentions that the niece of Anna Watson has just moved in next door – hopefully paving the way for Peter’s classic comic book love interest, Mary Jane Watson, to make her debut.
Secondly, the Parker household looks eerily similar to the house from Sam Raimi’s original Spider-Man trilogy, a fun tribute to the first ever live-action movie for the web-slinger. (Sidenote: this was the first superhero movie I ever saw and still sticks with me to this day, pun absolutely intended.)
Modell also asks Peter to give a school tour to a new student named Grady Scraps (Scott Menville), another wiz-kid who seems to have problems making friends and experience making trouble. He’s the typical awkward nerd, but he and Peter seem to hit it off pretty well with their love of the Avengers. Their fight to take down the “Technovore” (a great name for a tech-eating robot) is also a lot of fun.
Check out the rest of our thoughts on Spider-Man: Maximum Venom by clicking on page 2:
