They once made a whole Spider-Man show about the villain of Guardians 3, man

When you start looking at him, the High Evolutionary, the awkwardly named villain of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, is a kind of fungus: all sorts of places you’d never expect. A creation of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, High Evolutionary is about as old as the Marvel Universe, and a surprising number of creators have told stories featuring the infamously convoluted hero. This includes animation, as one of High Evolutionary’s most prominent pre-Guardians appearances was in an almost forgotten, completely bonkers Spider-Man cartoon.

This was a show that turned the supervillain Electro into a walking eel, reinvented the Green Goblin as a hero with an accent I’d describe as “Mexican Dracula” (read: I can’t decide if it’s ridiculous or offensive or both) , and ends with a cliffhanger so abrupt you’ll think the power has gone out. This was Spider Man Unlimited.

Spider Man Unlimited was intended as a sequel to the beloved 1994-1998 animated series, a mainstay of the animated superhero boom heralded by Batman: The Animated Series And X-Men. A big part of the success of these shows was their ability to tell complex, all-ages stories that stayed true to the spirit of their source material despite harsh censorship and a tough production environment. Spider Man Unlimited was different.

A loose sequel to its predecessor, the series began with Spider-Man leaving Earth to pursue Venom and Carnage, only to find themselves stranded with them on Counter-Earth, a bizarre world where the High Evolutionary’s genetic experiments led to a human race. animal hybrids called Bestials that serve him. Humans largely live in the slums or join the resistance against the High Evolutionary – including Spidey, in a high-tech suit designed for maximum toy potential. Over 13 episodes, Y2K Spider-Man balanced his roles as a resistance fighter, regular superhero and citizen of Counter-Earth, fighting bestial versions of his villains and all-new characters, and tracking down Venom and Carnage.

I’m not going to lie to you and say Spider Man Unlimited was a hidden gem. Narratively it was boring, with flat characters, nonsensical villains and wafer-thin plots. It was, however foreign. The show didn’t necessarily look great in action – scenes were inventively staged at times but shockingly edited – but the art direction? That was good shit. The opposite of Spider Man Unlimited was rendered in inky and dingy colors, while the New York in which it is set was given a cyberpunk makeover. The Bestials were a weird throwback to 1999, harking back to the “animals with ‘tude'” trend of slightly older shows like Biker mice from Mars or SWAT Kats who in turn were chased Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtlessucks.

Or Unlimited looking “better” than its predecessor is a matter of preference – both were projects commissioned primarily by executives who wanted them made quickly and cheaply – and some of the design decisions were downright baffling. Venom and Carnage, for instance, are barely recognizable, a pair of hideously wacky troll figures made of goo. It’s hard to take them, or the show they’re on, seriously.

In every other aspect it lacks ambition Unlimited which is in stark contrast to Spider-Man, with its bombastic score, ambitious serialized storytelling and spirited retelling of the character’s greatest hits. When I look at it more than 20 years later, Spider Man Unlimited remains a disjointed grab bag of vaguely Spidey-themed iconography and 90s sci-fi cartoons.

In a now-deleted blog that can still be read through the Internet Archive, Spider Man Unlimited producer Will Meugniot briefly describes the constantly changing circumstances that led to the show’s creation. The first was money: According to Meugniot, Fox (which aired the show) and Marvel had to keep producing new Spider-Man shows to keep the previous show on the air, and continuing the hit ’90s series was too expensive for executives to consider .

This meant that the first version of Unlimited was a straight edit of the first 26 issues of The awesome Spider-Mana faithful retelling (something that, loved as it was, Spider-Man was not) done “cheaply” to keep the Spidey brand in house. Then, Meugniot writes, the deal to make what would become Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man was smitten with Sony, preventing Fox and Marvel from making a show about the primary version of Spider-Man or his cast of characters. That left Meugniot with a random assortment of Marvel characters to use, and the final result was Spider Man Unlimited.

In the end it was all for nothing: like much children’s entertainment at the turn of the century, Spider Man Unlimited was canceled before it could complete its first season because it wasn’t as wild a success as pokemon. The curious can watch all 13 completed episodes on Disney Plus, which is almost certainly more than anyone saw in 1999. Again, that’s not a recommendation. Everyone gave their best, but sometimes the bad guy has the right idea – and if the High Evolutionary is known for anything, it’s scraping everything and starting over.