Episode #7 - The Alien Costume, Part One
Original Airdate February 18, 1995

A space shuttle returning to earth carrying an untested new isotope crashes on The George Washington Bridge and is stolen by The Rhino. The isotope isn't the only alien substance on the bridge, a bizarre black goo bonds with Spider-Man, giving him a strange new costume, Spider-Man, determined to clear his name, goes after Rhino.

Credits
Story By: Stan Lee and Avi Arad
Written By: Len Wein , Meg McLaughlin, Stan Berkowitz and John Semper
Music Composed By: Shuki Levy and Kussa Mahchi
Animation Services By: Toyko Movie Shinsha (TMS)
Guest Starring: Christopher Daniel Barnes as Spider-Man/ Peter Parker, Ed Asner as J. Jonah Jameson, Linda Gary as Aunt May, Roscoe Lee Browne as The Kingpin, Maxwell Caulfield as Alistair Smythe, Michael Horton as John Jameson, Patrick Labyorteaux as Flash Thompson and Don Stark asRhino

Review: Defiantly one of the highlights of the series. Whilst some would say that this cartoon was guilty of jamming too much into an episode, this wasn't the case with the Alien Costume, as the entire 3 parts where executed flawlessly. Great pace, an excellent story and some of the best animation and dialouge this show ever saw, The Alien Costume is the dogs bollocks, of this there is no doubt.

This episode kicked it all off. In the comics, Venom was created over a longer period of time, Spider-Man encountered the alien costume that created him on another planet, teamed with a whole lot of hero's to fight a whole lot of villains, and returned to earth, only to have Reed Richards tell him it was actually alive, and Peter rejected it, and it later went onto become Venom, Spidey's most popular enemy.

As you can guess, all that was far too much to tell in 20 minutes. Here, the alien kept its same mysterious presence, but was brought to earth in a much more simple, and just plain better way. It also gave us an incredible shuttle crash on the Bridge.

Despite only being 3 episodes long, it had it'd fair share of subplots, and a lot of characters. Used to great effect, as he often was, was The Kingpin. Bringing him in also meant bringing in new villains, 2 of my favorites in this case. Up first was The Rhino, who played a part in another sub plot involving Eddie Brock, and also was the star of one of the series best fights scenes, namely, his fight with the 'new' fugitive Spidey, decked out in his bad ass black suit. After he gives up, I remember being comlpetly shocked as to what Spidey did next, back when I first watched it. As said above, this is where the brilliant dialouge came through

SPIDER-MAN: Who said anything about jail?
RHINO: I... I don't get it?
SPIDER-MAN: You will.It's like this... I'm through with not getting what I want!
RHINO: Wha.. what are you doing? I told ya... I give up!
SPIDER-MAN: That's funny. I give up too. I give up trying to be a friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man!

The opening shot of the new symbiote Spidey was especially memorable, as it was just damn cool. Waking up staring at yourself in a costume you've never seen before. Very creepy!

While part 1 wasn't as good as part 2, it still outshines most of the series, with its spectacular animation, great script, and exceptional voice work, especially Chris Barnes, who had a great sense of arrogance and fear while voicing symbiote Spidey.

And it had the most whoop ass ending you ever did see!

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