Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man - Amazing Fantasy

Set in one of the many spider-verse realities, the opening episode of Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man introduces us to incoming freshman Peter Parker (Hudson Thames) who gets bit by a radioactive spider from another dimension on his first day at high school. The episode is a mix of modern and throwback, giving Peter a nostalgic look while replacing the older supporting characters with slightly different choices. Speaking of different choices, the moment from Captain America: Civil War arrives, but its not Tony Stark talking to Aunt May (Kari Wahlgren) when he walks into the apartment but Norman Osborne (Colman Domingo) instead. Although Osborne is there with a legitmate internship offer (not asking for his helping in taking down Captain America). Yes, a different world indeed.

Honestly, yet another early Spider-Man cartoon wasn't my first choice (or even fifth) on the various stories Marvel could explore from the spider-verse. Also, I'm not that big of a fan of Peter's first Spidey suit both in form and function (really, leaving your fingerprints all over town Parker?). That said, "Absolute Fantasy" is fun shaking things up a bit with the choice of Osborne for a mentor and Nico Minoru (Grace Song) as Peter's best-friend. While the show has some throwback feel, the episode also makes use of social media and with no newspaper editor currently out to tarnish his reputation, it seem like this Spider-Man is pretty well liked in the community. We'll see how long that lasts.

Aside from Peter, May, Nico, and Osborne, the other characters introduced in the episode are Harry Osborne (Zeno Robinson) who Spidey saves, and high school senior Pearl Pangan (Cathy Ang) as Peter's longtime crush who appears in the first episode mostly to put Peter and her boyfriend Lonnie Lincoln (Eugene Byrd). And we also get Doctor Strange (Robin Atkin Downes) and the monster he chased through a portal setting up Peter's spider-bite and changing the course of his life forever.

• Title: Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man - Amazing Fantasy
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