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New Spider-Man cartoon: Ultimate Spider-Man

The watch seems like a normal thing when you have flying aircraft carrier and a man in a high tech piece of armor.
 
I'm wondering if the watch gets in the way of the webshooter on that wrist. It's pretty big and could easily cover up the nozzle if it shifted.
 
Maybe it's not a stealth watch, but something that actually phases in and out of existence.
 
I think the only reason they are using a black Fury is because of the Avengers and Iron Man movies.
 
I think the only reason they are using a black Fury is because of the Avengers and Iron Man movies.

As the series name suggests, this is the Spider-man from the Ultimate universe, wherein Nick Fury is black. So your thing could be one of the reasons, but certainly not the only one.
 
I think the only reason they are using a black Fury is because of the Avengers and Iron Man movies.

No, I think it's because the Marvel Universe was created in the '60s and therefore has an unfortunate lack of ethnic diversity in its core characters, so modern adaptations take what opportunities they can to correct that problem. For instance, The Spectacular Spider-Man turned Ned Leeds into the Asian Ned Lee, made Liz Allan Hispanic, made Fancy Dan and Dr. Bromwell black, turned Tombstone into a primary villain, etc. Similarly, Smallville made Pete Ross black, Tim Burton's Batman made Harvey Dent black, Justice League made John Stewart their Green Lantern rather than Hal Jordan, etc.

Heck, that's no doubt part of the reason the Ultimate comics chose to base Fury on Samuel L. Jackson in the first place, as well as making Janet Van Dyne Asian. It was a modernized reinvention of the Marvel Universe, so in addition to updating character origins to something less hokey than "It was radiation" and changing Galactus into an alien swarm rather than a big guy with a silly hat and a G on his chest, they also updated their "casting" to be more inclusive. And since the Marvel movies and TV shows are also new adaptations made with modern sensibilities in mind, they've made a lot of the same choices as the Ultimate Universe, or blended elements from both the original and Ultimate continuities.
 
A bit surprising to see Josh Keaton returning as Spidey in a different continuity (I assume) from Spectacular, but a pleasant surprise. I guess it fits with Marvel's tendency to keep an actor associated with a role across multiple series and video games; Alex Desert has also played Nick Fury in Wolverine and the X-Men and The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes. (Leading me to wonder if USM might be in the same continuity as those.) And Keaton will be playing Peter/Spidey in an upcoming video game, opposite Christopher Daniel Barnes (the '90s animated Spidey) as Spider-Man 2099.
 
^ It's not been confirmed but I believe that it's supposed to be it's own continuity and entity. There was mention that Spider-Man would appear on Avengers eventually though. Not sure if that is still the plan.
 
Too bad that didn't set it the same Universe as the Avengers EMH,Then they could have crossovers and also set up a Fantastic Four and other Marvel animated series in this same shared Universe.
 
Future Foundation tie-in? They need Jonathon Hickman as a consultant for any live action or animated FF project.
 
Some new tid bits from the Jeph Loep Marvel Animation Panel:

-Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, and Hulk show up
-Drake Bell is the voice of Spider-Man
-Chi McBride voices Nick Fury
-Clark Gregg reprises Agent Coulson for this show and will also be posing as Peter's high school Principal
-J.K. Simmons as mentioned before will be JJJ
-They showed Spidey fighting Venom
-Steven Weber voices Norman
 
Drake Bell, huh? If I recall correctly, I just saw him playing a grown-up Timmy Turner in the live-action Fairly Oddparents movie Nickelodeon just did. I thought he was okay, but not great; his vocal performance was a little bit bland. But maybe in animation he'll put more life into it. I gather he's a singer, so he should be able to use his voice expressively. Still, Josh Keaton's Spidey is a hard act to follow. (And an interesting coincidence, Steven Weber played the villain in that Oddparents movie, so that'll be twice he's played an evil industrialist nemesis to Bell's hero character.)

It's cool that Agent Coulson is getting a life outside of movies; that's the first step toward pulling a Harley Quinn (or a Renee Montoya, or, heck, a Jimmy Olsen) and getting added to the comics. But it's a bit weird that the breakout character of the Marvel Studios movie universe is appearing in a version of Spider-Man, a character that Marvel Studios can't make movies about because Sony has the rights. Sure, I know that Sony sold the TV rights for Spidey back to Marvel (which is the whole reason Spectacular was cancelled and we're getting this instead, which I'd be a lot angrier about if it hadn't led to Greg Weisman getting a gig on Young Justice), but it still seems weird.

Although it would be interesting if this show were kept consistent with the Marvel Studios movieverse (or the Avengers movieverse, I guess you could call it). Maybe this could be the version of Spidey that exists in that universe, as distinct from the version that exists in the Raimi films' universe and the one that exists in the upcoming film's universe. But I doubt that'll happen. Keeping a TV series consistent with an ongoing film series, let alone multiple film series from different directors, would be a logistical nightmare. More likely it'll be in its own continuity that just kinda sorta resembles the movies but won't be honored by them (like the way the CGI Spidey series purported to follow the continuity of the first Raimi movie but was contradicted by the second movie).
 
Yeah, you'd think if they were going to incorporate Coulson into a TV show, it would be Earth's Mightiest Heroes.
 
http://comicbookmovie.com/fansites/joshw24/news/?a=42683

Loeb then played a sizzle for "USM," with behind-the-scenes footage featuring some of the show's talent. Stan Lee came up first, grinning "Spider-Man!" The first bit of animation was a split screen of MJ splitting carrots while Spidey fights off bad guys, talking on the phone. Following some action, Peter is shown sewing his costume, looking to the camera and saying, "What?" Spidey fights Venom, and there were several comic-esque visual effects

Stan Lee plays Stan the Janitor and will have a recurring role.
 
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