Edshugeo The GodMoor

Yes! The Japanese Spiderman. This series aired in 1978 around the same time as the American Spiderman TV series if I remember correctly. Not exactly a work of art, the show was infinitely more entertaining than it's U.S. counterpart, and I say this only having seen two episodes; the first and one that appeared to be the last. I'd seen a bunch of the version that aired on CBS and that was pure crap. The Japanese Spiderman at least looked like the comicbook character, though that's where the similarities ended. This show neither resembled the original comics nor the ones produced in Japan by Ryuichi Ikegami (better known for Crying Freeman and Sanctuary) for a short while.
The show gives him an origin that seems to based on The Mighty Thor (another Marvel comic from the early 60's), more than Spiderman. There are aliens from space, he finds some weird object in a cave and soon finds he has the ability to become Spiderman. From there it's all Power Ranger stuff. He fights a bunch of goons (all dressed the same), a guy comes out in a ridiculous rubber monster suit and when he has trouble with Spidey, the monster grows to about 50-60 feet. Spiderman knows it's time to bring out the big guns and summons his SpiderMachine, a Nascar type race car, which flies him to his Tranformer robot. From inside the robot, Spidey whips out this huge sword and kills the monster. With some variation, this is what happens with all these types of shows, except most Japanese superhero shows are team (Sentai) shows. There may be a little more to the plot, but I don't speak enough Japanese to know any better. Still, it's cooler than it sounds cuz it's Spiderman. I found this story via Anime News Service. Click here and scroll to the bottom for a Realplayer interview with Stan Lee about his impressions about the show... He seems to be reading from notes, towards the end.

Labels: Awesome, comics, DVD, fun, japanese