Ultimate Spider-Man S02E15-16 Review: Excelsior

Ultimate Spider-Man, Season 2, Episodes 15-16

Episode 15: Stan By Me

This was actually an episode that was shown to me November 2018 a couple of days after the unfortunate passing of Stan Lee. And it's... it's a simple, guest star episode that's vaguely tied into a recurring villain, the Lizard. Spider-Man finds himself trapped in a school alongside MJ, Harry and Stan the Janitor as some monster (later revealed to be the Lizard) is crawling around and abducting people. The story is relatively simple, a combination of generic superhero fighting, a "I know you're still in there!" sequence with Connors/Lizard and a not-actually-scary horror segment where the Lizard slowly picks off members of Spider-Man's group.

Of course, Stan Lee turns out to not only just be an awesome janitor with verbose alliteration (as Stan himself is wont to do in his work), but his broom-fu also includes sci-fi weapons as part of his broom. We do sort of end in a bit of a downer ending as the Lizard apparently wipes out all vestiges of Curt Connors from his mind, but honestly the main and most important parts of this episode is just seeing Stan Lee beat a giant reptile monster with a broom, while stressing to Peter that he should accept help from his team, even if it's not his usual one.

In a particularly charming bit, as Stan the Janitor reveals that he's actually one of SHIELD's founding members, he notes how everyone needs buddies to help out before greeting an off-screen Steve Ditko. Aww.

Anyway, definitely a very, very charming episode. I can't really say much negativity when Stan's just such a huge, charming part of this story! Excelsior, Stan. We miss you.
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Episode 16: Ultimate Deadpool

One of the biggest and rightfully-noted criticisms and comparisons to Ultimate Spider-Man as a show is that "why isn't this Deadpool?" And... and you know what? Those criticisms are absolutely right. I don't particularly hate the fourth-wall-breaking random cutaway scenes, especially in the second season where they seem to have a better grasp of comedic timing (it's not perfect, but definitely better than the first season), but it's definitely something that works better on a character like Deadpool. Spider-Man's a wise-cracker, sure, but the wacky fourth-wall breaking rambling is definitely Deadpool's forte. 

So a crossover seems inevitable. Ah, the world of the cartoons, where crossover between different IP's just requires some handwaving, and we don't need to go through all the "who has the film distribution rights" nonsense. Sure, the Deadpool has to go through some tricks to make sure that some of the black comedy elements get through the censors -- like never showing blades or swords actually stabbing Deadpool's body. Deadpool himself even makes a couple of jokes on censorship, apparently having a mental tic where he has to say "un-alive" instead of "kill"... a word that is decidedly not censored in this show, as Spider-Man points out. 

Ultimately, the episode itself is fine. It's a different sort of charming than the Stan Lee episode, but it's definitely one of the weirdest and funniest. Deadpool comparing himself to Spider-Man, with this incarnation apparently being his predecessor as part of SHIELD's superhero program, is interesting, a far more light-hearted sort of 'evil counterpart'. The two of them get into some fun hijinks as Deadpool  threatens to un-alive Taskmaster's school of villains, or Deadpool just dicks around and destroys Spider-Man's shuttle or whatever. Except that unlike villains like Zodiac or Taskmaster, Deadpool isn't disillusioned with Nick Fury's manipulation or anything -- he just self-admits to being a dick, basically. 

Ultimately the episode doesn't really take itself super-seriously, and thanks to the tone, the fourth-wall breaking moments work a lot better. It's an episode that does 'zany' well, a lot more fun to sit through than all of Ultimate Spider-Man's previous attempts at 'zany'. (RE: all the Loki episodes). It's not a masterpiece by any means, and a Deadpool that isn't R-rated will always feel odd, but it's definitely a fun episode.