The Amazing Spider-Man (1977 TV Pilot)

 "Maybe I wanna ask him where he buys his webs?"

I was expecting something corny and silly when I decided to watch the 1977 TV pilot with Nicholas Hammond; something not necessarily very good but fun to point and laugh at. I mean, look at the '70s hair and bell bottoms, right?

Except... this is actually a pretty solid, wll-written TV pilot with a strong script, impressively directed and with particularly impressive use of incidental music. Nicholas Hammond is a pretty good Peter Parker and, while the performances are a little kids' TV, I'm rather impressed with this.

Not that this is The Sopranos, of course, or that it necessarily aspires to be anything more than a bit of action and adventure. But the script is pacy and well- structured, with exposition nicely integrated into the action throughout and that familiar origin nicely, and quickly, done, with a glowing radioactive spider allowed to wander off and bite whomever else it so wishes.

We have Jonah, Robbie Robertson and Aunt May, although May and Peter's house is perhaps a little too large for a supposedly poor family. Spidey's wisecracking may be absent here, but the costume is good and Spidey's powers made to look cool. Hammond's Peter is endearingly dorky. He seems to get a love interest, Judy, so presumably no Mary Jane or Gwen Stacy. There's a comedy police detective, too, who works surprisingly well.

There are no supervillains, as such, as usul with 70s superhero adaptations, although one can see the argument that supervillains tend not to look good on screen. Yet the baddie we have here- a kind of evil mindfulness counsellor with the most 70s suit of all time- is pretty cool, using his 70s computer and hypnotised 70s martial arts people to hypnotise upstanding members of society into robbing banks. It's a solid, fascinatig plot, well-structured and exciting to watch.

This is far from the silly bit of low camp I was expecting, and certainly far better than that silly 60s cartoon. I'm impressed, and may blog the series at some point. This is good stuff.