Ultimate Spider-Man "Why I Hate Gym" Talkback (Spoilers)

[SpaceWay2008]

Agreed. I don't think this show will focus on the romance aspect. They are more likely to focus on the action for the kids, unfortunately.

 

[macattack]

Agreed. I don't think this show will focus on the romance aspect. They are more likely to focus on the action for the kids, unfortunately.

You're wrong. They're not focusing on action for the kids. "Kids" is a gender-neutral term. They're focusing on the action for the boys​. That's why there aren't many female characters in the series, either. White Tiger is the token girl on an otherwise all-boys team. Yeah there's Aunt May and Mary Jane but removing them is tantamount to heresy, though this show has minimized both of those characters to different degrees. Finally Thundara had the least amount of screentime and dialogue of the Frightful Four, even if you count Trapster.

I think that boys can appreciate romance and female characters. SSM had plenty of it going on with Liz, MJ, and Gwen. 90's Spider-Man had Peter flirting with Felicia and MJ and he even married the latter (well, a clone MJ but you get the point ). I am curious why people believe boys are turned off by romance and female characters. There's not really any evidence of that.

 

[JTMarsh]

You're wrong. They're not focusing on action for the kids. "Kids" is a gender-neutral term. They're focusing on the action for the boys​. That's why there aren't many female characters in the series, either. White Tiger is the token girl on an otherwise all-boys team. Yeah there's Aunt May and Mary Jane but removing them is tantamount to heresy, though this show has minimized both of those characters to different degrees. Finally Thundara had the least amount of screentime and dialogue of the Frightful Four, even if you count Trapster.

I think that boys can appreciate romance and female characters. SSM had plenty of it going on with Liz, MJ, and Gwen. 90's Spider-Man had Peter flirting with Felicia and MJ and he even married the latter (well, a clone MJ but you get the point ). I am curious why people believe boys are turned off by romance and female characters. There's not really any evidence of that.

There's a long standing stereotype that boys just aren't into romantic subplots and what not, whether because it's considered "unmanly" or "girly" or whatever. You know how it is, old stereotypes die hard.

 

[SpaceWay2008]

You're wrong. They're not focusing on action for the kids. "Kids" is a gender-neutral term. They're focusing on the action for the boys​. That's why there aren't many female characters in the series, either. White Tiger is the token girl on an otherwise all-boys team. Yeah there's Aunt May and Mary Jane but removing them is tantamount to heresy, though this show has minimized both of those characters to different degrees. Finally Thundara had the least amount of screentime and dialogue of the Frightful Four, even if you count Trapster.

I think that boys can appreciate romance and female characters. SSM had plenty of it going on with Liz, MJ, and Gwen. 90's Spider-Man had Peter flirting with Felicia and MJ and he even married the latter (well, a clone MJ but you get the point ). I am curious why people believe boys are turned off by romance and female characters. There's not really any evidence of that.

I stand corrected.

 

[macattack]

There's a long standing stereotype that boys just aren't into romantic subplots and what not, whether because it's considered "unmanly" or "girly" or whatever. You know how it is, old stereotypes die hard.

It's a stereotype that doesn't really exist anymore, like those giant lockers Flash has gotten stuck in. Has anyone involved in USM actually been in a modern high school lately? Plus you can't openly physically bully people inside the school building anymore in most places, most physical bullying happens outside the school now. The most common bullying though is through words, pranks, or online which all are far less obvious than trying to shove a kid into a locker or something. Flash's bullying in SSM, while not going into the online aspect, is far more realistic than his bullying has been in USM so far.

When I was in the target demographic, while I admit that I wasn't the biggest fan of romance I wasn't against it either. I wanted Tai/Sora to get together in Digimon and Peter/Felicia in the 90's Spider-man for example. However, the stereotype that boys hate romance was still prevalent when those shows came out, that meant in order to be "cool" boys had to act like they hate it, from what I can remember from my grade school conversations over those shows (which isn't a helluva lot).

Boys hang around with girls a lot more these days. Back when I was a kid in the 90's, a boy could still get in a ton of trouble from his peers if he hung around with girls. Nowadays not so much. So I think boys like or at least are more open to female characters now than they ever have been but the current generation of cartoon creators don't seem to get that with some exceptions.

I stand corrected.

I hope I didn't sound super harsh, I was in a bit of a mood when I wrote that.

 

[Rick Jones]

It's a stereotype that doesn't really exist anymore, like those giant lockers Flash has gotten stuck in. Has anyone involved in USM actually been in a modern high school lately? Plus you can't openly physically bully people inside the school building anymore in most places, most physical bullying happens outside the school now. The most common bullying though is through words, pranks, or online which all are far less obvious than trying to shove a kid into a locker or something. Flash's bullying in SSM, while not going into the online aspect, is far more realistic than his bullying has been in USM so far.

I always thought locker stuffing seemed pretty antiquated and stereotypical of tv bullying but personally it doesn't really seem any less plausible than openly tossing water balloons out of a third story classroom window during a lunch period.

 

[macattack]

I always thought locker stuffing seemed pretty antiquated and stereotypical of tv bullying but personally it doesn't really seem any less plausible than openly tossing water balloons out of a third story classroom window during a lunch period.

It is a lot harder to be caught throwing water balloons. Water evaporates after a while, and water balloons have nowhere near the physical threat that locker stuffing has. Locker stuffing is true physical violence while water balloons can be argued or justified as a prank. Locker stuffing will also leave witnesses everywhere and takes a significant amount of time, while you can throw a water balloon and run away really damn fast, allowing you to go "Who? Me?" because you're confronted in an entirely different area than where the water balloon incident happened.

Yes, I have thought a lot about bullying. I want to professionally write YA novels. Considering realistic bullying comes with the territory. Water balloons, naturally, aren't much more realistic but that act holds more water than locker stuffing.

 

[SpaceWay2008]

I hope I didn't sound super harsh, I was in a bit of a mood when I wrote that.

It's all good.

 

[Medinnus]

My eight-year old son is really hoping for someone to hook up with White Tiger, preferably Iron Fist (Iron Fist has been his favorite Marvel hero since the Facebook Avengers game). He likes smackdown and girls in equal measure... I am assembling embarrassing stories to relate to his dates when he's a bit older.

 

[Christopher Glennon]

When I was in the target demographic, while I admit that I wasn't the biggest fan of romance I wasn't against it either. I wanted Tai/Sora to get together in Digimon and Peter/Felicia in the 90's Spider-man for example. However, the stereotype that boys hate romance was still prevalent when those shows came out, that meant in order to be "cool" boys had to act like they hate it, from what I can remember from my grade school conversations over those shows (which isn't a helluva lot).

Is it just me or was romance much bigger 15 or so years ago in than it is today? I'm strictly talking Marvel cartoons, but X-Men TAS did Scott/Jean/Logan and of course had Rogue and Gambit, Spider-Man TAS juggled many women, and both series had weddings. Fantastic Four had no less than three couples, Iron Man had Julia/Tony/Wanda and then just Tony and Julia, Silver Surfer was basically motivated by the thought that he was going to get back to his love Shalla Bal, etc.

 

[Geodude]

My eight-year old son is really hoping for someone to hook up with White Tiger, preferably Iron Fist (Iron Fist has been his favorite Marvel hero since the Facebook Avengers game). He likes smackdown and girls in equal measure... I am assembling embarrassing stories to relate to his dates when he's a bit older.

Nice to see I'm not the only one who finds her attractive. Y'know, for her age...

 

[Medinnus]

Nice to see I'm not the only one who finds her attractive. Y'know, for her age...

Anthony has always liked older women... of course, being eight years old, almost all of them are...

 

[suss2it]

This was a good episode. I'm not really familiar with Taskmaster, since the only comics I read with him in it are an issue of Cable & Deadpool and Avengers Academy where he's possibly the father of one of the characters. He was pretty badass here, and he looked and sounded very menacing. Hopefully we get to see more of him in the future.

White Tiger was also more likable here than she's been in the show so far, hopefully they stick with this character growth.

Is it just me or was romance much bigger 15 or so years ago in than it is today? I'm strictly talking Marvel cartoons, but X-Men TAS did Scott/Jean/Logan and of course had Rogue and Gambit, Spider-Man TAS juggled many women, and both series had weddings. Fantastic Four had no less than three couples, Iron Man had Julia/Tony/Wanda and then just Tony and Julia, Silver Surfer was basically motivated by the thought that he was going to get back to his love Shalla Bal, etc.

I don't know, X-Men: Evolution had it's fair share of romance, as did Spectacular Spider-Man, Wolverine and the X-Men, with the Jean/Cyclops/Wolverine stuff and Wolverine/Mystique, the 2003 Spider-Man featured a lot of romance plots, so I think that Fantastic Four: WGH might be the only relatively recent Marvel toon that didn't have much romance stuff going on.

 

[JTMarsh]

It's a stereotype that doesn't really exist anymore, like those giant lockers Flash has gotten stuck in. Has anyone involved in USM actually been in a modern high school lately? Plus you can't openly physically bully people inside the school building anymore in most places, most physical bullying happens outside the school now. The most common bullying though is through words, pranks, or online which all are far less obvious than trying to shove a kid into a locker or something. Flash's bullying in SSM, while not going into the online aspect, is far more realistic than his bullying has been in USM so far.

Like I said some stereotypes die hard.

 

[Christopher Glennon]

I don't know, X-Men: Evolution had it's fair share of romance, as did Spectacular Spider-Man, Wolverine and the X-Men, with the Jean/Cyclops/Wolverine stuff and Wolverine/Mystique, the 2003 Spider-Man featured a lot of romance plots, so I think that Fantastic Four: WGH might be the only relatively recent Marvel toon that didn't have much romance stuff going on.

Hmm, romance may not be the right word. Yeah, there's always love interests and pairings and triangles, but because most of the characters in the shows you've mentioned are so young, there's only so far their relationships can go. Most of the 90's toons either had a marriage, or at the very least, a proposal.

 

[JTMarsh]

Hmm, romance may not be the right word. Yeah, there's always love interests and pairings and triangles, but because most of the characters in the shows you've mentioned are so young, there's only so far their relationships can go. Most of the 90's toons either had a marriage, or at the very least, a proposal.

True, and in most of those 90s shows the characters were clearly older; in the X-Men series Cyclops & Jean both appeared to be in their early 30s, while 90s Spider-Man featured protagonists in their early 20s.

Of course Evolution dealt with teens and still had a fair amount of romantic subplots. Whether the writers of Ultimate Spider-Man have any grand designs for that remains to be seen.

 

[Christopher Glennon]

True, and in most of those 90s shows the characters were clearly older; in the X-Men series Cyclops & Jean both appeared to be in their early 30s, while 90s Spider-Man featured protagonists in their early 20s.

Of course Evolution dealt with teens and still had a fair amount of romantic subplots. Whether the writers of Ultimate Spider-Man have any grand designs for that remains to be seen.

Yeah, ultimately, I hold out as much hope for Peter/Mary Jane in Ultimate Spider-Man as I do for Tony/Pepper in Iron Man: Armored Adventures. In other words, not much.

Kitty and Lance had a great set-up, but they really weren't on the level of the 90's romantic pairings, and since then, I don't have high expectations when it comes to teen heroes.

 

[JTMarsh]

Yeah, ultimately, I hold out as much hope for Peter/Mary Jane in Ultimate Spider-Man as I do for Tony/Pepper in Iron Man: Armored Adventures. In other words, not much.

Kitty and Lance had a great set-up, but they really weren't on the level of the 90's romantic pairings, and since then, I don't have high expectations when it comes to teen heroes.

I seem to remember reading that the WB Kids execs told the Evolution guys not to go real deep with the romantic subplots, since they figured their target audience (little boys) wouldn't be interested in that. Of course, these same execs said they didn't want Wolverine to be featured as prominently as he usually is because they seriously figured little kids wouldn't be interested in him since he was an adult (and as someone who never liked Wolverine much I'm grateful for that).