A Look Back at 'THE AMAZING SPIDERMAN' 1977 - 1979

Today, THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN, a reboot of the franchise, hits theaters. But does anyone remember the first live action incarnation of the web-slinger? Well, it was 1977 and CBS was developing projects with many different superheros as vehicles for its prime time lineup.

About THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN:

The pilot of THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN first aired in the Fall of 1977. It scored well in the Nielsen ratings and CBS ordered the pilot to series. In April of 1978, the first five episodes aired on Wednesdays. The series came back in the fall of 1978 with the first of six new episodes, but after 3-4 episode, the sieries was pulled from the line up. In February of 1979, the remaining one hour episodes aired, then SPIDER-MAN was pulled yet again. In July of 1979, a final two-hour movie aired on CBS and it would be the last of a live action Spider-Man until the 2002 movie release, staring Toby McGuire.

Cast:

Over the course of the 13 hours produced for the series, only the roll of Peter Parker stayed the same. Former child actor Nicholas Hammond (Sound of Music) played our superhero/Peter Parker, who started out as a college student, working part time at the Daily Bugle. At some point in the series, Parker is no longer in college and works full time at the paper.

In the Pilot, the role of J. Jonah Jameson, Daily Bugle boss, is played by David White (BEWITCH's Larry Tate). But when it when to series, Jameson was played by veteran actor Robert F. Simon.

The role of Peter's Aunt May was play by multiple actresses, never the same person twice.

Success/Failure:

There is not a lot of data easily accessible on TAS, but there is a wikipedia post that the first season, five episodes in spring of '78, the series placed in the top 20 for the 1977-78 season.But since the series was pulled very quickly in the fall of 1978, the ratings must of fell through the floor and production stopped with 4-5 hours left to air. The more commonly reported reason was that the series was too expensive to produce.

I recently was listening to the podcast NOW PLAYING, which is doing a Spider-Man retrospective on the movies,including the two TV movies that make up this series, and their review explains how and why the series only lasted 13 hours.

Their opinion of the 2-hour pilot is that it was campy and hokey, at times, it had good action scenes and, for the time, innovative special effects and camera work. By the time the last 2-hour movie aired, the series was a mess and the writing was horrible. What they had working in 1977 was gone by the fall of 1978.

My memory of the series is that it was on the air a lot longer than just 13 hours. I thought for sure, it played two or three seasons. I remember so much of it despite the spread out and erratic airing dates of the series. As a kid, I remember enjoying the THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN. It was fun 70's TV.

It also did not help that during this time of the mid to late 70's CBS had ordered pilots/movies from about a half dozen different superhero properties. THE INCREDIBLE HULK was the most successful, lasting 5 seasons. CBS picked up the last two seasons of WONDER WOMAN, after ABC cancelled it. and there were multiple pilot movies for CAPTAIN AMERICA and even DR. STRANGE received a 2-hour pilot order. CBS was starting to be pegged at the "Superhero Network." A title the network did not want to have.