“Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man”: Why is its animation style hard to enjoy?

Even if you are loving Marvel’s brand-new series ‘Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man’, it’s impossible not to notice some backlash against the animated show. A bunch of people didn’t like its animation style —some even hated it. And I must say that it’s pretty understandable. Look, the idea of recreating comic book visuals is amazing. Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man’s colors and character design are both beautiful and remarkable.

That idea is very special because the art style is meant to pay homage to the 1960s comic books ‘The Amazing Spider-Man’ and its artists Steve Ditko and John Romita Sr. At that time the aesthetic was characterized by primary and saturated colors, heavy black shadows, strong contrast, and simple backgrounds.

Yeah, the series looks like a “60s animated comic book”, as weird as that may sound. But maybe that’s the biggest problem: despite some similarities, comics and animation are deeply different art forms, and combining them is quite risky. This combination can either be fantastic or, like in this case, look a bit... clunky, as some Spider-Man fans have described it on the Internet.

Instead of “clunky”, I prefer “stiff”, and it’s not an understatement, believe me. Changing the adjectives won’t fix it anyway. 3D animation trying looking like 2D is hardly unnoticeable, and the low frame rate doesn’t help much. But there are other trouble spots that might bother the audience, like the harsh shadows around characters’ necks and others standing completely still in the background. Watching the teasers and trailers, I was like “What the heck, bro?”.

As I said before, it’s risky to combine comics and animation style. Look at what they did with ‘Invincible’. Ugh, that flat style is definitely a thing, man. Not my favorite at all. And I know this style was meant to resemble the comic’s visuals. But look at the animation —it moves smoothly and naturally. Furthermore, the characters are interesting and complex, and the story is compelling. And that’s exactly my point: what has saved this Spider-Man animated series is its characters and story.

Steve Ditko's Spider Man

In ‘Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man’, Peter is both a charismatic teenager and a fun superhero. Nico, his best friend, and Peter’s other classmates are interesting and engaging characters. We really feel like we’re following young Pete as he becomes Spider-Man in a different and inventive way. Yeah, the series’ plot has a lot of differences. Since the show is set in an alternate timeline, it introduces new elements. It’s interesting to see Norman Osborn’s role as Peter Parker’s mentor and how he influences Spidey.

John Romita Sr.'s art

In a nutshell, it’s a very well-crafted coming-of-age story, and I must admit the fight scenes are really cool. So, even though you don’t like the animation style, give the series a try. The last episodes will drop shortly. Watch two or three, at least, then it’s up to you wether to check out or go ahead. Despite my initial reluctance, I decided to keep going.

Available on Disney+.