[6.8/10] One of the days, I’m going to come off of my “Terry McGinnis is a pastiche of Peter Parker” routine, but not this episode! Here, we not only have him inadvertently let down his maternal figure due to his superheroing (a la Aunt May), but the episode gives him his own equivalent to Kraven the Hunter (creatively dubbed “The Stalker”).
There’s not much to it. Stalker hunts Terry. Terry struggles to get away and deal with this spear-throwing (oof), tattoo-having, prowler who has him bested using various tricks and traps. The fight visuals aren’t much to write home about, Matt being kidnapped is pretty mild as escalation goes, and the whole Terry being late to help his mom thing doesn’t really come back anywhere in this one.
That said, there’s at least some cool visuals and character development once we actually get to learn Stalker’s backstory. The black and white and red rendition of his tale of woe is an intriguing one, and while the whole “he couldn’t let go of his demons” moral is trite as hell, his single-mindeda quest to get revenge on the panther that crippled him, and by extension, all of earth’s predators, gives him at least a little psychological depth. There’s similar cool iconography to his system being scrambled to where he sees Terry as that same panther.
But overall, outside of that one backstory sequence, this one never really rises above “fine.” It’s not bad, but it feels derivative and unimaginative beyond that one solid stretch.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2020-05-16T02:11:24Z
[6.8/10] One of the days, I’m going to come off of my “Terry McGinnis is a pastiche of Peter Parker” routine, but not this episode! Here, we not only have him inadvertently let down his maternal figure due to his superheroing (a la Aunt May), but the episode gives him his own equivalent to Kraven the Hunter (creatively dubbed “The Stalker”).
There’s not much to it. Stalker hunts Terry. Terry struggles to get away and deal with this spear-throwing (oof), tattoo-having, prowler who has him bested using various tricks and traps. The fight visuals aren’t much to write home about, Matt being kidnapped is pretty mild as escalation goes, and the whole Terry being late to help his mom thing doesn’t really come back anywhere in this one.
That said, there’s at least some cool visuals and character development once we actually get to learn Stalker’s backstory. The black and white and red rendition of his tale of woe is an intriguing one, and while the whole “he couldn’t let go of his demons” moral is trite as hell, his single-mindeda quest to get revenge on the panther that crippled him, and by extension, all of earth’s predators, gives him at least a little psychological depth. There’s similar cool iconography to his system being scrambled to where he sees Terry as that same panther.
But overall, outside of that one backstory sequence, this one never really rises above “fine.” It’s not bad, but it feels derivative and unimaginative beyond that one solid stretch.