Avengers In, Spider-Man Out--For Good?

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by Steve Fritz
webdate: 11/3/99 1:25:40 PM

Over the last several weeks, Fox Kids has made a couple of changes that directly affected Marvel’s animated programming. The network suddenly pulledSpider-Man: Unlimited and just as fast replaced it with The Avengers This last action, by the way, came a full-month earlier than Fox Kids VP/Head of Programming Roland Poindexter said in a previous Animated Shorts. The time seemed ripe to ask Ungar: “What gives?”

Well, even though Ungar hasn’t officially moved to his new office, he was more than willing to talk. In fact, for the moment, he’s currently conducting business out of his house.

“What’s happening is Fox is dealing with the realities of Pokémon as a competitor,” Ungar stated while eating his breakfast. “They felt they needed to devote more time to those types of shows, which I understand. At the same time, you’ll notice that The Avengers came on last weekend.

“What’s happening is Fox’s Saturday programming has been really fluid. It hasn’t been the same from week to week. The real problem is they have a ton of really good shows over there and they are trying to find the right formula to be competitive. I think they’re getting there from what I’m seeing.”

The fact is that Fox Kids has managed to climb out of its doldrums quite a bit in the last several months. Last summer, the network was down in fourth place, well behind the likes of current king Kids WB, Nickelodeon and ABC. By the end of September, Fox managed to move comfortably back up to third. Say what you will, the network must be doing something right.

On the other hand, Fox’s lack of stability with its programming is somewhat disconcerting. Currently, the network slots eight different shows from 8:00 a.m. to Noon eastern programming. Only three of those shows--Sherlock Holmes In The 21st Century, Digimon and Beast Machines have maintained their timeslots since mid-September. By any TV standards that’s extreme. Among the shows that have been part of this programming revolving door are Ungar’s two current shows, the aforementioned Spider-Man: Unlimited and The Avengers.

“From the looks of things, Spider-Man will probably come back sometime between December and February,” says Ungar. “It’s coming off had nothing to do with the ratings. In fact, if you saw them, you’d see the show was doing rather well. It was pulling ratings in the mid-to-high 3.0’s and it was going head-to-head against Pokémon.”

In an earlier Animated Shorts interview, Marvel head honcho Avi Arad made it clear that there’s a lot being banked on Spider-Man: Unlimited being a success. Arad stated he had plans for a number of maxi-series revolving around the webslinger. In fact, he even named the first such sequel, Spider-Man 2001.

“I don’t know about that,” Ungar admits. “I’m mainly concerned with getting ready to re-kickoff Spider-Man: Unlimited at the moment. On the other hand, what I think I can say is you know we’re going to have a Spider-Man movie out next year, and I believe the next animated series will be a spin-off of that.”

The fact is, Ungar’s not a totally unknown name with Marvel. He did a previous tour of duty with them, working on such series as The X-Men, the 1990’s Spider-Man series, the Marvel Action Hour and Biker Mice From Mars. In fact, Ungar created this last series. This wide range of experience demonstrates that Ungar does have an idea about how this operation works.

“With this new job, obviously, I have administrative responsibilities but it was kind of tailor-made to allow me to do more things that I enjoy,” says Ungar, “which is not only the animation but the marketing and character management [aka licensing—Editor] as well. Marvel Character Group is kind of designed to work with all the other aspects of Marvel. Our job is to bring it all together. For instance, Avi Arad is still in charge of the movies, and he doesn’t need any help from me. On the TV side, Avi and I will work together, having both been involved in television for a number of years. On the marketing side, it falls mostly to me, especially on the international areas.”

When it comes down to what really did happen to The Avengers, Ungar has a solid answer. “The first episode came out good, ultimately,” says Ungar. “What happened was there was some problems with the animation when it came back from Asia. I have to admit the people at Fox did a fabulous job of fixing. It gets better. A lot of times these shows get worse over time. I’ve seen the second show and it really looks better.”

Ungar also reported that shows Arad talked about in the past, such as the two-parter involving Captain America and a guest shot by Thor, are still coming. Also in the works is a new animated series starring a certain team of mutant superheros.

“We’re hard at work on a new X-Men series,” says Ungar. “It will be animated, only this time we’re looking at using a whole different form of animation. I won’t tell you if it will involve the current X-Men, Gen X or even what kind of animation we’ll be using. Just accept that as kind of a teaser. It’s all getting worked out as we speak.”

Got a phone call from Dark Horse the other day that should be of interest to animation fans. The comic book publisher/animation production house announced that it has signed two separate deals with Fox Pictures. Come next year, Dark Horse will do the comic book adaptations based on two upcoming animated feature films the latter will produce.

The first will be a three-part miniseries based on Don Bluth’s upcoming Titan A.E. movie. Buffy fans might also want to pay attention to this movie as it was scripted by Josh Whedon. A creative team for the comic was not known as of press time, but Dark Horse announced that the first issue should hit the newsstands this April. The movie itself is slated for June-July.

The second deal is for the movie Monkey Bones. The film stars Brandon Frazier, and revolves around a comic artist in a coma being hunted by his own creations. Dark Horse expects to have this comic out next Fall. Again, no creative team has been set on this title.

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