Spider-Man Lament '77

Turning back the clock almost 40 years takes us to the short-lived but never forgotten Spider-Man television series starring Nicholas Hammond. I remember watching the pilot episode when it originally aired on television and sat enthralled watching the wall-crawler come to life on TV. And then the show disappeared. For years, I thought it was because the rating were poor. Shockingly, the ratings did quite well but CBS cancelled the show anyway. CBS was already airing the successful Incredible Hulk television show and didn't want to become known as "the superhero network" and lose advertiser dollars.

The quick abandonment of Spider-Man really was one of those unfair incidents in television history. Plans were made to bring Spider-Man to The Incredible Hulk TV, but the crossover never happened.

Unofficially Official - Michael Keaton as The Vulture in Spider-Man: Homecoming

From Batman to Birdman to The Vulture, that's the abbreviated career path of Michael Keaton. Michael Keaton is always going to be remembered for his two-movie run as Batman. Those whose memories recall the 1980's are sure to remember his work in Mr. Mom, Clean & Sober, and Night Shift.

Careers have their ups and downs and their major comebacks. Keaton's Oscar nominated performance in Birdman opened a comeback door for him. He can still be a bit choosy regarding his roles. He turned down Kong: Skull Island and reported backed out of the new Spider-Man movie before agreeing to appear. Nothing is official yet, but Keaton is assumed to be the new villain in Spider-Man: Homecoming and that villain is The Vulture.

MovieWeb and other sources have been reporting on Keaton's signing in the new film since about May 20th.

The Vulture is a bit of an odd villain to select since he is so- well - 1960's Marvel Comics. When the character first debuted in The Amazing Spider-Man #2, he was a garish and menacing villain. What made the original version of Adrian Toomes so creepy was his age. The Vulture was up in age and came across as a mean-spirited cranky old man. The villain fit perfectly in the "generation gap" theme during those early issues. (Young Peter Parker was constantly battling older authority figures in the form of creepy villains)

In the early 1960's, not much was needed to make a super-villain menacing. Donning a Vulture suit, flying around, and "whalloping" people was pretty much all you needed to do. The Vulture has remained a multi-decade fixture of the Spider-Man books, but his limited powers (a flying bird suit) does not exactly strike fear.

The demented side of Adrian Toomes, however, can be extremely unsettling. In 1968, Spider-Man battled The Vulture in a classic Stan Lee/John Romita story that featured a completely maniacal Toomes looking for revenge against Spider-Man....and giving the wall-crawler a vicious beating.

If Keaton brings that version of Toomes/Vulture to the screen, we might see a great bad guy-good guy dynamic play out.