Neil Patrick Harris Voiced Spider-Man In A Forgotten Animated MTV Series

"Spider-Man" is one of the most popular superheroes of all time, and one that is quite versatile when it comes to adaptations. We've had several "Spider-Man" shows and movies, from live-action to animation and video games, each with a unique take, visual style, and tone. Tom Holland's boyish Peter Parker is vastly different from Jake Johnson's jaded Peter B. Parker and Tobey Maguire's tragic, mopey version of the character (which audiences voted as the single best live-action Peter Parker).

Even in animation, we've seen many different interpretations from voice actors across games, TV, and film, portraying Peter as an older man, a newcomer just getting started with his powers, or an established hero. Though there have been many animated "Spider-Man" TV shows, each with their own fans and defenders, one show is usually left out of the conversation — MTV's "Spider-Man: The New Animated Series."

This was a wild experiment. The show starred Neil Patrick Harris as Peter Parker, in a story meant to serve as a continuation of the first "Spider-Man" movie by Sam Raimi. Except it was also a loose adaptation of the then-current "Ultimate Spider-Man" comic books by Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Bagley, Stuart Immonen, and David Lafuente. Those two approaches never quite fit together, and eventually, the show simply deviated too much from Raimi's films — which also just retconned the entire thing in the second film.

The show is arguably best remembered for its bold use of cel-shaded CG animation, unusual at the time in a high-profile cartoon like this, and which looks quite dated today. Still, not only does this cartoon have a very unique look, but there are moments in the short-lived 13-episode cartoon where you can almost draw a line between its visual experimentation and what ultimately became "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse."

The voice cast for "Spider-Man: The New Animated Series" was also rather unusual. In addition to Neil Patrick Harris (who would return to the role in the "Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions" video game), we have Rob Zombie play Curt Connors, aka The Lizard. Silver Sable is played by Virginia Madsen, while Kathy Griffin and Jeremy Piven portrayed the Gaines Twins. Strangely, though the show wasn't really about the larger Marvel universe, it did feature an appearance from Kingpin, curiously played by Michael Clarke Duncan — who played the character in the unrelated 2003 "Daredevil" movie.

Though the show reportedly had great creative freedom, there was one caveat. "Spider-Man: The New Animated Series" was not allowed to include the character of Aunt May because MTV executives feared that an elderly character would alienate the target young audience. Still, there was no shortage of comic book characters, from Kraven the Hunter to Electro — who gets the most Sam Raimi of portrayals, here reimagined as a bullied outsider who eventually becomes a victim of his own anger in the best episode of the series. It's a depiction that hasn't been captured properly on the screen, except in a weird way by a homage to Electro in "The Amazing Spider-Man 2."

Unfortunately, the show was canceled due to poor ratings, and "Spider-Man: The New Animated Series" was left on a shocking cliffhanger. After being tricked by Kraven the Hunter and The Gaines Twins into thinking Mary Jane had been murdered, Peter loses faith in his abilities as a hero and decides to throw away his suit — a story point that would have tied nicely into Raimi's "Spider-Man 2" had that movie not contradicted most of the story in this cartoon.