We’re Finally Getting Answers To That ‘Spider-Man’ Animated Series Cliffhanger 30 Years Later, And I’m Beyond Excited

Superhero animation has been experiencing a renaissance in recent years, with several beloved entries from the 1990s, in particular, receiving renewed attention and revivals. The Batman filmmaker, Matt Reeves, has collaborated with members of the creative team behind the iconic Batman: The Animated Series to create a spiritual successor, Batman: Caped Crusader. Similarly, the enduring X-Men: The Animated Series received a direct sequel in the form of the massively popular and critically acclaimed X-Men ’97. The latter show’s success has led fans to hope that Spider-Man: The Animated Series, which famously shared continuity with X-Men long before the development of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, could receive a similar continuation, especially given that the first season of X-Men ’97 features cameos from a few of Spider-Man’s characters and other references to its lore.

These fans can now fully rejoice, as a comic book miniseries serving as a sequel to the show has been announced. Spider-Man ’94 (curiously titled after the year the original TV show premiered rather than the one it ended, as in X-Men ’97’s case) will be written by veteran comic book scribe J.M. DeMatteis, who also worked on the original series, and is confirmed to resolve the famously significant cliffhanger left open when the show ended.

‘Spider-Man ’94’ Will Finally Reunite Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson

Like Batman and X-Men, Spider-Man: TAS certainly featured plenty of adult-oriented themes and storylines, but it was ultimately intended for child audiences, hence things like the famous restriction against Peter Parker/Spider-Man (Christopher Daniel Barnes) directly punching any of his opponents while crime fighting. Given this, it’s not surprising that the show didn’t adapt some of the character’s darker storylines from Marvel Comics, like The Night Gwen Stacy Died. In fact, Peter’s first iconic love interest only appears in a single episode, voiced by Mary Kay Bergman, in a sequence set in an alternate reality, with the show instead focusing on his relationships with Mary Jane Watson (Saratoga Ballantine) and Felicia Hardy/Black Cat (Jennifer Hale). But while it didn’t adapt them directly, the show did sometimes pay homage to aspects of Gwen’s comic book history, including her famous death.

In the third season finale, after discovering Peter’s secret identity, his archenemy, Norman Osborn/The Green Goblin (Neil Ross), abducts Mary Jane, eventually hurling her off the George Washington Bridge as he does to Gwen in The Night Gwen Stacy Died. But rather than being plainly killed in the ensuing fall as Gwen is, MJ falls into an inter-dimensional portal created by Jonathan Ohn/The Spot’s (Oliver Muirhead) time dilation accelerator (which Osborn had stolen), with her consequently being lost in space and time. Though not as violent or final as Gwen’s comic book death, this was still a devastating loss to the animated Peter, who struggles with feelings of grief for part of the fourth season, until Mary Jane mysteriously reappears and they resume their relationship. After Peter reveals his secret identity to her and the pair get married, the final season of the series reveals that this MJ is actually a water-based clone created by mad scientist Miles Warren (Jonathan Harris). After helping Peter defeat a similar clone of Morrie Bench/Hydro-Man (Rob Paulsen), MJ loses the ability to maintain her body’s solid form and evaporates.

The heartbroken Peter is subsequently contacted by psychic ally Madame Web (Joan Lee), who reveals that the original Mary Jane is still alive, promising to help him find her if he fulfills his destiny by leading heroic forces against a cosmic threat. After he does so in the series’ final story arcs Secret Wars (based on the original, 1984 Marvel comic of the same name) and Spider-Wars (which foreshadowed the later “Spider-Verse” comics and films), he and Madame Web set out to explore the multiverse in search of MJ. Although the implication is that they will find and rescue her eventually, this was still a somewhat bleak note to end the family-friendly series on and fans have longed to see Peter and MJ reunited in the intervening decades.

‘X-Men ’97’ Teased a Happy Ending for ‘Spider-Man: The Animated Series’

X-Men '97 - Peter Parker and Mary Jane watch the chaos in New York City — Image via Marvel Studios

X-Men ’97 already provided reassurance that the couple would find their way back to one another, although it didn’t elaborate on how. In that series’ first season finale, Peter (who had already appeared earlier in the season in costume as Spider-Man) and MJ (and Peter’s university rival, Flash Thompson) are shown wordlessly observing the chaos as Erik “Magnus” Lehnsherr’s/Magneto (Matthew Waterson) outer space fortress Asteroid M hurtles to Earth, before Magneto and the X-Men risk their lives to destroy it. Although some fans were quick to speculate that this scene could simply take place before MJ’s disappearance, or that the version featured was actually the clone, ’97 creator Beau DeMayo confirmed that neither of these was the case and that Peter had successfully found the original MJ.

While this was a highly appreciated bit of fan service, viewers still hoped to see how the actual reunion between Peter and MJ played out, whether this was through a more extensive storyline for the characters in either a future season of ’97 or a Spider-Verse film, or even a full revival of TAS. While one or more of these things is still possible, as it wouldn’t be surprising for a later film or TV show to override the continuity of a tie-in comic as has happened plenty of times before in Marvel and other franchises like Star Wars, the announcement of Spider-Man ’94 makes them seem less likely. The synopsis’s reference to Peter and MJ returning to New York after their multiversal travels suggests that the comic will offer the official, canonical resolution to their story, at least for the foreseeable future.