Spawn

Plot synopsis:
Al Simmons (Michael Jai White) is a Force Reconniassance Marine Colonel and Black Ops operative. Jason Wynn (Martin Sheen), the head of the covert government agency for which Simmons works, assigns him to infiltrate a biochemical weapons plant in North Korea. Unknown to Simmons, Wynn has ordered his top assassin Jessica Priest (Melinda Clarke) to murder him while he is on the mission. After Simmons dies, he is set on fire by Wynn and the flames cause the plant to explode. Simmons arrives in Hell, where one of the rulers of Hell - Malebolgia (Frank Welker) - offers him a Faustian deal: if Simmons becomes his eternal servant and leader of his army in Armageddon, he will be able to return to Earth to see his fiancée, Wanda Blake. Simmons accepts the offer and returns to Earth.
Upon his return, Simmons learns that five years have passed since his death. Wanda is now married to his best friend Terry Fitzgerald (D.B. Sweeney), who is living as the father to Al's daughter Cyan. Soon Simmons encounters a clown-like demon named Violator (John Leguizamo), sent by Malebolgia, who acts as Simmons's guide down the path to evil. He also meets a mysterious old man named Cogliostro (Nicol Williamson), a fellow Hellspawn, who has successfully freed his soul and now fights for Heaven. Simmons learns that Wynn, who is now a weapons dealer, has developed a biological weapon called Heat 16. During a reception, Spawn attacks Wynn, kills Jessica, and escapes with the help of his necroplasm armor.
Following the attack by Simmons, Violator convinces Wynn to have a device attached to his heart that will release Heat 16 worldwide if his vital signs flatline as a deterrent against assassination attempts. However, Malebolgia wants Simmons to kill Wynn and initiate the apocalypse. Spawn confronts Violator, who turns into his demonic form and beats Al down. Cogliostro rescues Al and teaches him how to use his necroplasm armor. Simmons learns that Violator and Wynn are going to kill Terry, Cyan, and Wanda.
Terry sends an email incriminating Wynn to a fellow newsman. Just as the email is sent, Cyan and Wynn enter the room. Wynn destroys Terry's computer and takes the family hostage. Spawn arrives and nearly kills Wynn, but Al extracts the device from Wynn's body instead and destroys it. With his plan foiled, Violator sends Spawn and Cogliostro to Hell, where they both battle the demon before subduing him. Spawn is then confronted by Malebolgia, who tells Spawn that he will never lead Hell's army. Spawn escapes with Cogliostro just before they are overwhelmed by Malebolgia's forces. Violator, having recovered, follows them. A final battle ensues, ending with Spawn decapitating the demon with his chains. Violator's head taunts the group and threatens his return before melting and returning to Hell. Wynn is arrested, and Spawn, realizing there is no place for him in Wanda's world anymore, dedicates himself to justice rather than succumbing to his lust for vengeance.

Tags: good versus evil, violence, neo noir

Review:
"Spawn: The animated series" is one of the best adaptations of one comic into animation, just like "The Maxx".
"Spawn" is one of the best animated series ever made..
I agree with what many reviewers said and I wont rehash the story line anymore - many folks have done so already.What I'd like to add is that HBO Cable Networks did a wonderful thing in showing this as a weekly series.
This is what adult animation and comic book adaptation was about.
The first season was better than the second one to me but both were groundbreaking.What I disliked more than anything -- was the feature film of "Spawn".
This is just a brief glimpse at the popularity of this single character whose sales in comics alone support the mammoth of a company that Image is.The animation runs over three seasons (also referred to as three feature-length movies) and each season is split into six twenty-five minute episodes.
Without giving away essential plot points, it is safe to say that the basic, original story of Spawn which is covered over the first couple of dozen comics and the not-so-well-received movie, is covered in the first season.
The second and third seasons are also true to the comics, but are a deeper insight into the legend of Spawn.The animations are slightly in manga style (only very slightly, taking the few better elements of manga and mixing it with conventional western cartoons), but are also western enough so as to keep the gritty feel that the original comics generated.
It is brutal, it is hard core, and I love it to bits.Spawn is voiced by Keith David who had the most brilliant, atmospheric deep voice which captures the purest essences of what Spawn should sound like, and likewise the rest of the voice-casting is outstanding at worst.
The voice overs are half what make a show like this, and when they are so precision perfect and so fantastically scripted it's no wonder that watching the film like this draws you deep into the world.And animation is well above par.
I do believe that the audience they aim for is quite small considering all the people out there who would rather watch feel-good daytime talk shows and shopping channels than a brilliantly conceived film-noir style animation.
Since when has a comic book character been adapted into an animated series and still creates an aura of harshness and entertainment.
The fact that Todd Mcfarlane has worked on comic books such as Spiderman shows that he knows how intricate characters are to be depicted.
Spawn the animated series is just that and if you take time to appreciate each character and their personalities you should find Spawn to be highly watchable.
Moving away from this the animation is just sublime; playing with the shadows of Rat Alley, and blending the hatred of Spawn with his undying love for Wanda, we are led into a paradoxical imagination of two untouchable forces colliding - Heaven and Hell.
Watch Spawn and if you can read the comics, they are of a very good quality..
During the year when the live-action adaptation of, "Spawn", was released, HBO released an animated series based on the comic-book series that ran from 1997 to 1999.
This is one of the greatest animated series ever made.The animation is excellent it make's the series look dark and edgy, the characters were great including Detectives Sam and Twitch, and the voice acting was good especially having Keith David provide the voice of the main character.Overall, if you didn't like the live-action movie or looking for a good show to watch, "Spawn: The Animated Series", is really worth watching..
Spawn was an animated series based on Todd McFarlane's comic book series.The first season of the show and the movie version both came out in 1997.The movie was PG-13 rated and while it was not the worst movie ever, it was nowhere near as good as the comics or this animated series.This series is great.It's dark, disturbing, violent, gory etc.Definitely not for the kids.The show is about a man who is left for dead by his old boss.He now comes back as a hellspawn and exacts his revenge while trying to see his ex-wife Wanda who has re-married to his friend.The show has Spawn living in an alley with other homeless people, as well as one who was once a hellspawn earlier.He basically saves them from all the gangs and the mafia who come and attack them as well, while trying to exact revenge on his old boss.Season 1 was the best season in my opinion, season 3 was great as well.Season 2 was good but a bit disappointing in comparison to the other ones.Overall a great series!
The show was released on 3 DVD's originally where they combine all the episodes of a season to make a movie.Now they have a 4 disk tin case box set.Worth watching!.
Brilliant stuff here that outshines anything DC is doing currently and DC is the only one really doing anything worth a crud for American comic-book animation.
If you're over 18 and want a good super-hero animation that lives and breathes in the dark...go buy Spawn.
The dialogue and, bizarrely enough, the acting are a hundred times as good as the film and the plot and characters are also much more intriguing.Sadly production ended before the 4th season of Spawn and it just seemed to be getting darker and darker.
But the one thing I can be sure of from this is that it's going to have one hell of a send-off when the entire story finally climaxes (if HBO ever bring it back, which they should!!!)I'd start watching this if I were you.
The voice casting is perfect, and a good job was done trimming the crap out of the comic book, and improving and streamlining the storyboards, it beats the ever living crap out of the movie and is the sort of thing that creates fanatics out of people..
Spawn was a 3-season long HBO animated series from 1997-1999.I was not there to watch it during it's original run, but I caught maybe one episode on Teletoon years ago.I watched the entire series on youtube about a year ago and I bought the Season 1 DVD.This review is for the third season?
Then Season 2 in my opinion was a disappointment.It was good just nowhere near as good as the first.Season 3 improved from Season 2 and came close to being as good as the first season.The series ended in a sort of cliffhanger and never came back, though there is talks for a continuation.You can either by the tin-case DVD set with all three seasons, or you can buy the 3 DVD's which are more like movies.At $6.00 a DVD, it's definitely worth it.The DVD for this season(the old one) has an interview with Todd McFarlane & the cast talking about the show, plus two music videos.One is "Bawbitaba" by Kid Rock and the other is "Play Around" by Lil Cease & Lil Kim.These are kinda random, they have nothing to do with Spawn.The songs are both decent in my opinion, but not great..
If you ask people around of why is animated Spawn good, you will have a 90% chance of getting this reply: It's cartoon for adults.
BECAUSE CARTOONS ARE FOR KIDS!Why isn't that cute; too bad I am an anime fan and those crazy Japs were making adult cartoons way before this one.
Of course in the animated version his enemies are limited to humans so don't expect any real threats for Spawn; most of them are n00bs before him while the really powerful ones like the demon clown and the angelic chick are never dealt with in the cartoon.
Jesus you guys, if I wanted violence and profanity around people, I would watch a life action title.
But don't go expecting for some sort of solid conclusion because all you get is Spawn and his indirect allies saying something corny like "Have hope, stay true to yourself, and things will be better tomorrow." Why thank you so much; I think Jack and Beanstalk had the same overall message.
Spawn is in effect a dark fairy tale and an intro to things you need to read about in the comic.
I do find Spawn the animated series interesting.
We rolled on the floor when Todd (the originator of the series) narrated after the second season that some wanted to purchase rights for Saturday morning kiddie viewing because it was in a comic book format.
Its been a long time watching this horror cartoon ,they must show this on Adult Swim for a re-runs,it better then other show They should make more episode of Spawn or at less a new season.I give this 8/10..
While not a transliteration of the original comics by any stretch, this adaptation is a great retelling of the eponymous character..
You have Cogliostro, Bobby, Terry, Wanda, Cyan, the Violator, Malebolgia, Sam & Twitch, and the eponymous character, each are deeply realized and brought to life, with the title character being the star of the show because of Keith David's stellar voice acting.The music is rather mood setting too, adding to the effect of certain scenes.
It's little things like this that make the series an excellent re- telling.It's also not a series for children, as it's dark and surprisingly violent.
This is a great retelling of the Spawn franchise, though it isn't faithful to the comic books, it manages to shine just as bright..
I have heard a lot of bad things about the film and I'm not even going to bother watching it.
Great voice acting, gritty, dark, amazing animation, you need to watch this now!.
this could have been a great show but it has a very disjointed plot and the pacing is awful.random bad guys are thrown in and a lot of the time spawn is just creeping around having flashbacks.
seizure inducing flashbacks for the viewer.the animation is VERY good and the voice acting is also great.
also gratuitous violence and nudity are always a plus.I get the feeling that the director of the series and the writers weren't used to scripting TV...only watch this if you a) haven't seen the movie (since you will be even more bored) and b) don't mind going 20 minutes at a time waiting for something meaningful and interesting to happen..
Better than the live action movie "Spawn", still nothing all that special..
I am just afraid that Todd Macfarlene is just a guy who is to full of himself and who tries way to hard to make this particular comic hero more than what he is, but adding unnecessary depth where a few more awesome fight scenes might liven up the program a bit.
I can see from the score here I am in the minority in this thinking, but Spawn is not all that popular in the mainstream because it is at times boring to read and watch.
Perhaps the single greatest animated series based on a superhero comic book, aside from the 1994 "Spider-Man".
I fondly remember that the 1997 animated series "Spawn" was one of the great forbidden fruits of my childhood 12 years ago.
I was 12 in '97, not yet mature enough, according to my parents, to watch a fantasy/horror superhero show about a Hell-spawned demon looking to avenge his own murder at the hands of his former boss.
The show was rife with dark subject matter that included Hell, demons and black magic, not to mention graphic violence and explicit sexuality/nudity.All of this might seem like poison to a 12-year-old boy's eyes, ears, and mind.
Sometimes I would sneak off into the basement, out of my parents' close supervision, to watch the glorious "Spawn" animated TV show that aired late at night on HBO, around the same time a bunch of soft-core porn shows were also being aired."Spawn" was adapted from the creator-owned Image Comics comic book created by Todd McFarlane.
Spawn, you could say, was the first mature-themed comic book superhero I ever encountered as a pre-teen.
It allowed me to grow up pretty fast when I got the chance to watch the animated TV series.
I was also pretty hyped to see the 1997 live-action movie in theaters, too, which was more like Spawn-lite - more of a watered-down introduction to the character for the masses, rather than being a straight-forward adaptation of the comics.The animated series is a lot more closer to McFarlane's original vision of the character.
Simmons is sent to Hell, where he makes a deal with the demon Malebolgia to become leader of his demonic army to lead the conquest of Earth, and eventually, Heaven, leading to Armageddon, in exchange to be able to see wife Wanda one more time, who is now happily re-married to his best friend Terry Fitzgerald, and together they now have a young daughter named Cyan.
The 1997 movie was all right as an introduction, nothing more, since it had forsaken the darker elements of the story in favor of a larger commercial appeal.Spawn is unquestionably one of my favorite comic book superheroes of all time.
The animated series is quite possibly the best animated series of all time based on a comic book superhero character.
Spawn is truly a sympathetic character you can latch onto and not hate yourself for doing so: he's a Hell-spawned demon, a product of evil, who has been manipulated by circumstances into serving the forces of good (like other demonic superheroes such as Ghost Rider and Hellboy).
The show does little to improve upon the source material or explore new dimensions of the Spawn universe and fails to create a product that fits into HBO's family of top-notch programming.McFarlane wasted an opportunity to tell a quality story that could attract a new audience, which was probably his intent, but he missed his mark so severely, ignores the potential of subtlety so thoroughly, that the end result is merely fan service in an attractive package..
The animation is nothing awe-inspiring so we are just left with an animated film that isn't bad to watch if you've nothing better to do and have the time to kill.
Spawn 2 is over the top with everything: Adult situations, graphic violence, strong language, extreme gore and nudity.
Their was too much fluff in the movie that looked way better on the pages of the comic book.
Two: The comic book was given another bad hit when it was made into a "mature" animated series.
The thing I've always appreciated about Spawn is that the comic book seemingly started a trend of the conflicted hero.
First thing first, Spawn grabs our attention through darkness and violence rarely, if ever seen before, in American animated television.
One more thing, hell sends a babysitter to care for Spawn, to make sure he makes all "the right choices." He comes in the form of a obese, disgusting, and promiscuous midget clown who underneath his human skin, is a jealous native of hell, who can never seem to understand why humans are given so much higher prestige as opposed to him and possibly his people.Now let's get to the other side of the show.
They make for a fantastic sub- plot of the Spawn story and offer the shows best humor.
Todd McFarlane himself, the creator of Spawn, has gone on to say he had big plans for the show, wanting it to have a understandably, steady pace.
Am I the only one that thinks Todd McFarlane plagiarized spawn from the Ghost Rider comics?
Todd did work for Marvel comics when he started out, although spawn is not quite the same as ghost rider, it still looks like he got all his ideas from that comic while he brought it back to life when he was working for Marvel, or maybe not many from my generation read the ghost rider comic.
The spawn series does start out great for a while then starts dragging in later episodes.
This animated TV series is based on Spawn, a comic that was quite popular when it came out.
It is indeed quite dark, but it's not evil.Spawn may be regarded as a superhero (he wears a mask and cape), but unlike Batman, Superman or Spider-Man, he's undead.
This darkness can sometimes be too heavy, so that watching several episodes on DVD at one time can become too much.
The nudity doesn't start out that great (one scene has two naked women being shot in bed, which comes a bit close to misogyny), but I loved seeing Jade's breasts during a naked ritual in season 3.Season 3 is my favourite of the six-episode seasons; Jade, the powerful woman sent by heaven to kill Spawn, is an attractive character.
The episode Hunter's Moon has heaven sending a vampire to kill Spawn.
A Really Cool Season Of Spawn.
In this Season, Spawn is stalked by a Bounty Hunter  from Heaven named Jade, who, in my opinion, is much like Angela in the  comic book series.
I wish that Todd could make a Season 4 of  Spawn.
If Spawn is supposed to be for adults, why does it feel like it's written by 15 year old boys?.
When people talk about great animated series based on comic books, there's always some guy wearing a stained Iron Maiden t-shirt who brings up Spawn.
But Spawn isn't even based on a good comic book.
The comic book is badly written trash, the live action movie is worse than ingrown toenails...he's just a combination of Spider-Man, Batman and Venom with a more satanic version of The Prowler's costume.
How original.The series is everything the comic book was, but worse.
Batman: Mask of the Phantasm is a much better choice you want a good animated movie for adults.Spawn doesn't deserve a new animated series, or the new movie Todd McFarlane has talked about ever since man invented the wheel.