Accidental Downer Ending: Despite many Spider-Man fans considering this show to have the best depiction of Peter Parker ever put on TV, the show was canceled after its second season due to contract issues withDisney. Once Disney had the rights to put Spider-Man on TV, they chose to let Spectacular die. As such, the series ends on a bittersweet and sad note: Spider-Man defeated the Goblin (now revealed to be Norman Osborn) and kept everyone safe, but this causes Harry to hate Spider-Man, who's wracked in guilt over killing Norman and leaving Harry without a father. Even worse, Peter's personal life is now at its lowest point as, along with said guilt, his friendship with Harry is very likely strained due to both his newfound hatred of Spidey and Harry manipulating Gwen into staying with him upon learning of her and Peter's feelings for one another. Eddie Brock is still in prison, and Black Cat hates Spidey for making her father stay in prison by guilt tripping him. Oh, and Peter and Liz's relationship ends on a painful note and it's likely that she will hate him once more. In short, Peter is mostly alone. Meanwhile, due to Curt being blackmailed by Miles Warren, the Connors are forced to leave the lab and relocate to Florida, leaving the lab to Warren, whom they don't trust, and the last scene reveals that Norman somehow survived the explosion as he boards a plane and will very likely continue his evil doing. Word of God released a list of things that would have made it into the show, including the introduction of the Carnage symbiote, the death of Captain Stacy, Mary Jane and Peter becoming a couple, etc.
In the episode "First Steps," the Sandman is obsessed with getting his "big score." The same actor voiced Bender in Futurama, including the movie Bender's Big Score. He even uses a similar voice for both characters.
Channel Hop: Moved to Disney XD from CW4Kids in March 2009. Interestingly, that's around six months before Disney's purchase of Marvel outright (August), and nine before that deal's completion (December).
Contest Winner Cameo: There was an advertised contest for a given school to appear in a future episode. Appeared in "Gangland".
Cowboy BeBop at His Computer: The episode summares on iTunes and Disney+ get an embarrassing number of details about the series wrong:
Several of the summaries for Season 1 — such as those for "Market Forces" and "Catalyst" — confuse Tombstone (L. Thompson Lincoln) with the Kingpin (Wilson Fisk) — who Tombstone admittedly is a substitute for. Season 2's summaries correct this.
iTunes' summary for "Market Forces" mentions the Human Torch, who doesn't appear in the series at all.
The original plan was to create extra material for each episode, then use it to edit each Story Arc into a movie for the DVD releases. But only the first arc was released like this before Sony switched to just plain episodes on DVD, leaving extra footage we might not ever see.
On a more positive note, Sony was pretty hands off during the production of the show with the only stipulation that the staff had to recreate some scenes from the movies during the fights (hence why some shots look familiar). This ended up working out though as it help foster familiarity for fans of the movies. Plus it was pretty cool seeing them animated in a different context.
After the first episode, Keith David is replaced with Kevin Michael Richardson note doing a rather spot-on impression of David in the role of Tombstone.
In the Enforcers' debut, Clancy Brown did Ox's grunts, but when the Enforcers returned in season two and Ox actually speaks, he was voiced by Danny Trejo.
The Robber was voiced by Jim Cummings in season 1, and James Remar in season 2.
Out of Holiday Episode: While The Uncertainty Principle and Nature Vs. Nurture being the series episodes for Halloween and Thanksgiving, both episodes aired six months prior their respective holidays in season one, the same goes for "Reinforcement" and "Shear Strength", the episodes for Christmas and New Year’s, in season 2.
Out of Order: Not only does the Disney+ release of the show put every episode as one 26-episode season, but it also puts "First Steps", the fifth episode of season 2, after "Final Curtain".
In the French dub, Harry Osborn, Flash Thompson, and Doctor Octopus are voiced by Philippe Valmont, Marc Saez, and Gabriel Le Doze respectively, reprising their roles from the Spider-Man Trilogy. Saez also voiced Flash in the French dub of Spider-Man: The Animated Series.
Screwed by the Lawyers: After Disney's purchase of Marvel Comics, Sony was forced to give up the broadcasting rights of airing Spider-Man TV shows during negotiations to keep their film rights. Rather than drafting up a new contract to continue the production of Spectacular Spider-Man, Marvel and Disney decided to just go forward with a new show (Ultimate Spider-Man) instead.
Short Run in Peru: Canada aired the entire second season before the US even started on it. And then Disney put it on hiatus midway through…
Spoiled by the Cast List: An eagle-eyed viewer can instantly learn who the Master Planner is by watching the credits carefully and seeing that Peter MacNicol voices them.
Professor X is just beginning to set up his school with his first couple of students, and the general public doesn't know about the existence of mutants.
