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| Spider Riders | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Also known as | |
| Genre | Mecha |
| Created by | Tedd Anasti Patsy Cameron-Anasti |
| Written by | Shelley Hoffman Robert Pincombe Yosuke Kuroda Hideki Shirane Noboru Kimura |
| Directed by | Koichi Mashimo Takaaki Ishiyama Hiroshi Morikoa Naoyuki Kuzuya Shintaro Itoga Tomoyuki Kurokawa Yuuki Arie Yutaka Hirata Tomoaki Ohta Yukio Kuroda Yutaka Hirata |
| Opening theme | seeMusic |
| Ending theme | seeMusic |
| Country of origin | Canada Japan |
| Original languages | English Japanese |
| No. of seasons | 2 |
| No. of episodes | 52(list of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producers | Lesley Taylor Michael Hirsh Patsy Cameron Tedd Anasti Kouji Kumode Yasuharu Iwakiri |
| Producer | Stephen Hodgins |
| Running time | 22 minutes approx. |
| Production companies | Cookie Jar Entertainment[c] Bee Train Yomiko Advertising[2] P.A. Works (season 1) |
| Original release | |
| Network | Teletoon (Canada) TV Tokyo/Kids Station (Japan) |
| Release | March 25, 2006 (2006-03-25)[1] – April 29, 2007 (2007-04-29)[3] |
Spider Riders is a series of science fictionnovels first published in December 2004, published byNewmarket Press written by Tedd Anasti, Patsy Cameron-Anasti andStephen D. Sullivan (books 2–3). The series was adapted into ananime series, produced byBee Train andCookie Jar Entertainment. It was the first show from the latter company that was placed under the control of their then-new action-adventure brand Coliseum.[4]
Three novels for the series includedShards of the Oracle,Reign of the Soul Eater andQuest of the Earthen. The series was broadcast onTeletoon,This TV, and used to be broadcast onKids' WB.Koichi Mashimo co-directed the staff at Bee Train with Takaaki Ishiyama. WriterYosuke Kuroda adapted the novels. Robert Pincombe and Shelly Hoffman wrote the English version.
Eleven-year-old Hunter Steel searches for the legendary inner world by following instructions in his grandfather's journal. He enters a pyramid where he finds a mysteriousmanacle that attaches to his arm. Aspider startles Hunter, who falls into a hole to the center of the Earth and into thesubterranean world of Arachna. There, he discovers a small group of elite warriors struggling to survive and to save Arachna from the attack of Invectids, a race ofinsectoids. The warriors are children/teenagers, each fighting with the help of their own 10 ft (3.0 m) battle spiders. They call themselves "Spider Riders". In the English TV series, the ages of the characters were reduced. There is a prophecy that says a surface-dweller or Human, like Hunter, will bring disaster to the Inner World. Sparkle mentions it at the beginning of the TV series. When Princess Sparkle finds out she says, "I wonder if he will bring doom to us...or to them."
The Oracle Keys are fractions of the Oracle's power. They are cards that can be split in two. The Invectids hope to gain them for Mantid, who wants to use their power to rule Arachna. The Oracle uses much of her strength to protect them. The Spirit Oracle Key passes its power onto Hunter and Shadow, giving them new armor and weapons as well as new abilities.
To activate the keys, the holder must shout "Oracle's Light!". Two in combination can create more powerful armor and weapons. The wielder must have a sincere desire to protect without arrogance, otherwise the keys will malfunction. The Oracle Key from Nuuma was called by Corona, using her power, to let Hunter use it without having to hold it. Mantid used two of the Oracle's keys to power himself, plunging the Inner World into darkness and preventing Hunter from using his own keys.
Currently, the locations of the four Oracle Keys are known in the English version:
| Season | Episodes | Originally released | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| First released | Last released | |||
| 1 | 26 | March 25, 2006 (2006-03-25) | October 15, 2006 (2006-10-15) | |
| 2 | 26 | October 22, 2006 (2006-10-22) | April 29, 2007 (2007-04-29) | |
The animated series debuted on March 25, 2006 on Teletoon in Canada.Kids' WB onThe CW began airing it during the 2006-2007 season. The lastSpider Riders episode was shown in Canada on April 29, 2007. The series was repeated on weekdays and Sunday from June to August 2007, and was not shown for the2007-08 season. It is broadcast on Kix sky channel 627 from 12 June. From September 1, 2008, Teletoon is repeating theanime on weekdays. From November 2008 until September 2011, it was shown on theCookie Jar Toons block onThis TV.
The music depends on where Spider Riders was aired. In Japan, there were different opening songs for each season, along with two ending themes in season one and one ending theme in season 2. There is only one opening and ending theme in North America, and a Spanish version of the same theme for South America.
Common Sense Media rated the show 3 out of 5 stars.[5]
On May 31, 2006, the Spider Riders manga premiered atTV Tokyo's ani.tv website, illustrated by Junji Ohno of Studio 23. The seventh and final volume was published between 2006-11-29 and 2006-12-27. Previous volumes were removed on 2006-11-29.
Starting on December 27, 2006, the manga was republished under the Monthly Fang Comic site, when two more chapters of the manga were later released. The web comic was first published in paper form on June 19, 2007, by the Monthly Fang Comic publisher LEED Publishing Co., Ltd.; the online chapters were removed soon after. Currently, the manga is not available.
The web manga has an alternate beginning, where Hunter Steele enters a spider-shaped monument and discovers the manacle floating above a spider web. Hunter wears the manacle when it flies to his hand and falls into Inner World through a gap between web strings. Inside the Inner World, Hunter discovers Shadow after peeking at the bathing Corona and after trying to rescue a cart of caged humans. Each chapter of the web manga ends with theSparkling Sparkle section, following the adventures of Princess Sparkle and Hortala in a 4-square manga format.
In the Boy's Fang manga version, certain scenes are re-edited; for example, Corona is now naked instead of in underwear when Hunter first met her in chapter 1, an illustration is added at the beginning of each chapter, and Sparkling Sparkle segments have been removed.
Tribal Nova produced a tie-in online game based on the show, available on the official site.
On July 29, 2006, the Anime X site published Spider Catcher and Oracle Daifugo, downloadable phone games based on the show for theFOMA-enabled cell phones. A third game, Jumping Spider, was released on August 9, 2006. Each game cost 105 yen.
Works ofBee Train Production | |
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| Television series |
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