Too bad you're not Spider-Man, or you could lose those two. 
- —Maria Calderon wishing that Peter could lose her bodyguards
Appearances
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
- Daily Bugle
- ⏴ Captain Barbera (Last appearance)
- Maria Calderon (First appearance)
- President Calderon (First appearance)
Antagonists:
- Lisa Alvarez (First appearance)
- Matsu (First appearance) (Apparent death)
- Klein (First appearance)
Other Characters:
- Ted Roberts (First appearance).
- Connors (Mentioned)
Locations:
- Earth-730911
- Earth
- United States of America
- Tvillia (Mentioned)
- Earth
Items:
Synopsis
Peter Parker meets with J. Jonah Jameson at the Daily Bugle, and Jameson sends him out to cover the story of the Calderons, who are arriving in New York at the airport, coming in from their home country Tivillia, so that the president's daughter can participate in the Miss Galaxy beauty pageant. Peter arrives at the airport, where Captain Barbera is welcoming, and guarding, President Calderon, and his daughter, Maria Calderon, along with several other police officers. Peter takes some pictures, but his spider-sense goes off, and it alerts him to a large man kidnapping someone in the president's entourage. Peter leaves and changes into Spider-Man, and he climbs to the roof. He sees the men putting the man in their car, and they drive off. Before Spider-Man can follow them, he sees a young woman cross the street, inadvertently walking in the car's path. Spider-Man jumps off the rooftop onto a lower roof, and jumping off that one too, he lands on the street and runs, pushing the woman out of the way. The car speeds past them, and Spider-Man leaves.
Later, at the Bugle, after being berated by Jameson for not getting any pictures of the historic event, he tells Jameson that he saw a man be kidnapped, and that Spider-Man was there and he tried to stop the kidnappers. After leaving Jameson's office, he asks Rita Conway to get in touch with Ted Roberts, a Bugle employee and sketch artists, for him. He leaves, and goes to the place where the pageant will be held, and he is assigned to escort Maria.
Meanwhile, Lisa Alvarez, a woman from the president's country, meets with the kidnappers of the man from the airport, and she tells them to target the president's daughter.
Elsewhere, Peter takes Maria to a disco at the theatre where the pageant will be, under the watchful eye of Captain Barbera and security officers, and she goes into the bathroom to freshen up. Alvarez also comes in, dressed as an executive, and she goes into the bathroom as well. Peter's spider-sense goes off, as Alvarez is kidnapping Maria with the help of her massive henchman, and both escape through the window. Peter and Barbera finally get the door open, but realize that they're too late.
After breaking the news to the angry and saddened president, Peter and Barbera leave the hotel, discussing that whoever bent the bars on the bathroom window had to be strong. Peter returns to the Bugle the following day, and he meets with Rita, and Ted Roberts. Ted draws a sketch of the big man that works for Alvarez, and Peter returns to the pageant hall, and asks several contestants if they recognize the man, but no one does. Peter walks outside, and sees Alvarez get into the same car hat he saw at the airport. He slips a spider-tracer on it, and follows it in his car. The big henchman driving it realizes that Peter is following them, and he tries to lose him. Peter persistently follows, but the man contacts another henchman in a different car to make care of Peter. The other driver speeds out from an alleyway and tries to ram Peter, who begins speeding backwards in reverse. A wild car chase ensues, but finally, the man catches Peter in a construction site and he rams into the side of Peter's car, sending it careening over a hill, where it lands in a crumpled heap below. Alvarez's car pull up, and she shows them the spider-tracer.
Inside Peter's car, he just manages to pull himself free and escape before the car explodes.
Back at the Bugle, he tries to explain the whole thing to Jameson, who hadn't let him buy a car with Bugle money in the first place, but Peter and Rita manage to convince him that he must've forgot about changing his mind, and that he's over-worked.
Meanwhile, Lisa Alvarez goes and visits President Calderon in his hotel room, and tells him that she'll return his daughter to him unharmed, if he publicly resigns from office and hands the position over to her at the pageant, and she explains that she wants it because she wants Tivillia to return to a dictatorship.
Later, Peter goes to visit President Calderon, but the guards outside refuse to let him pass, so he changes into Spider-Man and scales the building, entering Calderon's room through the open window. Calderon, reluctantly agreeing to let Spider-Man aid in the search for his daughter, tells the hero all he knows about Lisa Alvarez, and about her scheme to steal his position as president. He also tells Spider-Man that the large man working for Alvarez that Peter got the sketch of is named Matsu, and that he's a deadly assassin that the Alvarez family has hired many times. Spider-Man leaves, promising to return Maria to him.
Peter goes to the pageant hall and questions one of the girls in the competition about the executive that was in the bathroom with Maria the night before, and questions the head of the competition, and they finally conclude that Lisa used a false ID to get on the executive list.
Later, as Spider-Man, Peter sees Alvarez's car, and he jumps on the back and hitches a ride. Unseen by Matsu and Lisa, he climbs inside the trunk and closes it. They return to Alvarez's lair, and Spider-Man stealthily exits the trunk. He sees Maria and the other hostage, but accidentally sneezes, and Alvarez, Matsu, and the driver of the car that wrecked Peter's, Klein, go after him. Matsu throws ninja stars at Spidey, and though he dodges them, Spider-Man falls over the edge of the upper level in the hideout and falls into some oil drums below. Matsu jumps down and kicks them over, and they fall on top of Spidey, knocking him unconscious. Matsu moves to unmask him, but Lisa says that they don't have time for that, and that he should get rid of Spider-Man and the other hostages now.
Matsu and Klein drives them to a pier and prepare to shoot them and dump their bodies in the water, but Spider-Man breaks free of the ropes tying his hands, and he kicks Matsu and punches Klein. Klein draws his gun, but Maria warns Spider-Man. He webs the gun out of the man's hand, and the other hostage grabs the gun and points it at Klein. He then takes Matsu on, and the two begin fighting, and Matsu barely misses Spidey when he throws a knife at him. He picks up a small board with a nail in it and attacks him again, but Spider-Man dodges, and he trips and falls over the edge of the pier. Spider-Man looks over, but all that remains of Matsu is his hat. Spider-Man takes Matsu's car and leaves with Maria, while the hostage calls the police and watches Klein.
At the pageant, Barbera goes all-out with his security, and Lisa arrives to watch the president's resignation speech. He begins to give it, but before he tells the crowd of his resignation, Spider-Man swings down onto the stage with Maria. Lisa gets out of her seat and runs towards the stage with a gun, but Spider-Man webs her up in a net, and the police quickly arrest her.
Later, that night, Calderon, happy his daughter is back, thanks Peter and Captain Barbera, and he informs Peter that Matsu' s body wasn't found at the pier, and that they assumed him dead, though he suspects that Matsu survived, as the assassin is very clever. He also allows Maria to go out with Peter as her escort again, but warns him that Maria's safety is even more important now. They leave, tailed by two bodyguards, and Lisa joking remarks that she wishes Peter were Spider-Man, so that he could get rid of her bodyguards.Notes
- Peter Parker appears as Spider-Man 3 times in this episode.
Trivia
- This episode marks the last appearance of Captain Barbera. He is replaced as a supporting character by Julie Masters in the next episode.