Quoted from the 'Spiral Zone' Wikipedia Article:
I was big fan of this series when I was 14. I was just old enough to realize how dark andOn June 18, 2007 renegade military scientist Dr. James Bent uses a hijacked space shuttle to drop his deadly Zone Generators across half of the Earth, a region called the Spiral Zone (due to its shape).
Millions of people are trapped in the dark mists of the Spiral Zone and transformed into Zoners with lifeless yellow eyes and strange red patches on their faces. Because they have no will to resist, Bent - now known as Overlord - makes them his slave army and controls them from the Chrysler Building in New York City.
His followers are known as the Black Widows: Bandit, Duchess Dire, Razorback, and Reaper. They are immune to the Zone because of a special device called the Widow Maker. However, due to prolonged exposure to the Zone, they also share the same effects as normal people caught inside the Zone, which has dark skies and Zone spores growing in many places. Bent seeks to conquer the world by bringing everyone under control with the Zone Generators. The Zones feed off human energy, which is why Bent does not kill anyone inside.
With major cities Zoned, the nations of the world put aside their own differences in order to fight off the Black Widows. However, only five soldiers using special suits to protect themselves from the Zone could do it. While easy to destroy, Zone Generators were impossible to capture because of booby traps. Overlord would drop more generators on remaining military and civilian centers and force the Zone Riders into a standoff.
different it was from the rest of it's "Animercial" kin. The general concept of the series and
that it begins with a "mad genius" waging an already 50% successful campaign to wipe out
conflict. Namely by eliminating free will in the world. In my opinion is some pretty high
concept stuff for any fictional format. But for a children's animated series... While impressive
what were they thinking? The visible effects on the people under the effects of the 'Zone'
were pretty unpleasant, not to mention the creepy background aesthetics the zone brings
with it. I was not surprised to later find out that J. Michael Straczynski wrote the pitch
for the series. He is reknown for writing this kind of dark and serious stuff for children's
programming. The premise for "Captain Power" had some similar "child scary" plot elements(#).
Anybody else remember "Spiral Zone" around here? I am curious about other people's take
on this unusual series.
The "Unofficial" website: http://www.spiralzone.com
(#)Captain Power Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Po ... the_Future
