is a series of science fiction

novels A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itself ...

first published in December 2004, published by

Newmarket Press Newmarket Publishing and Communications Company, and its publishing arm Newmarket Press, was founded in 1981 by President and Publisher Esther Margolis. Newmarket published about 20-30 mainly non-fiction books a year, primarily in the areas of chi ...

written by Tedd Anasti, Patsy Cameron-Anasti and

Stephen D. Sullivan Stephen D. Sullivan is an American author and artist. Career Sullivan taught a course in ''Dungeons & Dragons'' at MIT the first of its kind in the country. Sullivan worked for TSR as a writer and artist. Sullivan joined CEO John Rickets, Ma ...

(books 2–3). The series was adapted into an

anime is Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside of Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, in Japan and in Japane ...

series, produced by

Bee Train , commonly referred to simply as Bee Train, is a Japanese animation studio founded by Kōichi Mashimo in 1997. Since their involvement with '' Noir'', '' .hack//Sign'', and ''Madlax'' (among other series) they have a strong following in the yuri f ...

and

Cookie Jar Entertainment Cookie Jar Entertainment Inc. (also known as Cookie Jar Group and originally known as CINAR; renamed as DHX Cookie Jar Inc. from 2012 until 2014, or simply just Cookie Jar) was a Canadian media production and distribution company owned by DHX ...

. It was the first show from the latter company that was placed under the control of their then-new action-adventure brand Coliseum. Three novels for the series included ''Shards of the Oracle'', ''Reign of the Soul Eater'' and ''Quest of the Earthen''. The series was broadcast on

Teletoon Teletoon (stylized as TELETOON) is a Canadian English-language specialty channel owned by Teletoon Canada, Inc., a subsidiary of Corus Entertainment. Its name is a portmanteau of "television" and " cartoon". The channel primarily broadcasts ...

This TV This TV (also known as This TV Network and alternately stylized as thisTV) is an American free-to-air television network owned by Allen Media Broadcast Networks, LLC, part of the Allen Media Group division of Entertainment Studios. Originally fo ...

, and used to be broadcast on

Kids' WB Kids' WB (stylized as Kids' WB!) was an American children's programming service and brand of The WB that aired on the network from September 9, 1995, to September 16, 2006. The block moved to The CW (a result of the merger of Time Warner's The W ...

. Koichi Mashimo co-directed the staff at Bee Train with Takaaki Ishiyama. Writer Yosuke Kuroda adapted the novels. Robert Pincombe and Shelly Hoffman wrote the English version.

Plot

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 mysterious

manacle Handcuffs are restraint devices designed to secure an individual's wrists in proximity to each other. They comprise two parts, linked together by a chain, a hinge, or rigid bar. Each cuff has a rotating arm which engages with a ratchet that ...

that attaches to his arm. A

spider Spiders ( order Araneae) are air-breathing arthropods that have eight legs, chelicerae with fangs generally able to inject venom, and spinnerets that extrude silk. They are the largest order of arachnids and rank seventh in total species ...

startles Hunter, who falls into a hole to the center of the Earth and into the subterranean 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 of

insectoid An insectoid is an insect-like creature. Insectoid may refer to: * Insectoid robot * Insectoids in science fiction {{dab ...

s. The warriors are children/teenagers, each fighting with the help of their own 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."

Oracle Keys

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: # Found in the Oracle's shrine in Arachna, the first key is taken by Hunter and Shadow, who retain possession of it throughout the series. # The second key is brought to Arachna by a page from Nuuma. Hunter and Shadow have it in their possession for most of the series, though it was briefly taken by Aqune and Portia. # The third key is initially kept in a sanctuary in Nuuma and allows the castle to float in the sky via the Oracle's power. It is taken by Aqune for the Invectids, but ends up in the possession of Hunter and Shadow during the final battle against Mantid. # The fourth key held by Mantid powers Castle Mantid and sustains Mantid throughout the series until he steals the Oracle's power and abandons it. It ends up in the possession of Hunter and Shadow during the final battle against Mantid.

Episodes

Characters

Broadcast history

The animated series debuted on March 25, 2006 on Teletoon in Canada.

Kids WB! Kids' WB (stylized as Kids' WB!) was an American children's programming service and brand of The WB that aired on the network from September 9, 1995, to September 16, 2006. The block moved to The CW (a result of the merger of Time Warner's The WB ...

The CW ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

began airing it during the 2006-2007 season. The last ''Spider 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 the 2007- 08 season. It is broadcast on Kix sky channel 627 from 12 June. From September 1, 2008, Teletoon is repeating the

on weekdays. From November 2008 until September 2011, it was shown on the

Cookie Jar Toons Cookie Jar Toons (also known as This Is for Kids) was a daily children's programming block on the This TV digital broadcast network when that network was partially owned by the former Weigel Broadcasting (7 years later, the network was acquired ...

block on

Music

Japan

*Opening Theme #1: ''"Alright"'' (eps. 1-26) *Opening Theme #2: ''"Brave Heart"'' by

Saeko Chiba is a Japanese Voice acting in Japan, voice actress and singer. She grew up in Tokyo and married on her birthday in 2007. She is contracted to the Space Craft Produce. Biography Chiba took up ballet at a young age with ambitions of becoming pa ...

(eps. 27-52) *Ending Theme #1: ''"Twilight Time"'' by MCU (eps. 1-13) *Ending Theme #2: ''"Koi no Keshiki"'' by Tamaru Yamada (eps. 14-26) *Ending Theme #3: ''"Towards a Dream"'' by

Takashi Kondo is a masculine Japanese given name. Possible writings The name Takashi can have multiple different meanings depending on which kanji is used to write it. Some possible writings of the name include: *江詩 - "estuary , inlet, poem" *隆 - "prospe ...

and Sanae Kobayashi (eps. 27-52)

North America

*Opening Theme: ''"Calling All Spider Riders"'' Theme song words and music by Grayson Matthews Audio (Elizabeth Taylor, David Borbara, Tom Westin, Jason Gleed); performed by Jason Gleed, Jason Dantes Balde "Clip", and Annelise Noronha.

South America

*Opening Theme: ¡Vengan Ya, Spider Riders! (Spanish version of the North American opening) adapted and sung by Jorge Bringas *Ending Theme: Calling All Spider Riders (short instrumental version)

Crew

English crew

* David Shaw - Music Score * Melodie Vaughan - Voice Director

Web manga

On May 31, 2006, the Spider Riders manga premiered at

TV Tokyo JOTX-DTV (channel 7), branded as and known colloquially as , is a television station headquartered in the Sumitomo Fudosan Roppongi Grand Tower in Roppongi, Minato, Tokyo, Japan, owned and operated by the subsidiary of listed certified b ...

'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 the ''Sparkling 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.

Tie-in media

Web games

Tribal Nova produced a tie-in online game based on the show, available on the official site.

Phone games

On July 29, 2006, the Anime X site published Spider Catcher and Oracle Daifugo, downloadable phone games based on the show for the

FOMA Freedom of Mobile Multimedia Access (FOMA) is the brand name of the W-CDMA-based 3G telecommunications services being offered by the Japanese telecommunications service provider NTT DoCoMo. It is an implementation of the Universal Mobile Tel ...

-enabled cell phones. A third game, Jumping Spider, was released on August 9, 2006. Each game cost 105 yen.

References

External links

* (former official site: now hosted as fansite)
''Spider Riders''
at Bee Train
''Spider Riders''
at TV Tokyo * * {{Kids' WB Book series introduced in 2004 Science fiction book series 2006 manga This TV Kids' WB original shows 2000s Canadian animated television series 2000s Canadian science fiction television series 2006 Canadian television series debuts 2007 Canadian television series endings English-language television shows Television series about spiders Fictional spiders Bee Train Production Funimation Television series by Cookie Jar Entertainment Television shows written by Yōsuke Kuroda TV Tokyo original programming Teletoon original programming Canadian children's animated action television series Canadian children's animated adventure television series Canadian children's animated science fantasy television series Japanese children's animated action television series Japanese children's animated adventure television series Japanese children's animated science fantasy television series Animated television series about children