The Vulture takes over the skies with his army of birds and demands a two million dollar ransom in return.
"The Sky is Falling" provides examples of:
- Artistic License – Economics: The Vulture demands his two million dollar ransom be paid with two $1,000,000 bills. Such a bill has never been in circulation and would never be considered legal tender.
- Construction Zone Calamity: Spider-Man battles the Vulture at a construction site and their fight nearly causes the entire scraper to fall down.
- Cut Himself Shaving: Peter gets a black eye after his first fight against the Vulture. When Betty asks what happened to him, Peter covers it up by claiming that he fell out of an airplane.
- Exit, Pursued by a Bear: Spider-Man manages to jam the signals coming from the Vulture's helmet, which causes his flock of birds to turn against him and chase him out of the city.
- Feathered Fiend: The Vulture uses a special device in his helmet to control of flock of vultures and orders them to attack anybody caught out on the rooftops of New York City.
- Hurricane of Puns: Spider-Man delights in the number of bird puns he can make given the situation:Never count your chickens before they're hatched! Or, the yolk's on you!
- Monumental Battle: The Vulture demands that his ransom be delivered at the top of the Empire State Building, but Spider-Man shows up instead to put a stop to him.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: Spider-Man disguises himself as a messenger delivering the Vulture's ransom, but he doesn't even bother taking off his mask as he makes the delivery. Luckily, the Vulture doesn't notice anything amiss, allowing him to gain the element of surprise.
Spider-Man is pursued by a robot controlled by J. Jonah Jameson, who will stop at nothing until he finally captures him once and for all.
"Captured by J. Jonah Jameson" provides examples of:
- Adaptational Name Change: Smythe's first name is Henry, but in the comics he goes by Spencer instead.
- I Need to Go Iron My Dog: When Smythe first activates his robot for Jameson, Peter remembers that he had to go "pick up some film from Herman's". In reality, Peter didn't want to blow his secret identity in case the robot started going after him.
- Implacable Man: It doesn't matter if he swings across the city or dives below the ocean, Spider-Man just can't shake Smythe's robot off his trail. By the end of the episode, Peter is exhausted and barely able to swing properly, while the robot shows no signs of slowing down.
- Magical Security Cam: The control monitor for the robot displays a third-person view of its pursuit of Spider-Man, with no explanation of how its actually obtaining this footage.
- Outfit Decoy: Spider-Man escapes from the robot's clutches before Jameson and Smythe arrive to unmask him. Peter leaves his outfit behind and stuffs it full of webbing to distract them as he makes a clean getaway.
- Title Drop: Jameson delivers the episode's title as he starts gloating upon capturing Spider-Man:My moment of triumph! Spider-Man captured by J. Jonah Jameson! (chuckles) This is the day poets will write ballads about!
- TV Head Robot: Smythe's robot has a monitor that will display the face of whoever's controlling it at the time. Jameson takes great pleasure in using the monitor to taunt Spider-Man and how he'll be the one to take credit for finally taking the wall-crawler down.
