Tarantulas on TV

[Rigor Mortis]

On Wednesday I was watching Chicago Fire and the two paramedic characters got called in to a guy's apartment where he was suffering from severe facial and hand swelling. The camera pans over and there's a tarantula climbing the walls of an enclosure and the guy lifts a couch pillow up to reveal the A. chalcodes that bit him. The wife explained that he was apparently allergic to the spider's venom, the guy gets treated, hooray.

And a couple weeks ago I was watching an episode of Highlander where the villain had dozens of tarantulas and adored them for their solitary nature. Fun stuff.

So where else have you guys seen tarantulas on TV? I'm always shocked to see them portrayed in any light besides "Aaah that awful spider, kill it!"

 

[MissouriArachnophile]

Besides shows about wildife? Or old Scifi channel movies.

 

[Rigor Mortis]

Besides shows about wildife? Or old Scifi channel movies.

I scarcely see them on wildlife shows so I'd love to hear about any instances of them being featured!

 

[Vanessa]

CSI New York had an episode where the murder was solved by linking urticating hairs, on the victim, to the murderer's Brachypelma hamorii. I was pretty impressed by that.
CSI Las Vegas - Gil Grissom had a pet tarantula.

 

[Flexzone]

On Wednesday I was watching Chicago Fire and the two paramedic characters got called in to a guy's apartment where he was suffering from severe facial and hand swelling. The camera pans over and there's a tarantula climbing the walls of an enclosure and the guy lifts a couch pillow up to reveal the A. chalcodes that bit him. The wife explained that he was apparently allergic to the spider's venom, the guy gets treated, hooray.

I saw that ep. aswell, I was wondering how long it would take for it to get referenced here haha ;-)

 

[Rigor Mortis]

CSI New York had an episode where the murder was solved by linking urticating hairs, on the victim, to the murderers Brachypelma hamorii. I was pretty impressed by that.
CSI Las Vegas - Gil Grissom had a pet tarantula.

Say what! That sounds awesome I gotta look that up.

 

[viper69]

Music videos-- the T owners get paid big money too!

 

[Thekla]

On Wednesday I was watching Chicago Fire and the two paramedic characters got called in to a guy's apartment where he was suffering from severe facial and hand swelling. The camera pans over and there's a tarantula climbing the walls of an enclosure and the guy lifts a couch pillow up to reveal the A. chalcodes that bit him. The wife explained that he was apparently allergic to the spider's venom, the guy gets treated, hooray.

I saw it, too, and was kinda impressed that they didn't make an all evil monster out of that sweet A. chalcodes, but instead made sure to say that a bite from them normally isn't dangerous at all. And I liked the guy's explanation why she bit him, and that it was his fault and not hers.

 

[Vanisher]

CSI New York had an episode where the murder was solved by linking urticating hairs, on the victim, to the murderer's Brachypelma hamorii. I was pretty impressed by that.
CSI Las Vegas - Gil Grissom had a pet tarantula.

Cool! I remember tha Grissom had a pet tarantula! He became mu idol!

 

[Rigor Mortis]

I saw it, too, and was kinda impressed that they didn't make an all evil monster out of that sweet A. chalcodes, but instead made sure to say that a bite from them normally isn't dangerous at all. And I liked the guy's explanation why she bit him, and that it was his fault and not hers.

Yeah me too, when I saw that the guy had tarantulas I thought "Oh great here we go, perpetuating the myth of the dangerous pet spider..." but they didn't go that route!

 

[EtienneN]

There’s a B. hamorii named Janet in one of the episodes of Star Trek:TNG. There’s also some in the series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Even Big Bang theory had an episode with an A. avic and one where there was a whole tankful of them together (which annoyed me to no end).

 

[Vanisher]

The earliest i saw tarantula on tv was in the movie "Home alone" that poor kid had a terrible set up cage for it!

Funny otherwise that in some movies they are totally missinformed whete the tarantula and scorpion they have in that movie originates. I saw B smithis in a Indiana jones movie and that movie was not set in Mexico! I have seen other movies with speicies not from the country where the movies was set, like Predator and some others!

 

[EtienneN]

Also that movie in 1996 or so called Jungle2Jungle. It had some kind of Theraphosa species in it.

 

[Vanisher]

Ahh, Twin peaks! My personal favourit tv show. To make a long story short. A psycopath killed a guy stringing a cage full of Avicularia sp to a guys mouth. When the guy dropped the cage, the spiders got loose and supposedly killed him!
That was a big downside to an exellent tv show!

 

[SonsofArachne]

The earliest i saw tarantula on tv was in the movie "Home alone" that poor kid had a terrible set up cage for it!

Funny otherwise that in some movies they are totally missinformed whete the tarantula and scorpion they have in that movie originates. I saw B smithis in a Indiana jones movie and that movie was not set in Mexico! I have seen other movies with speicies not from the country where the movies was set, like Predator and some others!

Still better than the snakes in movies where venomous species are almost always portrayed by non-venomous species. This always takes me out of the action, I'm sitting there thinking, "oh no a kingsnake bit him, how will he survive?"

 

[mantisfan101]

Not in tv but in movies-
The Aphonopelma seemani from Home Alone
The Damon medius/diadema from Fear factor and Harry Potter
The Centipede that crawls past the hobbits as they hide from the Nazgul from Lord of the Rings(1st movies)

 

[Magenta]

Also that movie in 1996 or so called Jungle2Jungle. It had some kind of Theraphosa species in it.

My sister uses this movie as proof that tarantulas chase humans.

 

[SonsofArachne]

My sister uses this movie as proof that tarantulas chase humans.

Does your sister believe everything she sees in movies? Please don't let her watch any of the Fast/Furious series!

 

[Vanisher]

Or Texas chainsax massacre!

 

[Magenta]

Does your sister believe everything she sees in movies? Please don't let her watch any of the Fast/Furious series!

Lol, maybe. She also thought that dinosaurs and humans lived at the same time. I gave up on telling her any facts about spiders/tarantulas to ease her mind, she plugs her ears and runs away.


Edit: Regarding the original topic, I recall seeing a tarantula(G. rosea?) in an episode of Breaking Bad.