Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Discuss: the new Avengers Assemble cartoon

Karen: Over Memorial Day weekend, Disney XD previewed two episodes of this new animated show, which hews more closely to the Marvel films than the previous Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes cartoon did. If you saw it, let's hear what you thought. If not, here's a clip below:


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14 comments:

J.A. Morris said...

Maybe I'll elaborate when I'm a tad more awake, but I thought it was okay. But the previous Avengers toon was better.

June 5, 2013 at 6:23 AM
dbutler16 said...

J.A. Morris took the words right out of my mouth, or out of my keyboard, I suppose. They obviously tried to pattern the cartoon after the movie version of the Avengers. While it was pretty good, the EMH cartoon that got cancelled in favor of this was far better.
And what's up with those silly sunglasses Hawkeye is wearing?

June 5, 2013 at 7:41 AM
Anonymous said...

Ya ever get the idea they're trying to reincarnate Green Arrow? I mean the real Green Arrow...Ollie Queen. Since D.C. decided to make him a refugee from the Backstreet Boys, I guess maybe Marvel should do something with it, to wit, Hawkeye, make him a buddy of Thor, which might humaninze him a little. Not sure I care anymore.

June 5, 2013 at 7:54 AM
david_b said...

Yeah, it's tepid crap.

Sure, it brings the movie to the animated weekly series format, but where's the originality, where's the nice fun flavor the EMH had, where's the kooky, early Avengers spirit EMH channeled, and YES..,

Where's Hawkeye's mask..?

I know the movie didn't have it, but if you recall, besides some incredible archery skills, Clint's character got buried in the film.

I know it's typically a easy, profitable move to move an established movie franchise to a weekly animated format ('Real Ghostbusters' and Batman:TAS anyone..?) but when compared to a richer, more original predecessor, I suspect most young watchers (who've already purchased the DVD sets and stuff..) will say 'Nice to see, but where's the other series..?'

I understand they've only showed a couple of episodes, but for most of us older folk, it was cool to see so many original storylines and characters woven into the mix of EMH.

Remember our anticipation in the BAB Suggestion Box the episode when the Vision would finally arrive..?

Sure this new series channels the movie feel, but y'know..., 'been there, done that'.


June 5, 2013 at 8:24 AM
Karen said...

Based on just the two episodes shown, I felt that it was no where near as good as Earth's Mightiest Heroes. In an effort to bring it in line with the movie universe, they've dumbed things down and lost the charm of the previous animated effort.I've read that the Avengers roster we've seen is it -there won't be any more! That seems incredibly stupid.

EMH capitalized on 50+ years of Marvel history, utilizing well known characters and storylines, but altering them to work in their format. It was a real kick to see so many familiar faces done in a new way. The Avengers themselves retained their core personalities from the comics. The writers understood what made the characters work, much as the writers of the Justice League animated series had understood the DC characters.

Now it's possible things may get better with this new cartoon, but right now, it seems pretty much to be a rock 'em sock 'em show with a lot of crappy one-liners and little room for character development or subtlety. Time will tell I suppose, and I'll watch it for at least a little while and give it a chance. But so far, I'm not that excited about it.

June 5, 2013 at 10:05 AM
William said...

Disney managed to take the best Marvel based animated series ever produced, "Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes", and replace it with one of the worst, "Avengers Assemble".

I don't know what was worse, the flat, stiff animation that looked like it was leftover from the 1990's X-Men show, the god-awful, corny writing with dialogue that seemed like it was written by a 12-year old, or the terrible voice acting that was so bad, I wanted to reach through the TV and punch the guy playing Iron Man in the face. What happened to the guy who voiced Iron Man in EMH? He was great!

This show is proof positive that there is a downside to us finally getting cool live-action superhero movies. That is that the "movie versions" of our beloved comic characters now become the standard, mainstream versions. So, before long, we no longer see the classic looks of characters like Spider-Man, Iron Man, Thor, Batman, or Superman, etc. on things like action figures, video games, lunch boxes, or animated TV shows. And before you know it, those iconic images will disappear from the public consciousness.

I fear we will likely never again get anymore animated series based on the classic comic book versions of superheroes. So, instead of excellent show, steeped in classic Avengers history, like "Earth's Mightiest Heroes", we get juvenile garbage like "Avengers Assemble".

Thankfully, EMH ran for 2 full seasons, and I own the whole series on DVD. Think I'll watch it all again to get the bad taste of AA out of mouth.

June 5, 2013 at 10:22 AM
Anonymous said...

Karen, I agree completely. Any animated series is gonna have to be pretty fantastic to measure up to Justice League or Justice League Unlimited...I just don't see it happening with Marvel.

June 5, 2013 at 10:27 AM
Mike said...

William has a really good point in his comment. I think the problem is with comic books in general - a lot of kids just aren't reading them anymore. That's why the overwhelming rating on the ones I see published is "Teen+". Its frustrating for me as my son is at the age where he's just starting to read and I can't find one doggone comic book at my local shop that is suitable for him. Back in my day (dang, I feel old now), everything was pretty much suitable for everybody. That's not true anymore. So the only way kids know these characters are from the big budgeted movies, ... so I'm afraid soon that's all that we're gonna get.

That being said, if my boy starts watching this I'll probably watch it with him. It doesn't look like something he'd get into though. Right now he's big on "Teen Titans Go!" and I'm really glad for that ... that's actually a pretty funny show!

June 5, 2013 at 10:44 AM
Anonymous said...

To respond to Mike...I don't have any kids, but as a 44 year-old, I'm not sure I'd want my kids (if I had em') reading most comics as they are now, as opposed to how they were when I (we?) were young. I'm not sure where the medium is going. I know my nephews were never much interested in it. I'd hate to imagine a world where kids don't still dig comics...for me, it was one of the coolest things I remember from that period. I guess maybe we just have to wince and grit our teeth and accept change. But I don't blame you for not liking it. I don't either.

June 5, 2013 at 12:03 PM
dbutler16 said...

Mike, when my son is old enough to read, I am going to get him started on my old back issues, which I luckily still have. That solves the problem of modern comics not being suitable for kids.
I know that DC had a "Johnny DC" line meant for younger kids, and maybe Marvel had the same sort of thing. Is that still around?

June 5, 2013 at 12:53 PM
Marc said...

Same here dbutler! My daughter is already eying my collection, provided once she is old enough to read, the torch shall be passed on to her.

EMH was such a great series, such a shame it was cancelled and replaced with this incarnation. I read somewhere, that this new series won't have any serial episodes. All story lines will have to be resolved in each half hour time slot. The reason being they don't think kids can follow along with cliff hangers. what kind of malarkey is that?

June 5, 2013 at 2:43 PM
Humanbelly said...

One has to assume that Disney is now being operated entirely by people who a)have never had kids of their own, ever, nor had contact w/ any in their extended families, or b) were never actually children themselves.

Sponsers in the golden age of radio discovered the GOLD MINE that serialized adventures represented 'cause kids were GLUED to the story once they got involved and would go to ridiculous lengths not to miss any episode. How many of us skipped school to catch a crucial episode of Dark Shadows?? Was ANYTHING more compelling than a "Continued Next Week" episode of any favorite program???

Kids aren't different now, for god's sake. . . oh, the stupidity. . .

HB

June 5, 2013 at 4:03 PM
William said...

To expand on my earlier comment about the movie versions of superheroes replacing the comic versions, I have a little story about my 12 year old nephew.

When the "Amazing Spider-Man" movie came out, we took him to see it, and afterward I asked how he liked it. He said it was good except for the fact that Spider-Man's web-shooters were all wrong. When I asked him what he meant, he said (and I paraphrase) because Spider-Man's webs are supposed to come right of his wrists, and this Spider-Man had to use mechanical web-shooters, which wasn't right.

Needless to say that I had to set him straight, and I told him that the older (Sam Rami) Spider-Man movies were in fact the ones that got it wrong. I explained that in the comics Spider-Man has always had mechanical web-shooters from the very beginning, and that the new Spider-Man movie actually got that part right. It took some convincing, but he finally came around.

So, I have to assume that there is a whole generation of kids out there that think that the "real" Spider-Man is the Sam Rami movie version, and that he is supposed to have organic web-shooters, and the comics have got it all wrong. Arrrg.

I can just imagine what kind of damage the "Man of Steel" movie is going to do to Superman's comic book legacy.

June 6, 2013 at 12:32 AM
Murray said...

Well past the expiry date of this discussion, but I must invest my two-bits.

"To Be Continued" was the absolute bane of my comic book existence growing up. Back in the once-upon-a-time, we didn't have dedicated comic book stores or "pull lists". We were at the whim of the store owner who had a twirly rack of "funny books" that was an insignificant part of his monthly inventory. It wasn't until a couple of decades later I managed to read the Part 2 of many of those childhood tales.

TV is different, of course. I had no problem with that. "Batman" and "Lost in Space" always had cliffhanger endings. But TV worked on a predictable schedule. O', the cursing and wailing if some stupid politician or news thing preempted my Part 2!

"Done in one" stories are too cramped. But I might agree that a season-spanning story arc is too much for the average kid. Two or three episode stories and move on.

On the other topic, more people will be exposed to the webslinger in the opening weekend of any Spider-Man movie than will read five or so years of the comic. Comics are essentially the R&D lab for future movies, keeping the copyrights and trademarks warm. So very sad, but that's the way it is.

August 11, 2013 at 12:47 PM

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