From the front page of AnimeSuperhero.com.
It’s time to celebrate the 15th anniversary of The Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, the Marvel Animation series produced in cooperation with Film Roman. As most readers might remember, it aired on Disney XD and ran for 52 episodes split into two seasons, and featured some of Marvel’s most notable characters that have been called Avengers over the decades. Developed by Joshua Fine, Ciro Nieli and Christopher Yost, the show did a great job at re-imagining and sometimes updating and interconnecting stories from the earliest Avengers comics, but at the same time also picked plot points and concepts that were introduced in later comics. Having access to years worth of material, it was a reasonable approach to pick the most interesting stuff or what would make for the most fun or entertaining stories.
For Marvel this was also the first real Avengers animated series; the previous one, Avengers: United They Stand lasted only 13 episodes around 15 years earlier. It starred lesser known heroes (with Ant-Man being the leader) and not the big names you’ve come to expect as part of an Avengers roster, and to top it all off, they all had Power Rangers-like battle armors to wear in every episode. That’s not to say the (actual) Avengers didn’t show up in any other cartoons by that point, they had cameos and guest-appearances in a few other toons, as well as some segments of the Marvel Super Heroes Show from the ’60s which would be considered “motion comics” by today’s terms; they just didn’t star in their own show until Earth’s Mightiest Heroes came around. I guess one could count the Marvel Super Hero Squad Show, but EMH was more general animation, serious in tone, and not designed only to tie-in with a series of toys.
To put things in some perspective, this was kind of Marvel’s answer to the Justice League/Unlimited animated series (which had ended about a decade earlier at that point). Apart from the usual Marvel and DC big superhero teams comparisons, Avengers EMH basically took the same serialized approach Justice League Unlimited had, from the beginning. Though of course, JLU had the advantage of being part of a shared universe and followed a few previous animated series, so not all of the characters were new to the viewers. Avengers EMH didn’t have that advantage, but still did an admirable job at introducing these versions of the Avengers, and developed them during its run. In a way the show could also be compared to the Young Justice animated series, which originally aired around the same time (and is another show that just might get its own 15 years anniversary retrospective in a couple of months), though that show focused more on the younger characters and was a bit too serious at times; that’s not exactly a complaint, since I enjoyed it for the most part, but Avengers EMH seemed to embrace its “Silver Age” comic book roots a bit more.
Click here to continue reading. (Lots more rambles in there)
Does anyone else wish to comment on the show?
“The Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes”: A 15 Year Anniversary Retrospective
It’s time to celebrate the 15th anniversary of The Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, the Marvel Animation series produced in cooperation with Film Roman. As most readers might remember, it aired on Disney XD and ran for 52 episodes split into two seasons, and featured some of Marvel’s most notable characters that have been called Avengers over the decades. Developed by Joshua Fine, Ciro Nieli and Christopher Yost, the show did a great job at re-imagining and sometimes updating and interconnecting stories from the earliest Avengers comics, but at the same time also picked plot points and concepts that were introduced in later comics. Having access to years worth of material, it was a reasonable approach to pick the most interesting stuff or what would make for the most fun or entertaining stories.
For Marvel this was also the first real Avengers animated series; the previous one, Avengers: United They Stand lasted only 13 episodes around 15 years earlier. It starred lesser known heroes (with Ant-Man being the leader) and not the big names you’ve come to expect as part of an Avengers roster, and to top it all off, they all had Power Rangers-like battle armors to wear in every episode. That’s not to say the (actual) Avengers didn’t show up in any other cartoons by that point, they had cameos and guest-appearances in a few other toons, as well as some segments of the Marvel Super Heroes Show from the ’60s which would be considered “motion comics” by today’s terms; they just didn’t star in their own show until Earth’s Mightiest Heroes came around. I guess one could count the Marvel Super Hero Squad Show, but EMH was more general animation, serious in tone, and not designed only to tie-in with a series of toys.
To put things in some perspective, this was kind of Marvel’s answer to the Justice League/Unlimited animated series (which had ended about a decade earlier at that point). Apart from the usual Marvel and DC big superhero teams comparisons, Avengers EMH basically took the same serialized approach Justice League Unlimited had, from the beginning. Though of course, JLU had the advantage of being part of a shared universe and followed a few previous animated series, so not all of the characters were new to the viewers. Avengers EMH didn’t have that advantage, but still did an admirable job at introducing these versions of the Avengers, and developed them during its run. In a way the show could also be compared to the Young Justice animated series, which originally aired around the same time (and is another show that just might get its own 15 years anniversary retrospective in a couple of months), though that show focused more on the younger characters and was a bit too serious at times; that’s not exactly a complaint, since I enjoyed it for the most part, but Avengers EMH seemed to embrace its “Silver Age” comic book roots a bit more.
Click here to continue reading. (Lots more rambles in there)
Does anyone else wish to comment on the show?
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