Ugh…

Updated on September 14, 2007 By Ken Begg 12 Comments

 

Marvel has finally caught up with, and in fact perhaps outshown, DC in movie adaptations.  Yet they have lagged in animated series (save for a few pretty decent Hulk cartoons in the ’80s and ’90s, on NBC and UPN respectively) since the very cool ’60s Spider-Man cartoon went off the air.  Here’s a prime example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHGyLoYy8ZU

Wow, that’s awful.  And yet, Marvel has had several shows as bad of late.  The ’90s Fantastic Four show (and the new one probably isn’t any great shakes) and the then concurrent and equally awful Iron Man cartoon are but two examples.

Avengers United was a stupid idea to start with, since rights issues presumably kept the show from featuring anybody who wasn’t a complete second banana, expect for the occasional guest appearance. 

This is the frickin’ Avengers, buddy.  You need Thor, Iron Man, Captain American, the Hulk…or at least a couple of those guys.  They would occasionally pop up here and there, but even then they had no juice.  I have no idea how you can make a Cap vs. Absorbing Man moment this breathtakingly lame, but there it is.  And why the hell is Cap’s shield glowing?!

In any case, the show’s regular roster was made of up Ant-Man, the Wasp, Hawkeye, Tigra, Wonder Man, the Scarlett Witch, the Falcoln (presumably for affirmative action reasons, as in the comics).  These are all legitimate Avengers, but yeesh, this is like a Justice League cartoon that doesn’t feature Superman, Batman or Wonder Woman.  Oh, yeah, like that awful live-action pilot.  Even that, though, had the Flash and Green Lantern, if very lame versions of them.

Speaking the Justice League:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ffE_2rHAEU

Notice the lack of sucking, there?

By the way, Avengers United was on in 1999.  So that means there’s only about a six-year gap between that show and the Justice League Unlimited cartoon linked above, you can’t pass the difference off on sheer technological advance in the animation field.

Avengers United had it all.   Badly written and poorly acted–check the Witch’s accent–versions of second-rate characters, truly awful character designs (what the holy f*ck is up with Tigra’s bushy limb hair?), simply horrible animation, hideously stupid stories…the show failed on just about every artistic level.

And then there’s the fact that they positively rub in the fact that the show was only meant to sell no doubt equally awful toys.  What the hell is with the ‘armor’ each character has on the show?  And armor that springs forth in order to, apparently, provide protection almost solely to their forearms and shins.  Yeah, that’s handy.  Maybe Iron Man should go in that direction.

Anyway, in case you’re a masochist, it appears that many, perhaps all, of the 13 episodes of Avengers United are availabe on YouTube, each split into 3 sections.

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  • turkish spock

    Avengers United also had a Wonderman who wasn’t wearing a red safari jacket, and any Wonderman who doesn’t wear a red safari jacket is dead to me.

    Saw an episode of the 90s Fantastic Four cartoon in which the Human Torch rapped. It hurt.

  • You are so right about Wonder Man. I simply love him in the safari jacket, and invariably loathe him sans it.

  • Dan Coyle

    Well, you’ll be happy to know that in The Mighty Avengers series that started this year, the safari jacket is back.

    IIRC, Cap’s shield was probably glowing because at the time in his regular title Cap’s shield had been destroyed and he was using a holographic force shield. Or something.

    That story was incredibly dumb, not so much because of the holographic shield but because Cap was so attached to his original shield he couldn’t use a replacement.

  • I think that at the time the Avengers in the comics were also full of B-listers. I think it was all a part of the corporate strategy at the time. The X-Men franchise ha been doing a good job of turning second-stringers into viable series (like X-Force, X-Factor, Gambit, Cable, etc.), and I think Avengers was trying to do the same.

    I remember reading the Avengers at the time, and there was no Iron Man (I think he was off on Avengers West Coast/Force Works) or Thor (replaced by Thunderstrike, I think). I think Captain America was in the book from time to time, but not on a consistent basis. The team was being led by the likes of Black Knight, Sersi, Crystal, and Black Widow. And Hercules was kickin’ around, but without his beard — which unfortunately made him look like someone from the cover of a romance novel.

    So, in a way, Avengers United kinda captured the terrible team roster in the comics at the time. I think it was only in the last few years with Bendis and Millar at helm that the Avengers finally lived up to the “World’s Mightiest Heroes” mantle that had only been a misleading slogan for the last decade or so.

  • Well, the difference with the comics (and I think the fans are always more content when the big three are around) is that you’re writing for fans. They may not be as happy with Hercules as Thor, but they know who (that particular) Hercules is, at least. And they’ll know that characters like Ant-Man or Scarlet Witch have been Avengers almost since the beginning.

    A cartoon show, however, has to reach a lot of people who don’t read comics to be viable, and certainly aren’t conversant with characters of that ilk. And limiting yourself to such a weirdly obscure roster, one lacking even one marquee name, couldn’t have helped.

    Plus there was the, you know…sucking.

  • The 90’s “Fantastic Four” cartoon got better in the second season, actually. The episode where the Human Torch rapped, however, was an atrocity that made me want to gouge out my eyes and ears.

  • Jack Spencer

    “Written by Len Wein”

    ?!?

  • Ed Richardson

    Nothing will ever top the Spiderman cartoon of 1981.

    http://spider-man.toonzone.net/

    ‘Nuff said.

  • hk6909

    Are you guys nuts?! This is the best cartoon ever!

    Okay, no it isn’t. But it’s better than Bibleman.

  • mitch

    Has anybody here seen the 1960s Spiderman cartoons lately? The first season is fun, but the later episodes, the ones Ralph Bakshi had a hand in, are sometimes amazingly bad. I actually like the Bakshi designs for backgrounds and monsters, and the crazy music, but there are so many animation errors, and then you have entire episodes redone with slightly different dialouge and images. It is mindboggling. I think those Bakshi episodes are prime candidates for the sort of treatment Ken gives to episodes of The SuperFriends.

  • BeckoningChasm

    I bought the Fantastic Four set and couldn’t believe how awful it was (Annihilus shouldn’t look adorable, damn it!). That was the first two disks.

    The second two disks, on the other hand, made a quantum leap in quality and are pretty good. The reason, I think is that Larry Houston became the producer (he produced the 90’s X-Men cartoon, which was pretty good, too).

    Granted, the second season had a really bad episode where the Impossible Man and Super-Skrull had a fight (Impossible Man should not be like Robin Williams!). Most were way better than that, though.

  • Dillon

    I seem to remember them playing Hawkeye as the team’s hothead, Wolverine type. Specifically, he was in constant conflict with the Falcon over their lack of mutual respect.

    Also, the Zodiac! Taurus appeared in the first episode, or some such, and he’s the only other thing I remember about that show. Anyone else wonder why Taurus got to be the leader?

    Also, Ken, what do you think about the other Marvel animated series, like the 90’s Spider-
    Man series, the MTV Spider-Man, or X-Men Evolution?