Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes

If you were lucky enough to be in front of Disney XD yesterday, then you were lucky enough to catch the premiere of the new Marvel animated series, Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes. Since hearing about this show many months back, I have been excited about it. And last night's premiere did not disappoint.

The story was based on the first New Avengers storyline, with some unknown threat causing a total systems failure in four super-villain maximum security buildings; the Cube, the Vault, the Big House, and the Raft. Due to this, the super villains break free and begin to cause chaos, and only the super powered heroes of the city can stop them.

What I liked most about the new series is the way they brought together the original members of the Avengers. I mean Iron Man, Thor, the Hulk, Ant-Man, and the Wasp. Though cameos were made by characters who will no doubt go on to join the team, like Hawkeye, and Black Widow, but in the end, it was the core members that made the cut.

It was also good to see the way the characters acted when not part of the team. The Hulk and Bruce Banner both struggle with each other, trying to find a balance between man and monster. Iron Man acts like a cocky son of a bitch who can take the world down between cocktails. Thor marvels at the strength that men have, a trait that they are unaware of, and spends some time with Jane Foster, which was a nice little addition. I'm not really sure if the series will remain true to the characters of Ant-Man and Wasp, as, at least in the first two episodes, he never once backhanded the shit out of her, and she never stood in as his punching bag. Well, I'm sure the show will have a long enough run to flesh this out.

The climax of the show was ridiculously insane, and I mean that in the best possible way. The main bad guy turned out to be a scientist-victimized-by-his-own-experiment (will comics ever run out of those types?) by the name of Graviton. His powers are complete control over gravity (obviously), and he uses them to immense satisfaction. He tosses Thor around quite a bit, and launches Iron Man into space. About the only lone Avenger who can take him on is Wasp, who stings the shit out of him constantly (but honestly, she's probably dealt with worse blows from Ant-Man). It's only when the Hulk shows up and begins to put a hurt on Graviton do they begin to work as a team and bring him down. The most insane part comes in the form of a bolt of lightning Thor calls down, taking out nearly half of the city. The action is so intense that it is rivaled only by the animated film Ultimate Avengers that came out a few years back.

But I can't say that the show is perfect. While I love the animated style and art direction, the animation itself seemed choppy to me. It paled in comparison to recent animated shows like Spectacular Spider-Man and Wolverine and the X-Men. By no means is it bad, just not up to snuff with some of Marvel's other work.

I somehow made the mistake of missing the micro-sides that Marvel released a few weeks prior to the shows premiere, and I really regret doing so. Had I known that the show was going to be this awesome, I would have gobbled them all up and asked for seconds. But I will be trying to hunt those down as I await the third episode of the series, and I would suggest you do the same. In the vein of most of Marvel's recent work, Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes is a winner. Let's just hope it makes it past one season (I'm looking at you, Wolverine and the X-Men).