First Thoughts Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes Promo

For the few superhero fans that have not heard, Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes is a new toon from Marvel airing this fall on Disney XD.

Here’s your trailer.


Thoughts:
Most startlingly is that, from what I've seen on various websites, it appears the series has been greenlit for 52 episodes. This is very strange—most action cartoons generally only run for fifty-two episodes, or a maximum of 65. With that, stations can run a series in syndication, have an established brand to sell toys off of, and can move on to the next big deal to sell toys for. To have 52 episodes greenlighted?

Either:
A.) Disney has so much faith in the Avengers brand that they’ve decided to throw their weight behind it and have essentially green lighted the entire series run. If this is the case, it’s a great idea as it gives the writers a chance to plan the whole thing out from start to finish and give us a full narrative rather than five rushed ones.

B.) The synergy department is paying attention. There’s an Iron Man sequel later this year, Thor’s next year. Captain America two months later, and Avengers in 2012. Knowing that, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with creating a long-running cartoon series to keep kids interested. Actually, given DCE appears to be getting WB off its butt, it would no doubt be the best bet for drawing (and keeping) attention.

C.) There’s been a shift in the way shows are being produced. Evidence leans heavily toward this. Both Iron Man AND Wolverine and the X-Men were renewed, not for the standard thirteen episodes, but for twenty-six. (Actually, Wolverine and the X-Men was created to have 26 episode seasons, but I thought that was a fluke.)

Now to see Avengers created to start at 52 episodes, it makes me wonder if they aren’t trying to stretch these things out and give us more programming over shorter periods of time. The thirteen episode formula may not be as useful as it once was—the last period of television (2000-2009) can best be described as the Marathon Decade, in which children (and adults alike) were inundated with almost endless repeats rather than given new programming.

Unfortunately, I don’t really know anyone in the “business”, so I’m unable to confirm any of these and thus they’re all guesses at the moment.

However, none of this has anything to do with the trailer. Before this becomes a typical JiH-length post, I’ll get into that real quick.

Pros:
- Love the classic line-up. Captain America, Thor, Hulk, Iron Man, Ant-Man, Wasp. Interviews from the writers talk about how they really want to adapt the classic, early Avengers stuff, and so far so good, honestly.

- That they’re going to adapt the early stuff counts as a second pro, to me. Hopefully that includes the roster changes that come with its progression--I want to see Hawkeye!

Cons:
- Tony’s helmet is, in a word, ugly. I could settle for the (http://www.ironmanarmory.com/UltraPower_Classic_Armor__2.html) early design, so long as it meant I didn’t have to deal with that helmet.
- Kang looks ridiculous. I have no idea what the original Kang the Conqueror design looks like (not offhand, that is), but they could have done better. He’s supposed to be THREATENING. This just looks like the head in a television.

No other thoughts to be had, really. I’d love to type up a long, ten paragraph spiel about how great or terrible this is, but…it’s just a one minute and forty four second clip. And fifteen seconds of THAT is devoted to the Marvel “rapid page flip” intro. Hopefully I'll have much more to say once we've seen a premiere.

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