Last month i posted my thoughts on a trope which is used often by marvel comics and how Civil War caused me to stop buy any their comics. At the end of the journal i posted brief rant on why the Ultimate Spider-man cartoon sucks. Anyways i would like to expand upon that and talk about Marvel's Animation department.

I know that the 90's was also known as the "Dork Age" of comics and that Marvel was nearly bankrupted at the time. But in the 90's, their cartoons were awesome. Since Batman TAS was getting the fame it deserves, Marvel decided to follow in that format. We got show like Spider-man, Fantastic Four, Incredible Hulk, Silver Surfer, Spider-man Unlimited, and the X-men. Speaking of the X-men, i liked this show with a passion. It helped introduce me to not only the x-men comics but to other marvel comics and it was one of the shows that helped introduced me to their comics.

But around the 2000's, we've seen less cartoons and more comic book movies instead. They had also released direct to dvd movies. But since Marvel has been making millions with their movies, they have stop doing it. And while Marvel has been getting much success with their theatrical movies, DC has been getting much success with their direct to dvd movies.

When a movie based on comic-book or video-game adaptation, i would like for them to be faithful to the source material. Which is why i enjoyed movies like 300 and Watchmen. As much as i like how DC respects the source material by putting it as it is in their DVD movies, why is marvel comics doing the opposite? For example, Since Hawkeye doesn't wear his signature mask in the movie, they changed his signature costume for the movie version in the mainstream comics.

I want to talk about two cartoons that were just about perfect until they got screwed over.

Spectular Spider-man:
This show premiered in 2008 and it was engaging. I wasn't a fan of the art style and i felt that the entire season trying to cash in on the Sam Rami Movies. Inspite of that, I enjoyed the show, i enjoyed Josh Keaton's voice acting and i was happy that Venom got more screen time in this show than in the third movie. The Blockbuster Buster said that the show wanted to be loyal to comics and that spider-man's apperance was a homage to steve Ditko's design of the amazing spider-man. Like i said the show was engaging to a point where i was excited about a third season especially after the last one left many unanswered questions. But no, even when there's was nothing wrong this show it still got canceled.

Avengers - Earth's Mightest Heroes:
Oh my gosh, this cartoon was Marvel's rival to the Justice League cartoon. I had little to no complaints about this show, except for one nick pick. Why is Nick Fury Black? I know he's African-American in the Ultimate Marvel version, but for what i can tell this show takes place in the mainstream Marvel Universe. I have nothing against this, it's just that i want to know why was the Ultimate Nick Fury so popular other than the fact that his looks were based on samuel Jackson. But again, it got canceled after the second season, but at least it ended in a triumphant note. If they were going to adapt the "Civil War" storyline into the third season, then i wouldn't watch this show any more.

Both Specular Spider-man and the Avengers were awesome cartoons, that showed that 2d animation IS NOT taking a back seat for 3d animation, they were faithful to the source material, it had action and good drama and it wasn't dumb-downed to little kids to a point where it would literally insult everyone's intelligence. Oh wait that's what the Ultimate Spider-man cartoon is for.

Yeah Spectular Spider-man was replaced with a show that desperatly wants to gain the same success as the Teen Titans cartoon. It feels like someone's show but the excutives put spider-man in it because kids love spider-man. I said that in my last journal, the show would have been great if they remove the constant humor and the cutaway gags. If they really wanted a Marvel cartoon with that humor, they can do it in two ways. They can replace the heroes and spider-man with the "Power Pack" or they call this show "The Adventures of Spider-Ham". Since Spider-Ham was a slap-stick parody of Spider-man, the cutaway gags and the humor would actually work.

And as for the Avengers, they get replaced with a new cartoon as well. It's called "Avengers Assemble" and has the same roster and costumes from the hit movie. You know what, i get it the avengers movie was a successful comic book i'll give them that, but you DON'T HAVE TO CANCEL THE OTHER AVENGERS CARTOON SO THAT YOU MILK THE POPULARITY OF THAT MOVIE FOR WHAT IS WORTH! You could have just left the cartoon well enough alone and focus more on the sequel(s). So yeah Avengers: EMH got canceled because Marvel really wanted to CAPITALIZE ON THE AVENGERS' BOX OFFICE SUCCESS.

DC may not be gaining much success in the live action movie department, but they sure know how to make some awesome cartoons. Young Justice is practically a perfect cartoon for kids and adults alike.