Marvel’s latest entrance into the young demographic is their new Cartoon Network series, The Super Hero Squad Show, based on the Hasbro toyline.
The toys and the series feature small exaggerated/cartoonish versions of all the popular Marvel characters and the show takes them all and combines them into The Super Hero Squad to fight a combination of villains from all of the different Marvel books.
Since I’m a Marvel fan I thought I’d give the show a viewing by checking out its premiere and tell you what I thought. Continue on to see my feelings on the series and to check out some pics for the series as well as a list of the incredible voice talent they’ve gathered to play our favourite Marvel characters.
|
|
In short, this is just a big pile of awesome for kids. For adult Marvel fans, it’s still a fun watch too, especially if you have children of your own to share the experience with. There’s a lot of shout outs (and a few jokes) for the fans that only adults would pick up on.
The premiere episode, titled “And Lo? A Pilot Shall Come,” featured Dr. Doom as the sort of mastermind villain behind the scenes with the primary bad guy being the Mole Man as he unleashes several monsters into Super Hero City, including Fin Fang Foom the dragon. Their mission: to gather the fractals of the Infinity Sword for their evil plans.
The hero team consists of interesting variants of the key heroes from the Marvel Universe including Ms. Marvel and her attitude, Thor and his cool accent, Iron Man and a bunch of cool gadgets, Falcon and his bird, The Silver Surfer who’s literally a surfer dude, an angry and dumb Hulk, as well as a Wolverine and Storm similar to their incarnations in all of the X-Men cartoons. All in all, not too far off from the comics 
The characters look great and they all wear their most iconic, classic or original costumes from Marvel history. They make for a cool cartoon team but with the sheer amount of characters, each episode will feel pretty random – especially with all the stuff they throw into it and the loads of action in nearly every scene.
That being said, if I were a kid, that’s all I’d want anyway. Plus, the more characters they show off, the more figures they can sell.
I can’t stress enough how awesome the voice talent is behind the series – even the premiere opened up with the Mayor of Super Hero city speaking to the people, voiced by none other than Stan Lee. Here’s an image featuring some of the talent you can expect to hear in the series:
Greg Grunberg, Taye Diggs, Lene Headey, Mark Hamill (!), Robert Englund, Wayne Knight (Newman!), George Takei (Sulu!), Adrian Pasdar, Shawn Ashmore, Kevin Sorbo (Hercules!), Ray Stevenson (the actual Punisher!), James Marsters, LeVar Burton (The Reading Rainbow!…err… Geordi La Forge!), Tricia Helfer, and tons more!
Can you believe that cast? They even got some of the actors who played these characters in the movies to do the voices here. Note the love of actors from Heroes, you can see a target audience they’re also trying to capture here with this geek-star-studded cast.
Click to more on the premiere and to see some images of the show and characters…
Loading ...
18 Comments
I will definitely be checking this out.
Although i do wonder, why they felt the need to leave out spiderman, arguably their most popular and certainly their flagship character
voice cast is incredible
NO SPIDERMAN??!! he be like super popular. I saw this show and didnt like it.
You actually liked this show? I realize it’s not aimed at me, but the first episode felt like one long joke about passing gas, which somehow accomplished the feeling that it was never going to end with the impression that the (I’ll agree with you on this point) very talented voice actors were rushed through (or just desperate to get it over with). Lame jokes, also rushed through with no time to breathe or find a plot, or characters to actually care about. I see what they were trying to do here, and could have easily accomplished with just a little better writing, but instead decided to spend all their money on bright colors and hiring the right voices for the wrong and directionless dialogue. Taking themselves to the lowest common denominator. This makes the Smurfs look like Shakespeare, and the X-Men from the 90’s a classic by comparison, hokey-ness and all. I’m sure kids will be distracted by the fast action and bright colors, but this will otherwise probably be very forgettable if it doesn’t get a whole lot better. And as every other review I’ve read from people who’ve actually seen it who are over the age of 5, not very popular with us older “kids” who still enjoy such things, with or without kids, who need a lot more to care about. In other words, lame.
Yeah, I’m going to agree with Erik’s comment. I wanted to like this show and watched it myself so I could decide if it was appropriate for my kids. After seeing the first two episodes that decision was a resounding “NO.”
In a combined 40 or so minutes of running time there had to have been 15+ fart/vomit jokes, Captain America was portrayed as some sort of out-of-touch old man making jokes about Pres. Roosevelt being on the phone, I couldn’t stand the Silver Surfer…and that’s just what I remember. In addition to all that I thought the writing/direction was just awful.
I was really disappointed by this execution since there was a great opportunity to create a more kid-friendly version of the Marvel Universe here. As much as I’m a Marvel guy from way back I have to say DC is doing a much better job of creating comics and shows that truly are appropriate for young kids.
It’s not a show for me but it’s watchable.
This is for young children (emphasis on young). Have you guys checked out the other shows aimed for this target demo? If this isn’t good for 5-10 year olds… what show currently otu there is?
I only watched the premiere ep.
haha, how old are u guys? and ur complaining that the show aimed for young children is bad. of course its bad! if ur older than a certain age.
when ur old u cant expect a script that is ment to be funny and entertaining for kids, be good! please, get some brain cells. now dont get upset by that sentence. it was a bit mean, but seriously tho, do it:p
and u cant say “oh this is so bad for kids” when ur not a kid. ye u used to be, but everyones different, and im sure kids like other things now then before so. but hey, everyone is entitled to their own opinion:)
Didn’t see the show, so can’t really comment on that, but is it just me or is it odd to have The Punisher as a child’s cartoon character? Like I said, haven’t seen the show so not sure how he’s used, just thought it was a bit funny.
Everything is…rounded…and cute…~chills~
@ chiguy,
It’s also odd that Wolverine is still a poster boy for the kids when his primary role is to gut ppl with claws. He always has his claws out but can’t use them at all, lol.
I’ve not seen Punisher in the show yet but I’m sure they’ll figure out some family-friendly way of utilizing him.
watched it with my kids, and enjoyed it. now i dvr it and we can watch it together over and over, they really love it. it great we can share something that i grew up with and something they are growing up with.
@Rob Keyes
I can only imagine Frank Castle’s new gimmick is putting people in time-out.
@ Chris,
Thank you for some proper perspective
@ K.Schlichter,
LOL
I remember the Marvel cartoon shows of the early 80’s. Not everything was made cute by Marvel back then, especially the Incredible Hulk.
Boy, have times changed…
I agree with some of the things u guys say like yeah its a show for young kids and i do mean really young but that’s not the case its marvel characters and some of the best superheroes around like wolverine iron man and all these characters have major problems in the marvel universe like Iron man’s drinking or Logan’s rage not to mention silver surfers distance from human interaction that’s what makes these characters interesting you don’t have to follow the comics to a exact but the 90s x-men and even the recent x-men did great compared to this the point is if they wanted to do a kid show that’s fine but do not bring marvel superheroes into it make it some other characters that we don’t know anything about cause marvel fans will not like to see their favorite characters acting like babies but like i said its meant for younger kid and to get upset over this would be well childish so since its out there just have to deal with it and if u you don’t like it then don’t watch simple as that
well that’s my say hope you guys know this is not complaining just suggesting.
I am a fairly recent Marvel fan and I know this show is aimed at the younger generation, but I absolutely love it. I actually find it very funny and silly in a good way, which is fine beacause it’s not meant to be serious. I think a lot of people are judging it before watching it. And I agree with previous comment, it’s mainly for kids, and I think they’ve done well with the characters considering it can’t be a violent show.
What's your opinion? Leave a Reply!
Go to Gravatar.com and upload your own (we'll wait)!