Question Iron Man: Armoured Adventures

2008 was a big year. It was the year I did my HSC. It was the year the MCU was kickstarted. It was also the year that Iron Man: Armoured Adventures debuted on television.

For those who didn’t see or hear of the show; Iron Man: Armoured Adventures was a CGI cartoon depicting teenage versions of the Iron Man characters. It ran for two seasons, and covered many of the arcs from the actual comics, including the Makkuan Rings saga, the Armour Wars saga, the Extremis mini-saga, and various other major and minor plotlines. Three episodes before the season 2 finalle, the announcement was made that the show was being cancelled for unmentioned reasons. It didn’t end as dramatically as Firefly. It just...fizzled out. Yet it is one of the most timeless cartoons of the 2000’s.

Twelve years later, I’ve gone back and begun rewatching the entire two-season show. Even after 12 years, I still think the show’s quality stands up. Unlike other animated adaptations aimed at a younger demographic like many of the Marvel and DC cartoons; AA is one of the most mature shows I’ve ever seen. While it doesn’t ever get really gritty; the characters come off as believable, they don’tmake the adult me cringe in embarrasment, and they genuinely behave like teenagers. The show’s art and animation still stand up today, appearing more stylized than they did originally. While the quality is about on par with RWBY’s first and second season (if slighly more competant), the show’s CG is well-belnded with the cell-shader-esque art style.

The writing is a bit lacking in the pilot, with a number of unresolved plot-holes; but the story stays true to the character of Tony Stark, while reimaging him as a teenager. The adaptation of classic storylines is done brilliantly, and the show comes off as pure-hearted entertainment, without any political messaging forced into the mix.

The music and sound design is also remarkably good. While the theme somg has noticably aged a bit since ‘08, the way the sound blending is handled places it ahead of many other cartoons of the time. Helk, I’d call the repulsor sounds in this animationbetter than those in the MCU.

Overall, Iron Man: Armoured adventures has aged well. I would have loved to see a third season, but twelve years is a long time, and even the MCU has moved on from Tony Stark to less...palatable...characters (*cough*IronHeartSucksAss*Cough*). I doubt there’ll ever be a season three, and I’m actually OK with that. Season 2’s ending left the world and characters in a good place, and I wouldn’t want a inferior product to ruin the place the characters ended up in. The world has changed since 2008, and with Marvel’s descent into the insanity that is “Magic Backpacks, Internet Gas; and Snowflake and Safespace”, I wouldn’t touch a third season with a thirty-foot pole.

Tl;dr? Go watch Iron Man: Armoured Adventures

Kristin Darken wrote: Don't like Marvel under Disney's control because its too happy PC for you? Go watch Frozen 2. It's surprisingly mature... and even dark in places.

I'm...not sure when Disney was brought up. Only time I came close to mentioning the delusional mess that Marvel Comics has become is when I mentioned their New Warriors reboot they recently announced.

Which consists of a obese Dora the Explorer expy with a magical backpack, a kid who gained the powers of Google Glass through exposure to "experimental internet gas", a vampire called "B-Negative" (who's the least laughable of the lineup, but is still pretty cheesy all the same), and a pair of non-binary twins codenamed "Snowflake" and "Safespace".

The artwork looks fucking horrible, the characters sound like they were written by a tone-deaf caricature of a SJW, and the powers of the group are just one step above the supermodel whose mutant power is to grow extremely fat and become bulletproof

I have to wonder at that "new New Warriors" lineup. It might be some corporate drone's idea of how to be PC... or it might be an over-the-top parody of the whole PC thing. Does anybody else remember Grant Morrison's one-shot "Doom Force", in which he parodied most of what was wrong with 90's comics, in particular anything touched by Rob Liefeld?

CrazyMinh wrote: I'm...not sure when Disney was brought up. Only time I came close to mentioning the delusional mess that Marvel Comics has become is when I mentioned their New Warriors reboot they recently announced.

Minh, Disney has owned ALL of Marvel since 2009.

Sir Lee wrote: Does anybody else remember Grant Morrison's one-shot "Doom Force", in which he parodied most of what was wrong with 90's comics, in particular anything touched by Rob Liefeld?

I have to admit I remember Nicola Cuti and Joe Staton's F-Men better ("E-Man" #2)

No points for using an intentionally bad character as pointing out how "bad" something was. Big Bertha was created as a member of the "Great Lakes Avengers", an intentionally goofy team. When you have characters like "Doorman", "Flat Man", and so forth, you aren't meant to be taken seriously. This was emphasized when they begged Squirrel Girl to join to be their "heavy hitter"...

null0trooper wrote:

CrazyMinh wrote: I'm...not sure when Disney was brought up. Only time I came close to mentioning the delusional mess that Marvel Comics has become is when I mentioned their New Warriors reboot they recently announced.

Minh, Disney has owned ALL of Marvel since 2009.

I am perfectly aware of this. To be fair, Disney hasn't meddled all that much with the comics side of Marvel. The last decade has not been kind to the printed comics industry, and Disney is much more interested in Marvel's more profitable film and television properties.

To be perfectly honest, Marvel has seen a real decline in the quality of their comics for reasons that I personally believe are not entirely the fault of Disney. I may have a immense dislike of how Disney handles intellectual property and copyright law, but I have to respect the fact that they are still one of the most successful entertainment companies in the world, and you don't get to that position by shitting out bad quality stuff all the time. I think it's more that Marvel has been less careful about who they hire to write and illustrate their comics. One of the things that I feel is extremely unacceptable is when a company selects employees based on their political opinions and viewpoints, or on their race, gender, sexuality, or other non-skill related attributes. It's good to have a diverse range of viewpoints, and exclusively hiring people who agree with your political byline is detrimental to the concept of diversity of thought. In addition, just look at the quality of the writing and art of some of their recent comic lines, like Iron Heart, Ms. Marvel (the Muslim one), and the New Warriors reboot. The art looks like it came from some amateur Tumblr artist, the writing is nowhere near what Marvel has achieved in the past with some of their best-known stories, and the stories spend a inordinate amount of time trying to justify why this character is a hero, rather than showing that the characters are heroes. This is especially true in the Ms. Marvel debut comic, where the main character displays no heroic behaviors, acts selfishly without the sort of immediate (or even delayed) redemption that other characters like Peter Parker displayed in their debuts, and is given the character trait of "Muslim". I'd like to note that ethnic backgrounds are not character traits. They're not a personality trait, and they're not something that should be the sole focus of the opening page.

You can't really call the art style stylistic even. It's the sort of art I'd expect from a indie comics publisher working out of a basement, not Marvel. Who have done far better in the past:



Versus:



The art is noticeably poor in comparison, and the character designs are just plain ugly to boot. Yet Marvel is convinced that this is a comic worth publishing. If I saw this on a shelf in a comics store, I'd have no urge to actually buy it, let alone continue reading past the first issue.

That's not to say big-name comics are all dead. Other publishers are still putting out quality work. 2000AD is still making great Judge Dredd comics. Dark Horse occasionally shits out a flawless gem of a licensed comic. DC (while on the same slipperly slope as Marvel) is occasionally keeping up their with their standards. Hell, even some indie comic book creators have put out some excellent stuff in the last while.

However, Marvel seems to be plummeting towards oblivion with increasing speed. Batshit comics, batshit art, batshit writing...they've really begun to hit rock bottom, and you can't really blame Disney for that.

Rose Bunny wrote: No points for using an intentionally bad character as pointing out how "bad" something was. Big Bertha was created as a member of the "Great Lakes Avengers", an intentionally goofy team. When you have characters like "Doorman", "Flat Man", and so forth, you aren't meant to be taken seriously. This was emphasized when they begged Squirrel Girl to join to be their "heavy hitter"...

I am aware that the Great Lakes Avengers are the "Goofy Avengers", and that doesn't change the fact that Big Bertha's power is incredibly lame. Having a "divine backpack" is something only slightly less stupid, or possibly even more moronic, depending on your opinion.

Kristin Darken wrote: Complaining about how a company like Disney protects intellectual property is not really going to make you many friends in a community of artists and authors, you know.

Let me rephrase that:

I dislike how Disney keeps extending the time that their intellectual property stays out of the public domain, thus making sure that nothing that had been published after 1923 would lapse into public domain. This has resulted in many brilliant pieces of literature and art that would have lost their copyrighted status in 1998 having remained in the hands of their corporate owners or estate holders, which has resulted in a loss of potential for fresh storytelling by fans of those works. I highly suspect Disney will again extend their copyright, seeing as Mickey Mouse is set to become public domain in four years time.

I don't like this, because this- in my mind- is a violation of the original intent of limited-period copyright, and has resulted in a world where writers and publishers have to be extremely careful not to violate copyright for works that should have lapsed into the hands of the people decades ago.

Take Sherlock Holmes. It's been adapted countless times over the last century. We've had movies, we've had TV shows, we've had novels, we've had countless versions of the same source material. The release of those stories into the public domain allowed for a diversity of opinion on how the world and the characters should, would, or could function.

Any person here can see that even small communities such as this one can produce a striking number of tales within a source material. When a idea has storytelling potential, people create brilliant works. When the canon works are released into the public domain, it allows for so much more creative freedom with such works. Sure, it can be taken in the exact wrong direction, but so can more rigidly controlled works. You all know my opinion on how execs with no idea what franchises like Doctor Who, Star Wars, and Star Trek stand for are vandalizing the work of countless writers and producers before them. I know you do, I've said enough on it already. But imagine if Doctor Who became public domain. Imagine if Star Trek was able to be interpreted and adapted by so many more people without the chains of legal restrictions and permissions.

This is my problem with companies like Disney, who will try and protect their works, while making every other work released at the same time or later stagnate under the control of a handful of people.