What Is The Best NOW RUNNING Superhero Cartoon Out There Today?

[November Rain]

Oh then whoops m,y bad then...

I guess The Batman then....but when Spectacular Spider-Man comes out The Batman better watch out it's going to have some competition IMO...

With a full season of guest stars coming in, i sincerely doubt though

just like the batman before it, spectacular will have the whole comparison to its 90s predecessor to continually deal with, it won't find its feet for a while...

the batman is just about to start hitting its full stride

 

[TheCorpulent1]

The difference is that Batman: TAS is a godlike example of how to distill a character to his essence and make him appeal to everyone while still telling fantastic, iconic stories, while the '90s Spider-Man cartoon was just a pretty good cartoon based on Spider-Man. Spectacular Spider-Man already looks better than the '90s Spidey cartoon to me, and I've only seen the little preview clip.

 

[carrrnuttt]

avatar is not a superhero cartoon.

Aang is not a superhero? Just asking seriously how you'd define him.

 

[November Rain]

The difference is that Batman: TAS is a godlike example of how to distill a character to his essence and make him appeal to everyone while still telling fantastic, iconic stories, while the '90s Spider-Man cartoon was just a pretty good cartoon based on Spider-Man. Spectacular Spider-Man already looks better than the '90s Spidey cartoon to me, and I've only seen the little preview clip.

you say tas is a pretty good cartoon yet it pretty much redefined and re-encapsulated a whole entire character which was eddie brock...

so much so that many spiderman fans still don't realise the symbiote had no effect on his persona and had that aspect of the character written into the movies..

heck, spiderman 3 is a poor version of the alien suit trilogy.

although not consistent and not in the same quantity, tas spidey has had an influence on the rest of spiderman's media just like tas batman has.

You cant tell me that lil clip is better than 'armed and dangerous' which is a million times better than spiderman 2 which most people consider the greatest superheromovie ever.

I'm sorry but i feel considering nothing happened in that clip, that's a lil too hard for me to swallow.

 

[November Rain]

Aang is not a superhero? Just asking seriously how you'd define him.

a being with the ability to wield elemental powers

I'm not entirely sure on this...

superheroes have generally secret hidden identities, alternate costume (or earth modes) and a moral code that is driven by some tradgedy in their lives.

most have two or at least three of these aspects...

I don't think aang fits the bill somehow...

 

[TheCorpulent1]

you say tas is a pretty good cartoon yet it pretty much redefined and re-encapsulated a whole entire character which was eddie brock...

so much so that many spiderman fans still don't realise the symbiote had no effect on his persona and had that aspect of the character written into the movies..

heck, spiderman 3 is a poor version of the alien suit trilogy.

although not consistent and not in the same quantity, tas spidey has had an influence on the rest of spiderman's media just like tas batman has.

You cant tell me that lil clip is better than 'armed and dangerous' which is a million times better than spiderman 2 which most people consider the greatest superheromovie ever.

I'm sorry but i feel considering nothing happened in that clip, that's a lil too hard for me to swallow.

Well, obviously I can't tell you that that clip is better than any episode of the '90s Spider-Man cartoon because it has no plot, it's just a bunch of random stuff happening. But I like the animation style in the Spectacular clip more than the '90s cartoon's, which I always thought made Peter way too bulky and never really conveyed the dynamic motion I always envisioned when I read Spider-Man comics. Once the new cartoon actually starts, I'll be able to determine whether it's better than the '90s cartoon, but it looks pretty optimistic right now.

Also, the '90s cartoon may have redefined Venom, but where did that lead? To Spider-Man 3's Venom, which was utter crap? To the symbiote leaving Eddie and winding up on the Scorpion? To the symbiote being so in control that Eddie still hears its voice in his head now that he's rid of it? None of those are positive things. I much prefer the Venom of the '80s and early '90s, when he was still actually an interesting character formed by Eddie and the symbiote, not just a persona that could be freely passed from one character to another.

 

[Green Goblin 1964]

i think Spectacular Spider-Man is VERY VERY promising by that short clip and it has a WONDERFUL team working behind the show...Greg Weisman from Gargoyles producing.

And they're not going to create villains just like The Batman and they're using the early years Lee/Ditko/Romita as their "bible"as Greg said.

IMO all the news coming out of the show is already showing off how promising the show is trying to be and IMO WILL be.

We'll see how it pans out but with such a team behind it it won't fail like the team behind The Batman did in Season 1 to me at least...

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Yeah, Weisman's got his head on right. He's still churning out Gargoyles stories in the comic book, and that feels exactly like the old show, aside from the art and the fact that it's always delayed.

 

[Green Goblin 1964]

Yeah, Weisman's got his head on right. He's still churning out Gargoyles stories in the comic book, and that feels exactly like the old show, aside from the art and the fact that it's always delayed.

Agreed, Weisman actually knows what he's doing and knows how to deliver a great story and that's what he'll do in The Spectacular Spider-Man for sure...Or atleast a kick @$$ attempt to...

Also if anyone didn't see the trailer in really good quality on Marvel.com here:
http://www.marvel.com/news/moviestories.1444.Spectacular_Spider-Man_Animated_Trailer~and~Poster

Also I heard it'll be the first cartoon you'll be able to watch in HD.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

What's HD gonna do for a non-CG cartoon? Blow a line or a block of solid color up to higher resolutions and it's still gonna be a line or a block of solid color.

 

[Green Goblin 1964]

What's HD gonna do for a non-CG cartoon? Blow a line or a block of solid color up to higher resolutions and it's still gonna be a line or a block of solid color.

Not sure but that's what I heard...LOL I don't even have an HDTV so why do I careWhat does HD do for Blades Of Glory?

Anyway it'll be awesome..

 

[TheCorpulent1]

I have an HDTV and I've watched anime and stuff on it. Any of the more recent animes, with computer coloring and such, look the same enlarged to fit on my current 40" TV as they did on my old 20" CRT TV. The high-definition stuff, from what I understand, is more about enhancing color quality and showing greater detail--cartoons have set colors (which I guess could be made brighter/higher contrast, but I don't really see that being necessary) and the only details are the details that are drawn in. Weird.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Double-post shenanigans.

 

[3dman27]

avatar is not a superhero cartoon.

more a wizard character then?

 

[Rockbottom]

The new Spidey series has good team behind it but an awful art style, why the hell do they keep using the big chest thin waste look. I can't stand it, give me B:TAS or Spiderman TAS art styles any day of the week.

 

[Green Goblin 1964]

The new Spidey series has good team behind it but an awful art style, why the hell do they keep using the big chest thin waste look. I can't stand it, give me B:TAS or Spiderman TAS art styles any day of the week.

The art styles better then The Batman's IMO. The Batman's Jeff Matsuda I believe that's the artists name makes the characters WAAAAAY too pointy for my tastes...and out of the shows that are on WB it's has one of the better art styles...

And they went that way for faster animation rather then detailed characters and slow animation...Especially Spidey who is known for his speed and agility...

personally I LOVE it.

It all depends on your taste...

 

[TheCorpulent1]

I think it actually makes sense for Spider-Man. He's 15 at the start of the series, so he should look a bit pixieish.

 

[Green Goblin 1964]

I think it actually makes sense for Spider-Man. He's 15 at the start of the series, so he should look a bit pixieish.

LOL, yeah exactly...

 

[3dman27]

The new Spidey series has good team behind it but an awful art style, why the hell do they keep using the big chest thin waste look. I can't stand it, give me B:TAS or Spiderman TAS art styles any day of the week.

point taken point well taken

 

[November Rain]

Well, obviously I can't tell you that that clip is better than any episode of the '90s Spider-Man cartoon because it has no plot, it's just a bunch of random stuff happening. But I like the animation style in the Spectacular clip more than the '90s cartoon's, which I always thought made Peter way too bulky and never really conveyed the dynamic motion I always envisioned when I read Spider-Man comics. Once the new cartoon actually starts, I'll be able to determine whether it's better than the '90s cartoon, but it looks pretty optimistic right now.

Also, the '90s cartoon may have redefined Venom, but where did that lead? To Spider-Man 3's Venom, which was utter crap? To the symbiote leaving Eddie and winding up on the Scorpion? To the symbiote being so in control that Eddie still hears its voice in his head now that he's rid of it? None of those are positive things. I much prefer the Venom of the '80s and early '90s, when he was still actually an interesting character formed by Eddie and the symbiote, not just a persona that could be freely passed from one character to another.

There were some very good portrayals of parker being dynamic in tas, most of the time it was in the early first/second series and also for important eps like turning point where the animation was on high par.

But then you have to think what did this cartoon have to build on up till then, spidey had hardly been seen as agile in other cartoons or live actions forms so the scenes that they produced back then were completely out of this world. I remember watching the early beginning sequence and thinking he was very fluid while still holding his superhero type shape.

Again this movement was built on highly in the movie and then also in the mtv spidey cartoon. With all of this to build on, it is pretty much accepted that spectacular spidey 'should' provide smoother animation and movement, that is the way of cartoon evolution.

Spidey three's took more from the symbiote's interaction with parker than the actual venom that came across. The venom in tas and spidey 3 were completely different and went about things in a totally different light.

I think those problems you are finding with venom ultimately have to do with the fact he is a very simple character with simple traits and motivations and people are trying their best to reinvent him time after time and ultimately they end up making bad choices.

YOu find that even a large amount of the characters produced and retranslated into comics from the dcau haven't really found their feet their either. It's hard to fit and character or idea formed in a creatively free universe into a long standing one with plenty of rules and relationships already formed.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

I could dispute that there were plenty of sources to take inspiration from on how to animate Spider-Man in a more dynamic way in the '90s cartoon, but frankly, whatever the reasons the '90s animation wound up the way it did, Spectacular Spider-Man looks better to me. That's really all it comes down to.

As for Venom, there are a ton of reasons why he sucks now and most of them aren't related to the cartoon. He's just been mishandled left and right, in my opinion.

Like I said initially, I didn't hate the '90s Spider-Man cartoon. I loved it, actually. But I also loved the first two seasons of ReBoot, yet that didn't stop me from acknowledging that the third season was easily the best. If Spectacular Spider-Man is better than the '90s cartoon, I don't think it takes anything away from the latter. It all just strengthens Spider-Man in general.

 

[November Rain]

why not dispute, I have nothing else to do...enlighten me...

Oh and I think alot of people from our generation grew up with that cartoon and that was the definitive peter parker and 80% of the way he should have been portrayed (most people didn't like his hairstyle but voice, best parts and animation, in-depth thought, scientific nature, relationships and monetary problems as well as his relationship to aunt may and his attitude towards being spidey and QUIPS) was pretty spot on.

And in all of that, he managed to still not sound cool and was still seen as an outsider.

Already the voice animation for parker make him seem somewhat....popular. I hope they do him justice but i am not as optimistic from the little preview as some are...

I was far more excited about seeing superman stop metallo dead in his track in the season five batman preview.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Well, first and foremost, there were the comics. They were developing the cartoon in the early '90s, a.k.a. the age of the Image artists. Todd McFarlane and Erik Larsen were drawing Spider-Man and they were both extremely dynamic artists. McFarlane rose to fame for contorting Spider-Man in superhuman ways, in fact. None of that was really apparent in the style of the cartoon's animation.

There was also anime, which was already known for being more fluid and agile than the standards for American animation. Anime was showing people all over the world that the sort of things suggested in McFarlane's art were actually possible to get onto a screen.

You could also count Gargoyles and Batman: The Animated Series, which showed how active a cartoon with simpler character designs could be. If all of the characters in Spider-Man weren't so bulked up and overly detailed, the animation probably would've been a lot more consistent and fluid. I actually have the same problem with the X-Men cartoon's animation.

 

[November Rain]

But wouldn't you say at the time, it was fluid for america animation though in comparison to some of the shows made in america in the 80s?

I'm fairly surprised you mention batman because i've always felt the dini timm character designs of batman were always hightly bulked up and somewhat always top heavy with those large chests and no stomach definition.

did you not like the fluidity of eps such as armed and dangerous?
I've always felt that physic was right for spiderman. He was adult sized and built like a superhero adult (considering he was in college and not high school) rather than the more child like build which has his powers adapts his skills and not really his body.

for some reason, the whole mcfarlane style type of spidey animation hasn't really translated across for some reason. THe closest it's come to that sort of freedom has been with mtv spidey. Considering how much footage was repeated in the tas spidey, i guess saving money and simplifying movements was probably more of an emphasis to get costs down rather than going all out (which they've shown they could do if they wanted).

 

[3dman27]

But wouldn't you say at the time, it was fluid for america animation though in comparison to some of the shows made in america in the 80s?

I'm fairly surprised you mention batman because i've always felt the dini timm character designs of batman were always hightly bulked up and somewhat always top heavy with those large chests and no stomach definition.

did you not like the fluidity of eps such as armed and dangerous?
I've always felt that physic was right for spiderman. He was adult sized and built like a superhero adult (considering he was in college and not high school) rather than the more child like build which has his powers adapts his skills and not really his body.

for some reason, the whole mcfarlane style type of spidey animation hasn't really translated across for some reason. THe closest it's come to that sort of freedom has been with mtv spidey. Considering how much footage was repeated in the tas spidey, i guess saving money and simplifying movements was probably more of an emphasis to get costs down rather than going all out (which they've shown they could do if they wanted).

that may be true rain or would you prefer november?