Iron Man: Armored Adventures [2011] Season 2. 26 Episodes

Armor for everybody! (except you, Hulk.)

Iron Man and his Amazing Friends! Co-starring “War-man” and “Pepper-star!”

Seriously. Check out Blizzard’s homage to Iceman’s classic means of travel.

After a three-year hiatus, Iron Man: Armored Adventures returned for a second season. It was not a good time to be a Stark. Neither Howard nor his son Tony had much go right, but in the end they did overcome kidnapping, financial ruin, corporate shenanigans, maniacal mutants, maniacal armor wearing morons, megalomaniacal armor wearing doctors, manic Pepper Potts in armor, and oh, an alien invasion.

Does this kind-hearted soul look megalomaniacal to you?

Justin Hammer’s Titanium Man used a derivative name, but was rather maniacal.

The look was even better than season one. The cel shading style still closely emulated Skyland. The number of quality assets constructed for this season was large, yet the French and Indian animation houses produced fantastic visuals on a television budget.

Madame Masque’s 1st season episode was strong. This season’s not-so-much. (Alternate caption: ‘Your costume party date… is unhinged.’)

“How do you keep kicking my butt in those heels?”

Where season two could have been better was in the writing department. Many of the individual episodes were well composed, but the overall flow, the arc of the season lacked focus. The finale involved Gene Khan’s Mandarin, but the set-up was weak. We see across multiple episodes, frustrating cameos of Gene manipulating cruelly a kidnapped Howard Stark. But there is no development of Gene since last season, except that he is less palatable.

Howard Stark says things like, “We can do great good for this world, son.” Gene Khan’s mom said things like, “You will complete our purpose and rule the world.”

So the Mandarin’s ten magic– er, ‘Makluan technology’ rings are actually artifacts from these wacky looking aliens?

Let’s cram season two into a sentence: Tony’s father Howard is not actually dead but kidnapped by the Mandarin and forced to help him acquire more power while Iron Man tries to carry on despite his company being stolen, and just about everybody from corporate big wigs to AIs and even nutjob students taking aim at him, though ultimately unsuccessfully thanks to his whiny friend James Rhodes, bi-polar friend Pepper Potts, and an almost completely reassembled cast of the Avengers movie.

Hulk shows up for the finale, and punches a big alien machine… Where have we seen that before?

Sure, this season’s sudden focus on the Avengers cast was just coincidence…

Who dons armor this season? (The shorter list would be who doesn’t.) Yes, Pepper does, to our chagrin, corporate nutjob Justin Hammer, Howard Stark, even Tony’s grandson from the future, plus of course the entire armored rogue’s gallery of the Marvel Universe. Even non-armored characters like Magneto wore armor.

The Ghost is still a cool character not easily beat. Magneto in armor? Hmmm. And the winner of this season’s goofiest armor is Iron Man 2099. Are those your glow in the dark pajamas?

But the stand out depiction, and the most pleasant surprise of the season was that of Doctor Doom. It was the best depiction we have seen of him since John Byrne’s Fantastic Four run back in the day. A great voice and modulation, and his wacky mix of tech and magic. Okay, they retconned his magic to be “really advanced quantum technology.” It was the only slip up, and unnecessary.

“Kneel before Doom!”

It was great to see young Iron Man, before he came into the fullness of his power, get his butt swiftly and mercilessly kicked. He was totally outclassed, which was a nice change up since he kicked butt all season long. Doom’s visual effects were different and exciting. He was not dumbed or powered down. We give props to shows when they do not emasculate the powerful veteran to make the newbie star look good (Huntik also handled this well).

“Check out my cool stealth armor and space armor. Huh? You think the red lights give my stealth armor away?”

Iron Man: AA offers a fun glimpse into lesser known Marvel universe characters. Their depictions are solid and worthy of them. We can even forgive the shameless latching-on to the phenomenally successful Avengers movie cast. Tony, in slightly unbelievable fashion, cranks out new armor types to please fans of the franchise. (Most of them, thankfully, retain the round uni-beam.) Overall, it is a finely crafted show still worth watching.

PS – This looks like the end of production for Iron Man Armored Adventures. It was a good and entertaining two-season run. We would enjoy seeing more of it.

When in the Hulkbuster armor, Tony needs only say, “Talk to the hand.”

“This commute is really starting to stink…”

Check out another rock anthem theme song. It rawks:

Check out other Iron Man related takes:

Iron Man: Armored Adventures [2008] Season 1

Iron Man (anime) [2011] Season 1

Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes Season 1

Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes Season 2

Next Avengers: Heroes of Tomorrow [2008]

Check out some of our other Marvel takes:

Green Lantern: The Animated Series [2011] Season 1

Hulk Vs Thor [2009]

Thor: Tales of Asgard [2011]

Star Wars: The Clone Wars [2011] Season 4: 22 Episodes

All Your Favorite Characters

(are hardly in this season)

If we may start in the movie-guy voice: “In a world– er, universe, where everything goes wrong for the good guys, and Jedi are ineffectual playthings to be outwitted, tortured, and slaughtered…”

See Anakin outwitted (not too hard in his case) by Dooku.

See Obi Wan Kenobi beat up, tortured, and enslaved. Ugh. He deserves better.

The series continued its format of filling 22 episodes with four or five multi-part arcs. It worked, allowing deeper plots and characterization than possible in one-off 20 minute episodes. This meant the choice and quality of story and writing were more important than ever. A bad writing effort could now sink three episodes at once! That’s bang for your writing buck.

Sadly, this was too often the case regarding the last couple seasons of this series. Really good visuals tied to high school writing efforts. The franchise, we must reiterate, did not do itself any favors placing the setting between Star Wars Episodes II & III. It is the darkest, most depressing era of the timeline, capped by the empire’s complete takeover in Revenge of the Sith. Anyone would be hard pressed to make a balance of episodes in that environment, much less writing interns.

Like all female TV partner interns, Ahsoka gets sent undercover in fetching outfits.

Ahsoka protects the little boy king… “I know he’s a squid, but isn’t he dreamy?”

However, the visuals continued to impress. From underwater environments to desert; daytime scenes and moody night, the visual team knew what they were doing. Considering the colossal scale of scenes thrown at them, and the number of different characters, and the tremendous amount of scene blocking, they did an entertaining job with the writing they were given.

What? Even Hutts get into the action? Nice headpiece. You playing on your X-Box or something?

The series was still seriously lacking in comeuppance. The good guys lost lives by the star destroyer loads, while the bad guys usually just lost a few machines. Bad guy leaders killed indiscriminately for episodes, only to receive no justice, or a quick end not fully satisfying the penalty for their gratuitous homicide.

Sharky here killed for three episodes with incomplete comeuppance satisfaction.

“Anti-depressants we have. Yeeass.”

What about first tier characters like Yoda and Obi Wan Kenobi? Yeah, we did not get to spend much time with them. We got episodes where C3PO somehow bumbled into being a hero spending time with boring aliens for which we cared little. Speeder loads of second tier characters interacting with whiny arc characters.

“Pay attention you must. Hardly in this season we are.”

Oh look, we got to spend three episodes with no-name characters after spending a couple with the droids as the stars… all in a row? Noble clones got their lives uselessly thrown away by a jerky, uncaring  and ultimately turncoat general. But do not worry. After thee episodes of pointless carnage lit by a 40 watt bulb, the general (and his tired plot) did get comeuppance. Well, that’s one.

(BTW, he doesn’t look evil, does he?)

“Don’t hate me because I’m beautiful (and a slaver).”

Otherwise its a whole season of traitors, slavers, criminals, and sith. The Star Wars universe is either uglier than we ever thought, or we just see the seedy underside each and every episode.

Obi-Wan finally gets a part… But he spends three episodes looking like this!?

A certain amount of action could be counted upon, often good and exciting. It was cool to see the bounty hunter Cad Bain in action again. He is a fun returning villain. His multi-episode arc was one of the better. The effects and music were quality too. However the overall feel of the season was not one that we looked forward to. We just started caring less.

The title was turned red for the supposedly super special return of the Sith…

The restoration of Darth Maul was a big deal (he was sliced in half at the end of Phantom Menace, after all). Perhaps they were getting desperate for ratings. The arc was strange, contrived, and a little unresolved. But it was interesting and the saber battles decent. Obi Wan (our favorite character in the series) and Ventress, opposites for sure, made an unusual but entirely fun team to wrap the season.

Huh? Wait a minute… Star Trek and Star Wars? When universes collide!

“Just because we teamed up, doesn’t mean we are going steady or anything.”

Check out related takes:

Star Wars: The Clone Wars [2008] Season 1

Star Wars: The Clone Wars [2009] Season 2

Star Wars: The Clone Wars [2010] Season 3

Star Wars: The Clone Wars [2011] Season 4

Wing Commander [1999]

Okay, something does not blow up every other second, but it does make for an exciting take introduction.

Wing Commander is an under-appreciated science-fiction film with slick effects and solid production values. It tried to accomplish much, and like most movies, did not hit everything aimed for. At times it touches upon poignant themes that resonate with the nature of mankind. Occasionally, it lapses into derivative moments not worthy of these higher concepts.

“What are you doing Admiral Towlyn?” — “Ruminating on poignant themes that resonate with the nature of mankind.”

It also stars Freddie Prinze Jr., who we enjoyed in the role. However, he did use this expression an awful lot.

Our patented synopsis in a sentence: Humanity, still recovering from a civil war, now face an alien cat-like (and poorly realized) enemy who after conspiring with a traitor (cut from the movie) are on the verge of destroying Earth not realizing they are about to be stopped by a fresh faced young band of hip (and good-looking)  heroes with attitude, flying skinny fighters, getting oppressed by “the man,” squeezing in some smooching, and occasionally breaking the laws of physics.

“Look Ma! I’m breakin’ the laws of physics!”

“I’m your wing commander. What? Not what you were expecting? We’re just as fabulous looking as movie archeologists.” (See Jack Hunter & Librarian takes.)

Chris Roberts, the father of the popular Wing Commander games of the 1990s, got a rare chance to realize his vision on the big screen. Did he get enough time and money to realize it fully? No. But was he bold enough, and perhaps new enough to Hollywood to include uncommon, worthwhile themes? Yes.

Chris Roberts does his cameo. (Don’t think it’s easy performing a salute in a skinny little fighter.)

Chris Roberts: “Hey, I’m gonna grab a beer, you direct this scene yourself.”

Dedication, selflessness, (occasional stupidity,) and duty are exemplified by our endangered heroes. While none of them are exactly Audie Murphy (the most decorated United States soldier of World War II), they do personify the brash, indestructibility of youth. They play off veterans of varying character and temperament who put up with their juvenile notions of fighter jock-ism.

Some early Wing Commander test footage.

Jürgen Prochnow plays a veteran of one temperament: Puckered.

Yup. Freddie Prinze Jr. really liked this expression…

There is also a Pilgrim subplot highlighting heritage and faith. This is quite the departure from modern era, faithless, counterculture garbage Hollywood often upchucks (believe us, we know). We found it to be a most pleasing foundation which gives the movie depth beyond that provided by hipster actors and quick action.

“I am not a hipster.” Tcheky Karyo (don’t ask us to pronounce it , we speak Kryptonian) did a fine job with an interesting character.

“Physics dead ahead captain!” — “Prepare to break the law!”

Young Christopher Blair, the part made famous by Mark Hamil in the later Wing Commander games, was portrayed by Freddie Prinze Jr. He was pleasantly likable.

… uh… It’s a good thing we liked Freddie Prinze Jr.’s (over)use of this expression. Now what does it remind us of. . .

Tcheky Karyo played the grizzled mentor with the mysterious past (classic; like Obi Wan Kenobi, but with 70% more grizzle). His role, like Prinze’s, was not one that pushed acting to its very experimental limit. But both hit solid notes within the material they were given, and bettered the movie.

“You young whipper snappers and your fancy armor. When I was young, all we took into battle were these cool-looking camouflage pajamas.”

Perhaps mistakenly, the movie tried to reinvent the Wing Commander franchise. This may have alienated and disappointed those familiar with it. Additionally, 20th Century Fox gave the film a bum deal, poorly marketing it because they were only its distributor, not its producer. They also bungled the release date. All these factors contributed to a rough box-office run.

Hmm. You don’t think they literally meant that it was only in theaters that one day… It would explain a lot.

Buy the toy now! Oh, wait. Never mind.

The production design was instructed to make World War II in space; they largely succeeded in an entertaining, occasionally silly way. Digital Anvil’s computer graphics and pilot displays added interesting, distinctive spice. However one area in which the visuals fell flat was the alien Kilrathi. Ugh.

Matthew Lillard takes it to the Axis powers!

Zany expressions for everyone! It’s the new rage in space.

The Kilrathi were brought to life well in the filmed game scenes, and at reasonable (though not cheap) cost. The “expensive” movie versions, however, did not even live up to that, looking horribly plastic. The producers knew it too, cutting scenes which featured them and reducing their shots to quarter-second flash cuts.

“No pictures! No pictures!”

The flight deck was a big set made from some old industrial facility. (It was later converted into a sweatshop for Twilight merchandise.)

You will enjoy computer-generated space scenes that look as good as model work, huge sets, full-sized fighter mockups, and lots of goofy expressions from likable actors.

Don’t let this happen to your Rapier.

David Arnold’s music is excellent background to scenes which often showcase the wonder and majesty of nebula colored space.

If you like science fiction, and like action, and are capable of tuning out the fair in order to enjoy the good, we suggest you try Wing Commander. Go in with no expectations, and just enjoy yourself.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars [2010] Season 3: 22 Episodes

It is hard to understand why Star Wars the Clone Wars started this season’s numbering with fifteen. Is that not a little strange? A twenty-two episode season… What happened to episodes one through fourteen? Okay, okay, this is not literally the case. However it is figuratively the case.

“Short I am, and small my part is.”

It is a tale of two seasons. One through fourteen written for undiscerning children apparently by writers whose skills were closely akin to their target audience. If they had better skills than that it is too bad they were forced into a junior high writing class box. The overall problem is still compounded by the series setting. That is right at the most depressing point in the Star Wars timeline.

These two still cannot get along. Obi Wan Kenobi and General Grievous have battled for seasons. It is one of this show’s dwindling highlights.

It is hard to explain just how badly written the first 14 episodes are. It is as though they were assignments to students in a middle school dramatic TV writing class. They tried to hit all the formulaic highs and lows, but they were more or less empty. Assignments crammed together the night before they were due. Something the interns did why the adult writers were on vacation.

How about this stereotypic goofball? It is like the show is going out of its way to create such characters.

It would not matter that much if it was only a few episodes, but it was three quarters of the season. These episodes did not prominently feature primary characters like Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker and Asoka. They did not even star secondary characters like Yoda. What about tertiary characters like clone Capt. Rex? Nope. We are not sure what comes after ‘tertiary’, but those are the characters with whom most of this season is spent. Nameless clone trooper cadets, the droids, Padme, etc., or gag -worst of all, Jar Jar Binks. Ugh.

However they did manage to write in Chewbacca. You would have to have a lizard’s brain to go hand-to-hand against a wookie.

Blockade Runners go faster because they have more engines.

We would not be so harsh if we did not know that they CAN make good episodes. Fifeteen through twenty-two were mature, entertaining, and still fun for the youngsters. However these eight episodes, the only ones of worth this season, consisted of only three multipart stories. A three-part episode with super force beings. Weird but interesting.

Apparently there is a contest at Skywalker ranch regarding who can make the ugliest Jedi master.

A three-part episode where the stars have to infiltrate a prison to free a young Capt. Tarkin. While it was predictable, and dangerous if you are not one of the stars, it was well done.

Captain Tarkin versus the bad guy checklist: Crimped brows? Check. Widow’s peak hair? Check. The world’s cheekiest cheek bones? Definitely. A subtle sneer -> Bonus. See him promoted to Grand Moff below in Star Wars a New Hope.

The final two episodes were all right. In a normal season they would rate low, however in this season they were definitely top half. Asoka is stranded on the planet with Jedi younglings. It may be one of the most contrived settings ever, but considering what happened the first three quarters of the season we cannot bring ourselves to zing it much. Except to say that Asoka was all of a sudden pretty weak without her lightsaber after kicking some serious butt all season long.

Ventress: “I told you I would kill the next person who served me a beverage with Nutra Sweet.”

Should you watch season three? Not the first 14 episodes. Perhaps if you feel we have lowered your expectations sufficiently, and for some reason you have time to spare… Well we cannot stop you, but we did warn you. As for the last eight, yeah go ahead. They did not really change the series or move any of the major arcs forward. But that is one of the show’s problems. What can they really do? We know what happens to the Jedi, we know what happens to most of the knights, the Senate, the war, the clone troopers, the stars… etc.

Obi Wan is one of the few mostly likable characters: “…Am I going to have to fight my way OUT of this series?”

Check out related takes:

Star Wars: The Clone Wars [2008] Season 1

Star Wars: The Clone Wars [2009] Season 2

Star Wars: The Clone Wars [2010] Season 3

Star Wars: The Clone Wars [2011] Season 4

 

All-Star Superman [2011]

We do not know if All-Star Superman is based on a comic series, miniseries, graphic novel or none of the above. And quite frankly, we do not care. We are judging this strange direct release solely on its own merits (or lack thereof).

What? Even Lex Luthor gets heat vision? It’s enough to make Batman jealous.

If we were to rename this feature, we might call it “A Series of Unconnected Events”. It felt like one of those disjointed amalgamated movies made from a number of unrelated 30 minute episodes glued together. Additionally some of those unrelated episodes featured weird and unfamiliar characters that had no time to be adequately fleshed out.

Who are these goofballs and why should we care?

“Oh, you two are those famous missing Kryptonian astronauts with the super elitist attitude…” Who? There goes one unrelated half-hour.

Nice hats Kryptonian super-jerks. Picking up TV signals?

“Oh no, it’s that sun- corrupting …computer thingee…” We had no idea what the heck that thing was even all about. Another wasted half-hour.

What the heck? Dropped out of nowhere… WHAT IS IT?

“Oh look Lois, here is a special formula I have been secretly developing that will give you my superpowers for 24 hours.” Huh? Really?

“Look, up in the sky. It’s a bird; it’s a plane; it’s…”

In this segment we also get to meet some fourth string characters that were hardly interesting and made little sense as presented. Samson and some other goofball who made even less sense and whose name we do not even care to look up. Dufus.

Do you really want our patented one sentence synopsis for this gem? Superman helps some weird scientist we do not even know but in the process gets fatally dosed with radiation and is dying so he decides to share his secret with Lois, turn her into a super being for 24 hours, battle some strange sun computer thing, sort of fight a couple D-listers, have a completely unrelated series of interactions with elitist Kryptonian jerks and all the while battles wits with Lex Luthor who seems to have gotten the upper hand in this battle as apparently he successfully murders Superman.

No. Lex Luthor has narcissistic personality disorder?

If you still want to watch this feature after reading that, you deserve everything coming your way. It was not an awful feature, but it was an awful waste. The art direction, music and animation quality were average. The discombobulated story was the part that was sub-par. Overall it was morose and depressing. Superman is indirectly murdered by Lex Luthor? Yeah, Superman apparently dies. We are so glad we watched… *ugh*

So what color IS Lois Lane’s hair?

One of the things we did like was the depiction of Clark Kent. It was good to see his clumsy bumbling, especially when it was used to secretly save people. Nice touch. Some recent Superman features have almost completely glossed over the secret identity portion of Superman.

Although Superman did wrestle with a bout of Kryptonian Rosacea.

Which of the following were not in All-Star Superman?

• Dr. Leo Quintum (Who?)
• Perry White uttering “Great Caesar’s ghost”
• Parasite
• Jimmy Olsen inexplicably dressed as a woman
• Some goofball named Atlas
• Krytonian superpowered Lex Luthor
• Mysterio

It is a trick question. They were all in it. …Okay, not Mysterio, but his appearance might have helped. “I’ll use my tricks to defeat you Spider-man!”

You know, there is nothing wrong with writing an interesting, dedicated hour and a half feature script. One that is specifically designed to make for an entertaining movie experience. We do not know what this one was based on but apparently making a cohesive cinematic feature was not one of the script’s goals.

“Ultra-Sphinx”? Really? You know DC, this is where some people start to have a problem with your brand…

We surmise All-Star Superman will be interesting to a niche audience, but the strange and dare we say -weird? -self-important?  -sullen? -melancholy script will not appeal to the masses who would otherwise enjoy a solid Superman movie.

Check Out Our Takes on Other

DC Comics Superhero Related Media

Batman: The Brave and the Bold Season 1 part 1

Batman: The Brave and the Bold Season 1 part 2

Batman: The Brave and the Bold  Season 2

Batman: The Brave and the Bold Season 3

Batman: Under the Red Hood [2010]

Batman: Mystery of the Batwoman [2003]

Superman/Batman: Apocalypse [2010]

Superman/Batman: Public Enemies [2009]

Green Lantern: Emerald Knights [2011]

Green Lantern: First Flight [2009]

All-Star Superman [2011]

Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths [2010]

Justice League: The New Frontier [2008]

Young Justice [2010] Season 1

Wonder Woman [2009]