Justice League animated
I want to preamble this by saying that I was never a Justice League fan during my childhood. I was a fan of Superfriends but they are quite different beasts. Superfriends did a very dumbed-down version of the Justice League in a way only a Hanna Barbera ensemble cast could do. I read a bit of Superman in the late 70s & early 80s but the angst of Marvel's X-Men was more my interest.
That said, Justice League, the current animated series now called Justice League Unlimited, is one of the best animated series on TV right now. Yes, a cartoon but not a cartoon for just adolescents and definately not one for the 5ish kiddies. The first few seasons take a core group of DC superheroes in more or less recent versions of their characters and have them protect the world from a revolving and evolving cast of mostly familiar super villains. Very quickly the producers realized the most popular episodes had plots adapted from well-known & popular comics (such as the Alan Moore Superman story, For the Man Who Has Everything) and those that had popular villain cameos. It also mined the common "cartoons for an older audience" aspects familiar in entertainment intended for children these days.
What I truly enjoy about Justice League, and we are just finishing off season 2 this week, is that it's obviously produced by people who love the characters and the medium.. and by people around my age. They remember growing up with comics where a battle an issue was standard but what made a kid read again and again were issues and plots that mattered. Nothing justifies reading a comic month after month than believing it is telling you important things.
The creators have taken this love and animated it, doing things with movement that could only be done in animation. The battles are so visceral with weight behind the hits and excitement in the flight of the titans. When Superman is knocked back, flips over and rights himself by digging one hand into the pavement, it's exciting. When a villain grabs a chunk of stone and knocks Wonder Woman into next tuesday, you can almost feel the bruise. Oh animated cars still look like blocks and nobody ever seems to be in the buildings that fall over but it sure does know how to make a superhero move!
Now what about the sexuality? I imagine its far too kissy kissy for some kids but geez, some of the sexual jokes have to be over the heads of most kids. And the ones who do get the more racy comments, must be giggling to themselves hoping mom doesn't catch them. The whole Gigantica-in-the-toga episode has a ball playing up the if you are ankle-high to her you might be looking up at her giant *beep* with a ton of angled-just-perfectly shots. I need to find more examples of this.
Yeah, I love the series. I cannot wait to start watching the revamped Unlimited series. I have already seen a handful of episodes and I love the idea of adding in so much more of the DC universe.
