Recommend me one animated superhero series

[Christopher]

^Yes, I know, for I too have listened to the DVD commentaries.

Yeah, but there are presumably other people reading this thread, and I thought they might be interested.

Indeed, I'm pretty sure TMS animated a handful of BTAS episodes too.

Oh, they did a bunch, including some of the best-made ones of the series. (Check out the "Feat of Clay" 2-parter for a huge contrast -- part 1 is animated by Akom and looks awful, while part 2 is by TMS and is simply stunning. Luckily part 2 is the one with all the Clayface transformations.) They also did maybe about half the episodes of The New Batman/Superman Adventures, not just as contractors for the animation but handling the entire production. (Normally the animation director and the storyboard and layout people are in the States and the overseas studio follows their creative lead, but TMS had become enough of a partner by that point that they were entrusted with the whole process.) I don't recall offhand whether they did many episodes of Batman Beyond, but I wouldn't be surprised.

 

[DigificWriter]

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (the series that ran from 1987 to 1994, not the new series that came out in 2003)


I also second the recommendations for Captain Planet and the 1994 FOX Kids Spider-Man series.

 

[Christopher]

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (the series that ran from 1987 to 1994, not the new series that came out in 2003)

I'd say the other way around. The first animated series was a lot more comical and kid-oriented, and it kinda went steadily downhill -- the very first episode was the best, followed by the rest of the original 5-part pilot miniseries, followed by the next 8 episodes they made to fill out a Saturday-morning season, followed by the first syndicated season, and so on progressively downhill (except maybe for the last season, but I'd mostly stopped watching by then). The 2003 series was much more faithful to the source and generally better-animated, although its last couple of seasons with revamped formats weren't as good.

Although I guess it depends on what you're looking for. The 2003 series is more serious and authentic, but the original was funnier and sillier.

I also second the recommendations for Captain Planet and the 1994 FOX Kids Spider-Man series.

Captain Planet's kind of cheesy. Spider-Man is a classic, really capturing the flavor of the comics, though a lot of its writing is very stilted and melodramatic by today's standards (but then, so was Stan Lee's writing style, so it feels authentic). Its animation is inconsistent, though; it was produced by TMS, so at its best, in the earliest episodes, it was fantastic, but it suffered later on due to increasingly tight budgets and the use of video/digital animation techniques that were relatively crude at the time. (And I'm not talking about the 3D CGI cityscapes, which were kind of impressive for their time though they've aged badly, but the conventional 2D animation being either composited on video or drawn directly into a computer, with scan lines and such and a cruder look than traditional cel animation or modern digital 2D animation.)

 

[Davros]

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (the series that ran from 1987 to 1994, not the new series that came out in 2003)

I'd say the other way around. The first animated series was a lot more comical and kid-oriented, and it kinda went steadily downhill -- the very first episode was the best, followed by the rest of the original 5-part pilot miniseries, followed by the next 8 episodes they made to fill out a Saturday-morning season, followed by the first syndicated season, and so on progressively downhill (except maybe for the last season, but I'd mostly stopped watching by then). The 2003 series was much more faithful to the source and generally better-animated, although its last couple of seasons with revamped formats weren't as good.

Although I guess it depends on what you're looking for. The 2003 series is more serious and authentic, but the original was funnier and sillier.

There was an anniversary special that had a crossover with both groups of Ninja Turtles teaming up while staying true to their own show's style.

 

[DigificWriter]

Christopher, I never liked the 2003 series, which is why I specifically recommended the 1987 series, but I guess I ought to have kept my recommendation less specific so as to allow the OP to make his/her own decision regarding which of the two series to watch.

 

[Frontier]

OP: you've got a dozen or so votes for Batman: TAS amongst a handful of other myriad suggestions. Just go watch BTAS already. :P

 

[Gotham Central]

I'll throw in another vote for The Tick.

It was one of the weirdest but consistently hilarious animated series on TV. What's unique about it is that it has GREAT continuity for a "kids" series. Lets just say that a certain super villain leaves a visible scar on the rest of the series which is only compounded by a certain intergalactic menace.

There are not a lot of eps of the tick so its easy to digest. Anyone who likes comedy and superheroes will enjoy the show's off the wall humor.

SPOOOOOOON!

 

[Kirkman1987]

I'll throw in another vote for The Tick.

It was one of the weirdest but consistently hilarious animated series on TV. What's unique about it is that it has GREAT continuity for a "kids" series. Lets just say that a certain super villain leaves a visible scar on the rest of the series which is only compounded by a certain intergalactic menace.

There are not a lot of eps of the tick so its easy to digest. Anyone who likes comedy and superheroes will enjoy the show's off the wall humor.

SPOOOOOOON!

The Tick is a very good series. It's worth checking out the Live action version as well.

 

[Darth_Daver]

OP: you've got a dozen or so votes for Batman: TAS amongst a handful of other myriad suggestions. Just go watch BTAS already. :P

Noted Will do.

Also, looked Captain Planet up on wikipedia, remembering I quite liked it in my childhood, and I'm amazed of the well known actors that appeared there!

 

[Christopher]

The Tick is a very good series. It's worth checking out the Live action version as well.

I can't agree with that. Only two or three of the live-action episodes actually managed to live up to the premise of a sitcom about superheroes (including the ones actually written by series creator Ben Edlund himself). The rest were effectively just Seinfeld episodes in which the dysfunctional friends sitting around talking about sex for half an hour happened to be wearing superhero costumes. The animated series was immensely better.

 

[Cutter John]

Well, to revive a dead thread, I'll add another recommendation for Batman:TAS. But you'd be missing out if you didn't follow it up with Superman, Justice League and JLU.

I've been recently watching a bunch of JLU episodes on Youtube and boy does it bring back good memories. What a truly epic series.

 

[the G-man]

Like so many others on the thread, I'm going with Batman: the animated series. Not just the best superhero cartoon, but the best version of Batman, hands down and that includes the Nolanverse.

 

[the G-man]

The Tick is a very good series. It's worth checking out the Live action version as well.

I can't agree with that. Only two or three of the live-action episodes actually managed to live up to the premise of a sitcom about superheroes (including the ones actually written by series creator Ben Edlund himself). The rest were effectively just Seinfeld episodes in which the dysfunctional friends sitting around talking about sex for half an hour happened to be wearing superhero costumes. The animated series was immensely better.

I agree with you that the animated series was immensely better but the live action version is still worth checking out, especially the pilot.

 

[Christopher]

^The pilot is worth checking out, as are "The Terror" and "The Tick vs. Justice," the other two Ben Edlund-scripted episodes. One other episode was halfway decent -- I think it was "Arthur Interrupted." The rest, as I said, is just a Seinfeld clone with funny costumes, and I never liked Seinfeld. I think the producers other than Edlund just didn't know how to make a superhero sitcom so they just fell back on the stock sitcom cliches.