Justice League: Capes, crusaders
When it comes to comic book superheroes, I’m mostly a Marvel guy. DC’s heroes always seemed more iconic, but somehow less human to me. Even Batman — who has by far the most complex character and compelling backstory in the entire DC universe — isn’t exactly a guy you can go out and have a beer with. And as far as Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, and Superman go (don’t even get me started on Superman), none them ever seemed like actual people to me. They were just these invincible logo-bearers with flawless moral codes. Even as a kid (and I read some — in retrospect — truly unreadable comics as a kid), DC’s superheroes always felt like cardboard cutouts.
Which is kind of weird. because I adore DC’s animated television shows with every single fiber of my being.
Partly, it’s because the iconic thing works so well in animation. I’m just spitballing here, but when I read comics, I want the world to feel like a real place. But cartoons, with their 22 minute storylines and cheap, farmed-out-to-Korea animation, get more of a pass. When Superman shows up on screen, he’s freakin’ SUPERMAN, and I’m not really worried about what he’s doing for the other 23 hours and 38 minutes of his day, or how mind-numbingly slow the staff of the Daily Planet must be for not having figured out his secret identity by now. Also, good voice acting can go a really, really long way toward humanizing the characters.
But mostly I love these cartoons because they’re truly, genuinely good. Marvel’s animated attempts (with one notable exception) have always been pretty half-assed. But after his enormous success with Batman: The Animated Series in the 1990s, Warner Brothers (which owns DC Comics outright) installed a guy named Bruce Timm as the creative vision behind DC-on-TV. Which turned out to be a really good move on their part.
I loved the Batman cartoons, and the Batman: Beyond followup series. And I’ll probably write up Teen Titans (on which Timm had a producer credit, but apparently didn’t actually have much to do with) at some point as well. But for my money, the utter cream of the DC cartoon crop is Justice League. It excels at both the huge, earth-shattering, big-time superhero action, as well as all the little personal moments that made me care about some of these characters for the first time. The writing staff (Dwayne McDuffuie, R.I.P.) and voice acting were both spectacular. Justice League ran for four seasons on Cartoon Network (or five, depending on how you break it up), each one feeling like maybe the creators were a little surprised to get to do one more.
The first season has the core team — Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, The Flash, Martian Manhunter and Hawkgirl (they had to dig pretty deep into the DC roster to find a second woman, but good on them) come together to stop an alien invasion, and then they do a bunch of big, epic plots, establishing the series format of two-part episodes that give them a little storytelling breathing room. It’s good stuff, and season two is where the show really hits its stride.
Then in the third season, Justice League gets rebooted as Justice League Unlimited. Basically, every hero from the comics who was ever a member of the League joins up, and the show focuses on teams consisting of a few of them at a time, usually with at least one or two members of the original cast as well. The writers get to have some fun with their favorite obscure superheroes, the toy line gets expanded by like two dozen figures, and everybody wins. I’m not going to lie to you, though, JLU started out pretty rough. They dropped the two-part format in favor of 22-minute one-offs, replaced the theme music with some guitar-solo monstrosity, and had a few pretty dull plots right out of the gates. (Hawk and Dove? Really?)
But once they settle in, JLU gives us some of my absolute favorite stuff of the entire run. The Flash switching brains with Lex Luthor. Wonder Woman getting transformed into a farm animal. A far-future story of Bruce Wayne as a very old man that does double duty as the Batman: Beyond series finale we never got. And, most notably, a season-long arc about Luthor becoming president of the US, and a government conspiracy to take down the League that’s rooted in very real fears about the safety of the entire world being in the hands of this virtual army of living, breathing gods. You know, like maybe they shouldn’t have a license to do whatever they want simply because they have the word “Justice” in their name?
This, my friends, is what stories about untouchable superhero icons can be. And it won me over. Because when it comes to animation, I am absolutely a DC guy.
You have a limited amount of time, so why spend it reading about things that suck or are only kind of okay? Favorite thing EVER is not a review site. We're unrepentant fans, and this is the stuff we love. Hope you like gushing, because we're about to embarrass ourselves.
Oh, man The Christmas episode! ::snuggles it:: And seriously, Clancy Brown’s Lex: So Lexcellent!
He’s my all time favorite Lex Luthor, including any comic book or movie version (suck it, Gene Hackman). Seriously, after I saw Clancy Brown in Carnivale, I realized that he should have been playing the role in every available venue (and I’m including 17-year-old Smallvile Lex here), for the past 30 years.
I still remember how scary he was in Highlander as The Kurgan. And yet awesome. I think his best role may be Mr. Krabs, though.
I remember being really impressed with Batman: The Animated Series back in the day. I’ve only seen a few episodes of Justice League, but I appreciate the art style and the characters that aren’t typical DC cardboard cutouts or Marvel angst-bots. (Seriously, Cyclops, shut up).
For reals. Cyclops: kind of dull. But a little bit fun with the White Queen in Joss Whedon’s Astonishing.