New Animated Fantastic Four

So there have been a number of animated Fantastic Four shows over the years. And while I love H.E.R.B.I.E. as much as the next guy, I think that so far the best one has definitely been the FF show from the 90s. It was a part and parcel of the entire Marvel cartoon run with Fox, which included Spider-Man, X-Men, The Hulk, The Avengers, Iron Man, Fantastic Four, and Silver Surfer. Honestly I loved all of these shows, but the Silver Surfer was always my favorite. That said I probably actually watched more Spider-Man and Fantastic Four than any of the others. Of course that time is long gone, and while those cartoons are really some of my most favorite shows from back in the day. I'm pretty amazingly stoked to see that Marvel is stepping up to the plate again with some animated fare. We got our first tastes with the two direct to dvd movies The Ultimate Avengers, and The Ultimate Avengers 2. I bought and loved the first one, and have just last week picked up Avengers 2, but I have to wait for my friend to watch it. Anyhow, I've been very happy with what Marvel is doing lately, and their first animated series to hit airwaves since the end of X-Men Evolution (which I also loved) in 2003, hits the Cartoon airwaves this coming Saturday, and yup you guessed it... it's a brand new series all about the Fantastic Four.

I know this isn't the best quality video, but check out this trailer from YouTube



I think it looks pretty sweet. The show is Premiering on Cartoon Network this Saturday, (September 2nd) at 8pm, during their Toonami block of programming. Interesting time placement. Maybe they're going for people like me to watch as opposed to the kiddies at first. My friend Joey suggested that he thought that maybe the Justice League cartoon started later in the evening too. Marvel's Animation Age website has a short synopsis of the first 5 episodes. I'm surprised that they're not going with Doom for the first episode but the Kree instead. Anyhow I'm very glad to see a guest star pretty early on in episode 4 "Hard Knocks" with The Incredible Hulk. I've definitely got my hopes up for this program. I've heard tell that they consciously decided not to go with the origin story for this show, as they are placing it squarely in the middle of the FF mythos. It's not a continuation of the movie by any means and I don't think technically its being considered cannon, but it is made with the expectation that most everyone coming into the show already know who the FF are, and some basics about them.

For some reason Cartoon Network does not have a page set up for the show yet. pretty weird... Although the Wikipedia page is ok, and has links to more. Honestly we'll probably have to wait to see what the show is like before we can really find out much more about it. I am pretty stoked by what I've seen though. Let me know what you think in the comments.

Oh and next year Marvel is coming out with more animated goodness in the form of an animated Iron Man Series, another series called Wolverine, and the X-Men, and more direct to dvd films including Iron Man, and Doctor Strange. Check out this article on SHH for more info on upcoming projects. Later all.