Sorry for the irregular posts recently, my work situation will be changing a lot over the next few months, so for now, posts will be Monday and Friday. Once things settle, we'll probably have a new schedule again, sorry, it's just how things are right now.
Hey there, are you looking for a programme with lots of references to Marvel Comics deep lore, Stan Lee cameos and more characters than you can count? Well look no further than The Superhero Squad Show, a two-season masterpiece that you probably skipped over because it's marketed to young children, but may well be one of the best Marvel animated programmes ever made. Make no mistake, this is a programme for children, complete with a shocking lack of violence, fart jokes and two-dimensional characters, but never have I seen any other Marvel multimedia production reference Artie Simek (famous Silver Age letterer) or George Clinton. Hell, The Superhero Squad Show makes Herbie the Robot a fun and interesting character, how about them apples? The broader narrative, of first trying to rebuild the Infinity Sword, then saving the universe from the "Dark Surfer", is pretty basic, but so much care and effort has gone into each episode that it's very hard to not be charmed straight away.
Even a person so versed on Marvel deep-lore as myself, I found myself having to reach for my Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe on occasion to remember who Jack Russel (Werewolf By Night) or Santana were. Seriously, there's an episode where the main antagonist is Plantman! Which is also a great episode because Wolverine is sick of the Superhero Squad, so joins Captain America's "All-Captains Squad", featuring Captain Brazil, Captain Australia, Captain Britain and Captain Luxembourg. Wolverine, of course, becomes Captain Canada, a repaint I'll have to do at some stage. Whilst there are no appearances of Spider-Man and his associated characters, and few X-Men to be seen, the spread of other characters is brilliant, from Adam Warlock to Zabu, there's a chance your favouirte obscure hero or villain is in there somewhere. New hero Repteal is a tad underused, but I never found him as annoying as some seem to, but replacing him with Scarlet Witch in the second season provides some nice balance that the programme was lacking.
As an extra treat, each episode is named after a classic comic, a fun little device I wish I saw more often, especially given the huge history of the 616 Marvel Universe. The Mayor of Superhero City is played by Stan Lee, who even gets a couple of episodes to develop, though he's clearly not a voice actor, and those episodes aren't the best in the series. The Superhero Squad Show gets to have a lot of fun playing with iconic stories and characters, from "The Ballard of Beta-Ray Bill" to "Planet Hulk", seeing these places and people played for laughs is very enjoyable once you get used to the younger tone. Oh, and the theme song is great! The Season 1 version is probably a little better, but both rock hard and really need a reference in the MCU at some stage, for sure. I really enjoyed The Superhero Squad Show, though I'll admit I tended to only watch a couple of episodes at a time, and it was good to see some of these characters and ideas I love taken a little less seriously for a change. Time to Hero Up!
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