Toon World Order

Archive for the ‘Commentary’ Category

Paul Levitz stood to make an announcement, and spoke about a new strategy for DC to move into direct-to-video animation.

Working with Warner Bros. Home Video and WB Animation, the company will launch a new line of direct-to-video DC animated movies that are being designed with DC Comics fans in mind, Levitz said.

He continued, saying that DC is looking to do a series of titles that will tell the character bits and stories that were important to fans, and will be working with the comic book creators on them.

I’m really looking forward to the new batch of Direct-to-Video projects planned by DC and Marvel. DC really needs to redeem themselves from the disappointing Superman: Brainiac Attacks feature. Thank goodness I was able to watch that one for free on Cartoon Network.

Read more on Newsarama

The Coolest shirt on the net!

The Journal Gazette has a feature on the future on anmimated superheroes, following the demise of Justice League Unlimited. It mentions new TV shows like The Legion of Superheroes and Fantastic Four, and movies like Teen Titans Tokyo and Iron Man.

Also found this comment interesting:

Cartoon Network officials say Justice League has been canceled due to low ratings.

Yeah, and CN constantly changing the time slot , putting the show on a long hiatus and lack of promotion had nothing to do with it. Thank goodness for DVDs!

The Superman Homepage has link to the promo art for the new Legion of Superheroes. Unfortunantely, this show does not appear to be a spin-off of Justice League Unlimited, as many thought after seeing the episode “Far From Home.”

The art appears to be similar to the style of Teen Titans. More pseudo-anime.

It will be interesting to see what becomes of the show, with the current Superboy lawsuit.

Don’t try. Cartoon Network will probably change the schedule again. But with TiVo, I never have to worry about that. With a Tivo Season Pass, I can record Justice League Unlimited whenever it comes on. Unlike a VCR, you don’t have to tell it to record on Cartoon Network, Saturday at 10:30 pm. It will figure out the correct time and automatically change it when CN changes the schedule again.

It will also recommend similar shows based on your tastes. If you like JLU, it’ll recommend shows like Teen Titans or X-Men.

The best part is, you’ll never have to rush home to watch a show, or hurry up and watch a taped show because your 6-hr tape is full. With an 80-hr capacity, you can record without worries!

From Sci-Fi:

A federal judge in Los Angeles has found that Smallville may be infringing on the copyrights held by the widow and daughter of Jerome Siegel, who created the Superboy character for DC Comics, Variety reported. The March 23 summary judgment also found that Joanne Siegel and Laura Siegel Larson had successfully recaptured the Superboy rights as of Nov. 17, 2004.

If there is trouble for Smallville, there could be potential problems for the Legion of Superheroes show being developed.

WEP finally gave in! We will soon get to see Golion and Dairugger uncut on DVD

From VoltronDVD.com:

In addition to Voltron: Defender of the Universe, we are planning to release Hundred Beast King GoLion and Armored Squadron Dairugger XV on DVD starting next year. These releases will be completely uncut and in their original Japanese with English Subtitles.

Samurai 7 premiers on IFC on April 1 at 10:30 ET.

Shamefully, I must admit that I’ve never seen the original Seven Samurai or the Samurai 7 anime series, but I look forward to checking them out soon. I haven’t had a good samurai fix since Rouruni Kenshin/Samurai X. I’m really curious to see how they work Sci-Fi elements into a samurai series.

Don’t miss the end to a wonderful series. I often went to Yuyu when I needed my anime fight fix and Dragon Ball Z wasn’t available. I’ll miss watch the Spirit Detective grow from a punk teen with a spirit gun he could barely control, to a warrior with an awesome array of fighting moves. The show actually parallels DBZ on several levels: (1) Enemies becoming friends, (2) Evolving power-levels and new techniques, (3) Coming back from the dead, and my favorite (4) martial arts tournaments.

I’m looking for any recommendations on shows that can fill my fighting fix.

Click the link above if you’re a Tivo owner.

Tivo recently upgraded the Tivo service to include better suggestions. I am now being treated to a variety of new surprises on my TiVo every day. One of the most recent ones includes the “Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends” episode “Origin of the Spider-Friends.” Here’s a synopsis from Spider-Friends.com:

While attending an inventors convention, where Tony Stark is demonstrating his new computer devised for crime detection, Peter Parker is mesmerized by the beauty of Angelica Jones. All of a sudden the Beetle bursts in through the ceiling to steal Stark’s invention. Peter changes to Spider-Man only to find Iceman and Firestar already on the scene. The Beetle escapes without the invention. Later, as Peter is talking to Angelica and her friend Bobby Drake in the Cafeteria, a fire breaks out in the science lab. Peter changes in a storage room. He begins to put out the fire as Spidey, and coincidentally Iceman and Firestar show up. That night, Peter finds that his camera took pictures when it was left in the storage room. What develops are pictures of Angelica turning into Firestar. This makes him realize that Bobby must be Iceman. The three decide to join forces while the Beetle kidnaps Tony Stark, giving The Beetle access to his newest invention, the Power Booster.

It’s amazing how your tastes change as you age. As a child, I thought this was one of the greatest shows on TV. I thought it was almost as good as the Superfriends! But watching this in 2006, the show just doesn’t hold up as well. I can deal with the corney dialog and silly come-backs, the headquarters that Aunt May never finds, and even the super-computer that shorts out when she is vacuuming, but what they did to Tony Stark (Iron Man) was just wrong. His voice sounded like a poor imitation of James Earl Jones. As I watched him, all I kept picturing was Brack’s dad on “The Brak Show.” How could anyone watch Tony Stark in this episode with a straight face? And why didn’t Iron Man ever show up after The Beetle takes Stark’s invention?

Yeah, I know. Sometimes you just have to shrug your shoulders and say “It’s just a cartoon.”