The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes is an American superheroanimated television series by Marvel Animation in cooperation with Film Roman, based on the Marvel Comics superhero team the Avengers. The show debuted on Disney XD and online in the fall of 2010, starting with a 20-part micro-series that were later broadcast as five television episodes. In the second season, it was one of the inaugural shows of the Marvel Universe programming block alongside Ultimate Spider-Man. The series initially features a team based on the roster for the original Avengers, composed of Iron Man, Giant-Man, Hulk, Thor, and Wasp. The team is later joined by Captain America, Black Panther, and Hawkeye in the first season, and Ms. Marvel and Vision in the second season. In terms of overall tone and style, the series is based principally on the original stories by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. The series also uses material from all eras of the comic's run as well as other sources, such as the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The series ended on May 5, 2013, and was replaced by Avengers Assemble.
Synopsis
The series features the adventures of Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, Hulk, Ant-Man, the Wasp and all the members of the Avengers as they fight various supervillains and other threats in order to protect Earth.
Plot
Season one
As 75 of the world's most dangerous super-villains are mysteriously freed from the Vault, the Cube, the Big House, and the Raft, four of Earth's mightiest heroes assemble a crime-fighting alliance called the Avengers. The Avengers team is composed of Iron Man as de facto team leader, Ant-Man/Giant-Man, the Hulk, Thor, and the Wasp. Captain America joins the team later after being found frozen in ice while the team is looking for Hulk. Future members of team for season one include Black Panther and Hawkeye. In the season finale, it is revealed that Thor's stepbrother Loki was responsible for the breakouts so that Amora the Enchantress and Skurge the Executioner could build his Masters of Evil to defeat Thor.
Season two uses cold openings and remixes the opening theme song "Fight As One", replacing the original singing vocals with that of Nick Fury, voiced by Alex Désert, introducing the show's concept and main characters. Season two depicts the Avengers as they track down the remaining members of the Masters of Evil and end up facing the invasions of the Skrulls in the first half of the season and the Kree in the second half. The Avengers are unaware that Captain America had been replaced at the end of season one by a Skrull operative as part of their systematic infiltration of Earth. The season also alludes to a developing storyline that Surtur, now free of his imprisonment in Muspelheim, is slowly gathering his strength to oppose the Avengers as a prelude to Ragnarök. Ms. Marvel joins the team, followed by the Vision. Many other characters from the Marvel Comics universe make appearances, such as Spider-Man, Wolverine, Scott Lang and his daughter Cassandra, Heroes for Hire, Doctor Doom, Crossfire, Thaddeus E. "Thunderbolt" Ross, the Guardians of the Galaxy, Quake, Beta Ray Bill, the Falcon, the Winter Soldier, and Galactus and his heralds. Series producers Joshua Fine and Christopher Yost revealed that certain returning characters would adopt their Ultimate Universe counterpart costumes for the second season, such as Nick Fury appearing more like Ultimate Nick Fury with a shaven head and goatee, and the Skrull operative posing as Captain America wearing the Ultimate Captain America costume and wielding an energy shield. The second-season premiere, titled "The Private War of Dr. Doom", was shown to audiences at both the 2011 San Diego and New York Comic Cons, as well as the 2012 WonderCon in Anaheim. It premiered with the two-part Ultimate Spider-Man pilot on April 1, 2012.
Marvel announced in October 2008 that its Marvel Animation division and the outside studio Film Roman would produce an Avengers animated TV series, The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes!, for planned broadcast in 2010. Fifty-two episodes have been confirmed as being in production. The show's executive producers include Simon Philips and Eric S. Rollman. Joshua Fine serves as supervising producer and Christopher Yost serves as story editor on the show. A 20-part micro-series debuted on September 22, 2010, on Disney XD, focusing on each hero's backstory and the events that lead to the main series. The series started airing on Marvel's sister network, Disney XD in the United States on October 20, 2010, and on Teletoon in Canada on October 22, 2010, in English and March 2011 in French. According to Jeph Loeb, season 2 would presumably begin around October 2011, same as season 1 and producer Josh Fine tweeted in April 2011 that 13 episodes have been completed. At the 2011 New York Comic-Con, Marvel TV director, Jeph Loeb contradicted his earlier statement of season 2 launch in late 2011. Loeb announced at the panel at New York Comic-con that "Avengers Season 2 will be coming in early 2012." This date would later get clarified to April 1, 2012. Dong Woo Animation, Lotto Animation and Noxxon Enterprise has contributed some of the animation for this series.
Future of series
The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes was not renewed for a third season and was succeeded by a new Avengers show called Avengers Assemble in 2013. On Saturday, July 14, 2012, at the 2012 Marvel Television Presents panel at San Diego Comic-Con, Jeph Loeb, Head of Marvel Television, said of the relationship between the two shows: The only voice actors to reprise their roles for Avengers Assemble are Fred Tatasciore and James Matthis III as the Hulk and Black Panther, respectively. Additionally, Drake Bell returned to voice Spider-Man for guest appearances, while the other members of the team share their voices with their counterparts in the separate Ultimate Spider-Man series.
Release
Comic book
The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroescomic book series, written by Christopher Yost, and artwork by Scott Wegener, Christopher Jones and Patrick Scherberger was published to accompany the series. It was a four-issue limited series. An ongoing comic book series titled The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes Adventures debuted in April 2012, alongside the Ultimate Spider-Man Adventures series. Christopher Yost returned as the main writer, with Adam Dekraker serving as the comic's creative team, while Nuno Plati provided artwork.