#source: avengers earths mightiest heroes

[incorrectshantaequotes]

Tubeworm Siren: I am a siren general, and I will meet my end with pride.

Zapple, nodding: I'm going to meet mine with kicking and screaming.

[tf2incorrectquotes]

Soldier: I AM A TRUE AMERICAN, AND I WILL MEET MY END WITH PRIDE!

Scout: And I'm going to meet mine with kicking and screaming!

[stardust948]

[Held hostage by Ozai loyalists]

Zuko: I am the Firelord! I will face my end with honor!

Sokka: Yeah, I will face mine kicking and screaming.

[one-half-guy]

Scourge: Hey, Silver, if you are from the future, how many punches will I hit you today?

[bbu-fan-blog]

Elaine: I am a proud pirate queen, and I will meet my end with pride!

Scrimshaw: I'm gonna meet mine with kicking and screaming.

[fillxsargeloverfan]

Me:Wake up sleepyhead!

Steve:Why?

Tony:The fuck man.

Me:Ohh!

[purrtylilith]

"Avengers' Amusing Mishap"

Wanda and You were sitting in the common area of the Avengers' headquarters, having a casual conversation after a recent mission. The room was filled with a comfortable silence, broken only by the occasional banter between the team members.

Wanda, always keen on picking up on details, noticed the assortment of bruises on You's neck, chest, and belly. With a playful grin, she leaned in and asked, "The mission must be rough, huh?"

You raised an eyebrow, slightly confused, and replied, "What?"

Wanda's grin widened, and she pointed at the telltale marks on You's skin. "You have a lot of bruises on your neck and on your chest and belly, too."

You chuckled, realizing that Wanda had misunderstood the source of those marks. "Oh, yeah, no, the mission went great. These are hickeys. So yeah, after the mission, Nat wasn't feeling too great and started making out with me till-"

Before You could finish your sentence, Nat, who had been quietly sitting nearby, decided to chime in with a mischievous smirk. "Yeah, till it got heated and I started-"

Wanda interrupted them, her face turning slightly red, "Okay, okay, stop with the details, you horny bitches."

You and Nat burst into laughter, thoroughly enjoying Wanda's reaction. They shared a knowing look, and You playfully added, "Well, you asked about the bruises, Wanda. We're just providing the details."

The room filled with laughter as the team members enjoyed this light-hearted moment. The Avengers had faced countless challenges and threats, but it was the bond between them that made their home truly special. In that moment, they were not just Earth's mightiest heroes; they were a family that could find humor even in the most unconventional of situations.

[popculturebuffet]

Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes Retrospective Part 1: Breakout (Episodes 1-7) (Comissioned by WeirdKev27)

Assemble all you happy people and welcome to the first of many looks at one of the greatest cartoons in marvel history, an adaptation that honors the source material while streamlining and improving it to create something impressive. One of the best adaptations and one of the last before the MCU was in full force. It's a show unlike any other, it's Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes.

And the timing isn't concidential. While i'm a few months off, this year marks the 60th anniversary of the avengers, the first time the team assembled and hulk was a clown for a bit because the 60s. And since I both hadn't really talked about the Avengers on this blog despite being a massive marvel nerd and because i'd rewatched this very arc a few months back, I was happy to jump on it when Kev suggested this. He won't be sticking around for the rest of the retrospective, but I plan to cover this series on and off for the foreseable future as i've only seen about half of it and hadn't rewatched it in years and it was about damn time I did. And i'm glad I am as this is one of the sharpest shows in marvel history.

For those less familiar Earth's Mightiest heroes was a cartoon that ran for two seasons from 2010 to 2012, and was a fan faviorite for most comic nerds like myself, as what I caught of it I love. It's not hard to see why either: EMH is a giant love letter to the Avengers history and Marvel in general: Ciro Nireli, Christopher Yost and Joshua fine, who developed the show, all were clearly fans and thus try to cram as many iconic foes for each of the avengers as they could into this show, from cameos to arc villians to our big threats, just about every major avengers threat you could want makes it's way into season 1.

It's also a smart remix: The show takes after the earliest days of the team, starting with the original roster of Iron Man (Tony Stark), Ant-Man/Giant Man (Hank Pym), Wasp (Janet-Van Dyne), Hulk, and Thor (Odinson), while soon adding cap as happened in the comics, as well as adding longtime mainstays hawkeye and black panther soon into the season, with many of season 1's episodes adapting early avengers tales and the art style is a very stylistic jack kirby style art, while still being it's own thing with a bit more expression and some anime styling in the eyes and how the action unfolds.

That said it's clear the crew was also aware those early tales could use a coat of paint and thus the series takes from all across the heroes histories, combining Kang's first apperance with the later epic kang dynasty for instance, or setting up Carol Danvers becoming Ms Marvel as soon as Captain Marvel debuts. It's a streamlined approach that feels like what the ultimates should've been: honoring the past but looping in the present, with the classic avengers being assembled using the breakout arc from the new avengers. More ont hat later. The result is a fresh take on the cast that feels awesome.

It also feels unique as this was before a LOT of change swept through the marvel universe and productions: the x-men and the ff still show up beofre their LONG unecessary hiatus due to marvel being dicks about not owning either's film rights, the mcu was just budding so only iron man is modeled after that version as Cap and Thor's films would air the same year as EMH, and Black Widow is a recurring character rather than part of the team, though it was hinted they might have her join up eventually.

It also happened before a lot of comics biggest events of the 2010s, which like the MCU stuff isn't bad at all, it's just neat to see just how diffrent things were: Carol Danvers wasn't captain marvel yet, next gen heroes like Ms Marvel or Miles Morales weren't around, and ideas like Jane as Thor or Sam Wilson as Cap hadn't happened. It's an intresting time capusle of a comics brand before it changed forever.

So opening this capusle is a treat. As for this batch of episodes, EMH started in a unique way: With shorts. See at the time cartoons were just starting to captalize on the concepts of minisodes, tiny shorts in continuity usually distributed via youtube. Most shows just have some skits, like Lapis trying to destroy her phone thinking Steven's trapped or Tilly Green getting buried in cats

EMH decided to get ambitious with theres: TWENTY shorts, all from what I can tell intended to be repackaged as full episodes, all setting up important stuff for the series and serving as introductions to our main cast before they all assemble properly, including later additions Captain America, Hawkeye and Black Panther.

It's an approach I respect: much like the MCU was doing around the same time, it allows the writers to set up each character, get to know who they are as a person, what their deal is and put them into place for the series proper, essentially giving them their own solo series like they had in the comics. It's a great idea and makes these feel like characters who had their own lives and plenty of adventures BEFORE we step into them, and makes the idea of them coming together all the more awesome. It also fits the avengers well: the x-men and fantastic four are largely their own spheres of the marvel universe and most members of those teams were created for them. With the avengers it's marvels' best and brightest all assembled into one massive dream team, so showing said team's adventures. We even get setup for later additions to the team: Black Panther gets a short detailing his origin story and Hawkeye is a key part of hulks before getting his own.

I have only two gripes with this setup: the first is that it's long. It's well done and important but it's still a LOT of setup, and both times i've found myself happy to get to the end: Glad I took the journey but thankful we can get to the main event.

The other is the structure: as a result of them being shorts every non-thor episode here has one segment that serves as an epilogue to the others.. but really dosen't lead as effortlessly in. It feels like the episode ended and we're now just in an extended post credit's sequence. Not a bad one, all of these are necessary and important, it just shows why this type of structure wasn't repeated: it has it's limits, and they show at the end of almost every episode. You could for instance cut out the kang bit that starts the cap one and the kang segment that ends the cap ones and have a cohesive story. Their still GOOD shorts, it's just clear they don't quite work as a cohesive episode, which woudln't be an issue if these shorts also weren't clearly part of the season order.

Still I admit these are minor complaints. They drag the presentation down slightly.. but not enough for me to not have enjoyed this episode pile. So assemble under the cut as I break down the first 7 episodes of Avengers: EMH

Iron Man is Born! (Micro Episodes: Iron Man is Born!, HYDRA Lives, Behold, The Mandroids!, and Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.)

So our first episode. .is third on disney+. Getting this out of the way if you watch these on disney +, start with this one, as disney mildly messed up the airing order. It isn't as bad as say Ducktales was at first, which was so bad the creators had to ask directly, but it's still very noticable disney coudln't be arsed to.. move two episodes on the list they gave people down a few slots. Then again this is the same company who won't give us the weekenders dammit, so i'm not surprised, just mildly in convinced.

Anyways this short follows Iron Man and as we go through our mightiest heroes, I thought it'd be fun to give my own personal history with each character. As I said, I really haven't gotten to dive into the avengers on this blog. I've covered Avengers #200 and Avengers Annual #10 this year but the former is more a Brotherhood of Evil Mutants story guest starring Ms Marvel and the Avengers, and the former.. is a nightmare from which there is no waking where only The Scarlet Witch and the Vision are remotely in character. Neither were really a time to talk about the team, the members of said team, or anything besides deep hurting and an antidote for said deep hurting that involves Carol Danvers verbally bitchslapping the avengers. Which is awesome, but not really a time to go "Gee this is why iron man is so great".

So starting with the cool exec with a heart of steel, I'm a pretty big iron man fan. I love Tony as a character a guy whose arrogant and overly macho at times.. but deep down is a man who just wants to make a better world after helping burn it to the ground for a profit. Someone who can be an arrogant know it all ass.. but also someone who once you've got his loyalty, he'd die for you. A man struggling with addiction, but whose also a poster boy for getting better.

I became a fan of Tony's around the movie, as before that I only really knew him as "that guy who was on spider-man once", "that weird cartoon I watched once or twice" or "That fucking asshole who ruled the superhero community with an iron fist and kicked every dog he could find post civil war".

Thankfully the movie changed that, and along with finding out his fascinating history and the utterly awesome run by Matt Fraction that launched alongside the movie, something I badly want to cover in some form at some point, I was a fan of shell head for life. My favorite runs for him aren't anything suprising: Fraction's run with invincible iron man, Dennis O'Neil's awesome epic run that sees Obdiah Stane break tony with every intention of having his enemy relapse and see's tony rebuild himself while Rhodey puts on the suit, and of course the classic Layton and Michillne run that introduced Tony's Alcholism in the first place.

The movie is important to this series as it not only launched the MCU, but said MCU incoming is likely why it happened, and while it was still young enough at the time to not impact this series heavily for most characters, that wasn't going to happen with tony. Tony, his CFO Pepper and his best friend and military liaison Rhodey, are all heavily modeled after the movie versions. That said given said versions are entirley accurate to the comics and all the MCU did to Tony was give him even more swagger.. this isn't remotely a bad thing and making sure kids had the iron man they were familiar with dosen't hurt the series. The suit's still more designed after the then current bleeding edge suit from the comic, one of my favorites. I have no issue with using stuff from the MCU, the mcu is mostly great. My issue is when latter stuff kinda.. ignores the comics except to bring in more people to punch.

Iron Man is Born gets tony down pat, in large part thanks to his VA, Eric Loomis. To my shock Loomis hasn't done a ton outside of play tony in this show and various video games but damn if few do it better. He gets the swagger, the desire to do better, and the stubborn ass refusal to let people help him down PERFECT, as does the writing. This is tony stark. Leading with him was also smart given, again the movie would be fresh on everyone's mind.

What's also neat about this one is it dosen't put tony up against any familiar foes. We'll still see some in Breakout and like the other heroes here he's already well experienced by the time the series opens up. The only thing close to it is Ultimo, a giant robot he fights in cell phone footage at the start of the episode, and even then that's just to establish Iron Man Slaps.

No instead it sells Tony's obession with his tech not hurting people by putting him up against some HYDRA robots using his tech. For those less familiar with marvel stuff, HYDRA are a bunch of snake themed nazi offshoots who are everywhere and generally the go too mook to punch in the face in the marvel universe. Who dosen't want to punch a snake nazi? Except bob. He's just there for dental. Oh bob.

The fight with said HYDRA bots is awesome: not only are they well designed, but it's classic iron man stuff: his suit running out of power, and tony having to use his brains, and hold out against his suit rapidly draining. Been used before? Sure. Helps establish how Tony fights and how his suit is both super strong and has a logical weakness in battery life? Yup.

And the best part is.. while HYDRA are his main threat... the real conflict simmering underneath this one.. is Stark vs S.H.I.E.L.D. the world's top super cops and shady assholes. Wether their being actually helpful or being obtuse and trying to obstruct the hero largely depends on the day, with the MCU making them more helpful and less greasy.

See SHIELD is mad Tony stopped making weapons. Tony is mad they won't quit bugging him about that, as he simply.. dosen't want to be an arms dealer no more. Which is fair. He made their weapons, and as he makes clear to Rhodey who also wants him to work closer with SHIELD, he's still HELPING them. He just won't build weapons. As we find out in breakout he built the Vault, one of four supervillian prisons , this one specializing in tech criminals. So he hasn't STOPPED helping them, he just wont' give them tech to go kill people with, which is fair. While they don't give his origin, at least not yet, it's very clear whatever version of it taught him the same lesson: just because someone else fires the gun dosen't mean you won't have blood on your hands.

So naturally SHIELD"S reaction to Iron Man taking down HYDRA.. is to try to arrest him

Yeah Tony has.. done ABSOLUTELY nothing wrong here.. and Nick Fury, for all his flaws we'll see in VERY short order, is not so stupid as to fire and orders them to stand the fuck down. The fuck is implied.

Tony trying to help them.. instead gets them to fire on him as the SHIELD Agents are using mandroids powered armors using tony's tech.. and unlike the comics where he BUILT the mandroids for them as a compromise, no lethal weapons but still a way to be on even foot with superheroes, here they just flat out used his blueprints to make their own weapons and expect him not to be mad. He has no right to get mad at them for doing this, he sold them the goods and clearly gave them enough legal room to do whatever, but they have no right to be mad at him for SAVING THEIR LIVES.

And they are as while Tony takes down the last hydra bot that suddenly wakes up, when he shows up at the hellicarrier, RIGHTFULLY pissed at being fired on and having them make their own iron man.. maria hill, Nick's right hand and like the comics a total asshole, PUTS A GUN TO HIS HEAD

I mean yes she has him surrounded by shield agents and if fighting them tony would half to hold back.. but he's still a man in a mostly powered armored suit that can suplex a train, while your only strategy is "hope he's really scared of a hand gun".

Fury wisely asks her to stand the fuck down, again fuck's implied, and we get a really compelling argument with him and tony: Tony has every right to not want to sell weapons, while Fury makes the point that with supervillians ont he rise they NEED this tech to compete. Tony still wins in my eyes mostly because while yes he's witholding tech and what not.. SHIELD... isn't hurting. They made the mandroid armors, they have the tech to compete with the hydra bot likely bodying them because it has the element of suprise. THey have a giant hellicarier, tons of staff, and plenty of super powered allies help keeping the various super prisons safe. Granted all four prisons are about to become paper mache, but that's not down to SHEILD being stupid. While Tony dosen't SAY it to his face, which given this is tony is a fucking achivement... the issue isn't that Fury can't handle these or the various super powered heroes out there don't have this covered for now. It's that Fury dosen't have CONTROL over it. IT's a problem inherent in most versions of Nick: it's not enoguh to be the world's top cop he has to CONTROL the situation, the info everything. He's often resonable sure but he puts control over what makes sense and antagonizes valuable allies simply by not respecting they want autonomy.

Our backup story is really just "why nick fury is badass" and "Why hydra is super dangerous". Turns out Fury has their leader, Baron Strucker. Strucker is an egotistical nazi who frequently runs hydra and is Nick's arch enemy and opposite number. So this whole mech thing.. was a smokescreen to get one of their agents, The Grim Reaper in.

The Grim Reaper in the comics is the brother of Simon Williams, aka Wonder Man. We'll get into him more next time as he has a full episode coming up, but long story short, he died, Grim blamed the avengers, and then he tried to kill his brother when Simon came back because he'd put simon on a pedestal. Here the two are pretty much detached and Grim is instead hydra's top enforcer, single handidly breaking in and wrecking up the place, only stopped, and captured alongside strucker, because Nick Fury is that badass. He also life drains fury a bit, giving him his signature white streak from the comics.

Thor The Mighty (Microepisodes: Thor the Mighty, The Siege of Asgard, My Brother My Enemy and the Isle of Silence)

As I said Thor the Mighty is the only one of these episodes that feels like a mostly cohesive 22 minute episode. I mean you can still see the seams where the shorts were, but it's one 22 minute story instead of one long story and one short one connected to the first. It's also not suprisingly my faviorite, but not just for this reason but for having some gorgeous action, great character work and a hell of an ending.

Before all that we have to talk about the god of thunder. Thor's a character I love, I mean I have a mjonr I got a yard sale somehwere around here. But he's also one i'm pickier on story wise: you either have to REALLY sell the scope and granduer of asgard, as done by Walt Simonson, god among men, and currently Al Ewing or do something fresh with it like the start of Jason Aaron' srun, Donny Cate's recent run or my all time faviorite thor story, J MIcheal Strazenzki's run. Thor's not a bad character but there is a tendency to focus on ye olde english and not on him as a person.

EMH thankfully sidesteps that. It shows thor as fucking awesome and has him do cool stuff.. but it also emphasises who the odionson is and WHY he prefers our world over his own. We start with his daily routine: finding some supervillians to punch. He fights the wrecking crew. The Wrecking Crew are villians I like, marvel's designated Jobbers. If you need someone to get their face punched in these are the guys. They CAN be dangerous, see the avengers storyline under sige where the four of them together bodied a slightly frazzled hercules, but their primary there to show up and get knocked down: their strong enough to fight thor, having asgardian enchanted construction tools.

But still not SO strong that say spidey , the runaways or whoever needs a pick me up this week can't body these jackasses. So their the perfect starter foe for thor: powerful enough to give him a good scrap, but not nearly as strong as what he faces on his home turf.

It also serves as a handy intro to Thor's love interest, Jane Foster. The film takes her from a doctor to a paramedic, ironically years before the comics would do the same, and it's a great update: Since Thor isn't spending time as mortal doctor Donald Blake here, there's no real reason for her to be at his practice as a nurse then doctor. Instead she's in the field trying to save lives just like him, and is shown to be fearless DESPITE being a squishy human, getting out to help someone the wrecking crew hurts without any hesitation while her partner cowers in the car instead of helpign. I mean .. I get it , supervillians, but yoru a fucking emt man. Your job is to save lives even at your ownr isk.

Thankfully thor provides backup. And cleans house. The Wrecker TRIES to hold jane hostage, with Thor chastising his lack of honor.. before smacking him in the back of the head with mjonir because hammer's don't respect chilvarly. Thor and Jane hit it off, and I like how even if Jane's entirely in this series to be thor's love intrest.. they give her personality and a reason he falls for her: she's just as dedicated to her job of helping people, and Thor is awed by the fact that DEPSITE not having the powers of a god and being at high risk she does it anyway. Which for us is a normal thing but for thor.. sums up why he likes Midgard so much. On asgard heroisim happens all the time, death is an endless cycle. Here humans are fragile.. but the best of us try to help each other anyway.

Thor is played by Rick D Wasserman and as you can wager i'm mostly focusing on the main cast's voice actors for this review. I"ll point out some others, for instance Jane is voiced by VA legend Kari Whagreen whose also played Charmcaster in the ben 10 franchise and Saturn Girl in the awesome Legion of Superheroes cartoon i'm bound to cover at some point, it's just EMH has a MASSIVE cast and introduces a lot of characters in the span of these 7 episodes, so adressing every single one is a lot to ask. I will try to adress the most important ones and some in future reviews as the voice cast here is positively stacked.

Which makes it weird that once again one of the main cast is a pretty low key voice actor: like with Iron Man, Thor's va did his voice for Marvel Vs Capcom 3 and Marvel Ultimate ALliance 3, but otherwise hasn't really done much else in the main roll. And given just how well Rick slides into the roll of thor as if he was born for this it befuddles me.

But we, and the god of thunder, have bigger issues..s pecifically frost giants thor writing shorthand for "We wanted something big for him to hit" I can only think of one run in recent memory that hasn't invovled thor hitting a frost giant in the face.

Turns out their invasion is being led by Loki. Loki here is another intresting time capsule as a combination of Tom Hidelston's standout performance in Thor and Avengers and character defining runs I need to read and finish respectively from Kireon Gilleon and Al Ewing placed Loki squarely in the anti hero position. As such instead of the genderfluid trickster we know and love, this is the old school loki they were for much of their run and what loki at present is deeply afraid of becomiing again: manipulative, evil and hellbent on burning down everything his dad and brother built.. if with a dope horn helmet. He at least has that.

As such this loki gets into a badass fight with thor, with Thor BEGGING his brother to reconsider.. but it falling on deaf sweet horn helmets. Loki wants to burn it all. Thankfully Thor is able to beat him and being thor does it in the most badass way possible.. gatherting a GIANT STORM above him before focusing all it's energy into a massive lightning bolt. And those horns are really good conductors.

Odin, who sat this one out as his powers are weak at the moment, more on that in a sec, punishes Loki by banishing him to thei isle of silence. It's one of his faviorite pastimes. The other is questioning his son's life choices, wanting Thor to stay to guard Asgard while Odin takes a nap. It's why he was weak: Once a year Odin enters the odinsleep for a few months, to a week to a day. Whatever's narratively convent. It's how he recharges.

Thor.. dosen't want to as he's needed on earth and the two get into a snit and what I like is it's well ballanced: Odin isn't wrong to want his son to protect the kingdom that will one day be his.. but Thor isn't wrong that the warriors three and sif, his best friends and badass warriors, can do the job and Thor is only one call away if needed. Odin bringing up Jane dosne't help as Odin comes off as being a spying dickhead which.. he is. He entirley is. So Thor leaves in a huff.

And so we get our final segment.. which unlike the others ties in directley. We see Loki in the isle of silence, which is neatly depecited as a black and white void with no sound. Loki is visited by the Enchantress. The Enchantress is a powerful sorceress whose vane as she is obessed with thor, but dosen't understand he's just not that into her for being you know.. manipulative, cruel and trying to kill his friends. Turns out, in classic loki fashion, this was ALL his plan. ALLL of it.

He set up thor to run into the wrecking crew by spying on them taking a job for the Leader, more on him later, having the Enchantress disguise herself as a regular woman , i.e. just a green dress, and point thor their way. Fun fact: She and jane have the same VA. Funner fact: Loki is voiced by Scottish actor Grahm McTavish of the Hobbit and Outlander fame. Both do a terrific job.

Loki then pretended to be Baulder, Thor and Loki's third brother and painted what Thor was doing as egocentric hot doggin and grand standing and the Jane thing as more serious than "They just met". All of this was part of a larger scheme... all going to plan.. and neither the god of thunder nor his neglectful dad have any idea they were played. Granted Loki's scheme would fall apart of Odin brought up that conversation with baulder to the brave himself, but while a risk.. Loki still wasn't TOO reckless with this: in any other thor story this would be highly stupid. Here it's risky, but with Odin going into the Odinsleep soon and Loki's plan HINGING on his dad being in the odinsleep anyway, it gives his plan a VERY small window for fuckups.

And what is his plan?

I genuinely forgot what his grand plan was other than "conquer asgard" but we'll find out as the season unfolds. For now we move on to another hero..... some call him a man, some call him a monster.. but is he both?

Hulk Vs the World ( Microepisodes: The Coming of the Hulk! , Hulk Vs the World, This Monster, This Hero!, and Beware the Widow's Bite!)

Now we talk about the strongest one there is, the man whose wrecking the town with a power of the bull, ain't no monster clown, he's that loveable and ever lovin Hulk. And sometimes immortal, grey and what have you but point is Hulk slaps.

Yeah like Tony I love me some hulk: I haven't read nearly enough of his earlier stuff but I adore the late 80's early 90's run of peter david, one i'm just one digital omnibus away from having the complete run of at the time of this writing, and Al Ewing's recent and incomprable Immortal Hulk, which I REALLY need to cover and just. .haven't. Hulk's just a good character: A man with DID who turns into the literal represntations of the emotions he represses: his rage, his childlike innocence that his abusive dad made sure he never had, his need for a father, his hornier and more traditionally masculine traits... Hulk is an endlessly fascinating character.

And the show does him good, partly by exploring a key part of Hulk's marvel history: the fact that for the vast majority of it.. he's an outsider. Oh sure Hulk will show up for crossovers if needed and what not, but most of the time people treat him as a giant monster to be put down instead of simply an angry, powerful being tired of people trying to kill him. Hulk is oft pegged as a monster, and can often turn on his own allies thorugh bad luck or simply a poopy mood. Most people in Hulk's suppporting cast care about BANNER not hulk, while Bruce is often hunted simply because.. he has a mental illness. Granted most mental illnesses can't suplex a train, but many people genuinely don't seem to CARE that Bruce isn't responsible for what hulk does. Hulk is part of bruce banner.. but he's NOT bruce. And the poor guy is constantly hunted for something he tries to cure or control but often simply can't.

EMH emphasies this as when we meet Bruce he's deshevled, in a hat, looking like the unibomber and getting harassed by the police like one. And this is a Bruce who as we learn later ACCEPTS that hulk is part of him: he dosen't LIKE turning into a rage monster, no one does, but he acknowledges the big guy can do things he can't and that curing him simply hasn't worked. He's someone trying to manage his condition: until now staying away from population centers and only going into them.. because he's worried.

This is also our intro to our second of the four supervillian prisons, the Cube. The Cube is a heavily locked down place for radiation based supervillians, mostly gamma mutates like Bruce himself. And in a fitting shift instead of being a place to stash away or rehabilitate their foes.. the cube is basically one giant lab and Bruce fears it's purpose.. is to create a hulk SHIELD can control. It gives a reason to why he runs: Sure the Cube has facilities to help.. but one hulk is already incredibly dangerous and barely managable. Now imagine if say it goes wrong and hulk ends up with no brain or concense like the current hulk, just PURE. RAGE.

Or they succed in making a super solider with gamma power.. but he simply dosen't want to do what they ask and has all the power of a hulk but none of the restraint, and all the ingellgence to misuse it.

Or you get someone with repressed issues and DID like bruce.. but you get something darker than a cranky teenager who just wants to be left alone

Granted that last one didn't turn out so bad but Bruce's point is easy to see just looking at the comics or basic logic: Making more monsters is way too big a gamble and as we saw with SHIELD in the Iron Man episode, they aren't exactly moral paragons to begin with. Fury will go to any lengths to make a safer world... so whose to say even IF best case scenario we get a she hulk style transformation... that fury can be TRUSTED with that power.

So Banner goes to get some answers. Bruce is played by Gabriel Mann, who played Alan M in the JOsie and the Pussycats film I need to cover, and also played Bruce in Wolverine and the X-Men, which shares a universe with this show. More on that later. He does a great job selling Bruce's fear but also compassion.. he wants to CURE the target he's after, Absorbing Man.

Absorbing Man, aka Crusher Creel, is another frequent Jobber of the marvel unvierse, though unlike the Wrecking Crew he's slightly less of a joke, though like them he started with Thor. Unlike them he became more of a hulk villian and a general marvel villian. If they need someone dumb and powerful, Crusher is their go too. In the comics he also has a wife Titania, also a super villian. They have an adorably healthy and happy marriage.

So naturally Crusher.. wants nothing to do with this and wants to instead punch the hulk. He gets his wish.. but then gets plenty of punches back. The Hulk here is based more on then recent Planet Hulk Storyline: Hulk is still not super smart, but isn't thuggish like say Joe Fixit or sadistic like Devil Hulk. He's just savage hulk if given the chance to learn and evolve: all the power, all the rage.. but with SOME smarts and dry quips. He eventually flattens Abosorbing Man easily after a brief fight.

Hulk himself is played by Fred Tatiscore. Much like Thor and Iron Man's VA"S, Tatiscore is marvel's go to for the hulk for adaptations, and has played him a LOTTT: Ultimate Avengers 1 and 2, Avengers Next, Avengers Assemble, Hulk Vs(Also part of this continuity), Wolverine and the X-Men, Hulk and the Agents of SMASH, Ultimate Spider-Man, Marvel's Spider-Man (Cartoon), The Incredible Hulk Tie IN game, Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, All three Marvel Ultimate Alliances. If you want someone mean and green you go with Fred and that's JUST his rolls as hulk. Fred is a prolific voice actor with a WIDE list of credits. This isn't even his only roll in this SERIES, but we'll get to that. If you want a good gravely voice, Fred Tatsicore is your man.

So Hulk is no sooner done punching his daily asshole when General Ross shows up.

So for those who haven't had the distinct pleasure of meeting this twatballoon before, General Ross is one of Hulk's two main arch enemys, the other one we'll meet later. He's the old man who ruins everything, a hard nosed general who already didn't like banner and hunts him and hulk like a monster, and is LARGELY responsible for both the hulk being treated like a monster (though his earlier, far shadier versions didn't help), and for Banner being hutned like one. If someone's going to fuck a situation that could've helped the hulk up, it's this fucking guy. It's shown here brilliantly as one of his men questions WHY banne'rs here.. and ross dosen't care. He can interogate banner later, not getting that bruce wont' want to help him.

Ross charges in with a bunch of smashable robots, but is ordered to stand down by the Black Widow and Hawkeye, in their classic outfits. For Nat it's .. really the same as the movies, for Hawkeye.. he has an actual costume instead of purple spandex and maybe sunglasses... please bring this outfit back.

Thankfully Clint isn't a piece of cardboard like the MCU , though he is an agent of SHIELD since Thor was in production and the Ultimate Unvierse existed. The two plan to subdue the hulk.. yes the martial arts master who is great in hand to hand and the expert marksman... think they can take down the hulk. or at least hold him off. Hulk is less than impressed but has bigger worries as Ross FIRES A MISSLE AT TWO SHIELD AGENTS DESPITE BEING ORDERED TO STAND DOWN

Seroiusly ross you fired on two fedral agents. I'm shocked he wasn't disohnorably discharged but he's gotten away with worse in the comics.

Thankfully hulk beats missle.. and we get a heartbreaking moment as Ross's stupidity and the hulk reflecting the missle nearly downs a hellicarrier... Hulk saves it.. and is taken in anyway. Always hunted, always alone with Banner's cries of having actually made the hulk work and not wanting to be cured falling on the deaf ears of Doc Sampson, usually Hulk's therapist here just a scientest.. and an asshole. Hawkeye though buys it.. unfortuantely he thenf inds out Black Widow is seemingly a tratior and she betrays HIM, framing him for working with hydra. So yeah this one ends with our heros impreioned for doing nothing wrong, the bad guys ahead and things about to get so much worse.

And if you thought we were done with downer endings well.

Meet Captain America (Meet Captain America, The Red Skull Strikes!, If This Be Doomsday!, Come the Conquerer)

Almost forgot this till I was done with this section: So I fucking love Steve Rogers. Loyal to nothing but the dream, kind, thoughtful and a badass through and through. That said when it comes to solo stuff it's hit and miss. I've come around to Ed Brubaker's run as while the winter soldier itself has lost a little impact with the fog of ages, Bucky's turn as cap is great, what i read of Ta'Nesi Coates run is fantastic, and I love Mark Gruenwald's lengthy run. I like cap, he can just be very hit and miss for me on his own, but usually if he's in a team he slaps and there's a reason he's key to the avengers.. and getting his own episode despite not being there for the origin story.

Meet Cap is a fun WII adventure, reminding me of the First Avenger despite coming first. It's got a lot of silver age charm and pep to it as Cap breaks into a hydra castle with the Howling Commandos. The Howling Commandos are Nick Fury's WWII running buddies in the comic and his dad's friends here. The roster's mostly the same, characters I don't really know and who won't be relevant to this show so i'm not going into... except one. He's still not relevant to the show.. but it's a cameo I can't not mention. One of the commandos here is...

YUP. As one of the many subtle hints this is the same continuity as Wolverine Vs X-Men and it's prequel Hulk Vs Wolverine, Logan fucking HOwlett is on the team. He dosen't go snikit either because he dosen't have bone claws in this continuity or simply to keep that under his helmet but it's still neat to see him. THey even got Steven Blum for this tiny apperance. There's small hints like that here and there, with another in the next episode we'll get to but sadly a combination of diffrent networks and Nick screwing over WATXM meant we never got an actual crossover, and Disney screwing over this series meant we never got a fully absorbed finale either. And as should come as no shock as a giant x-men nerd, I plan to cover WATXM after this show.

Anyways, cameos aside it ventually comes down to Cap and Bucky. Bucky is cap's sidekick, and unlike the mcu he' skept to being around 17. This is also one of his first apperances in animation after the landmark winter soldier story recontexutalized Bucky from "Child sidekick who really REALLY shoudln't be fighting WWII" to "that being a propoganda and Bucky being Cap's stealth man who does the stuff too dirty for america's symbol".

As a result this version, at least as Bucky, is voiced by Robin voice actor Scott Melinville, an excellent bit of meta casting given Bucky comes off as a fairly blatant robin clone. The two's banter is genuinely heartwarming as you really get a sense of their friendship.

Cap himself is played by Brian Bloom, who like most of theset voice actors continued the roll for Marvel Vs Capcom 3, it's sequel Infinite, Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3 and unlike the rest recently in Midnight Suns. He's awesome and plays Steve Pitch Perfectly.

So the two's target is Red Skull, Naziism incarnate. He's pure evil, one of the most horrifying villians in the Marvel Universe and one of the few most other villians will nope out of working with being a literal nazi. And not just a snake Nazi, though as he does here he will work with Hydra. He was taught by Hitler himself. Fun fact that's pretty brutal: he has in fact met Magneto, Marvel's #1 holocaust survivior, who held his contempt of the guy long as he could when forced to work with him for acts of vengeance..a nd then first chanc ehe got Erik buired the guy in a bunker with this chilling as it is awesome sequence

This is just one long fun pulp adventure as Cap punches out hydra agents and i'ts revealed the Red Skull was experimenting with the 9 realms of norse mythology and marvel comics. Well 8, he's already on Midgard. His various captured norse creatures escape from fairies to a frost giant he almost kidnapped. it's fun chaotic brawl as many a nazi is eaten and we get some really cool lighting. We also get a mention of a Baron Zemo. This will be importnat later.

The Baron himself is absent though, and rather than being the one escaping on a rocket it's the red skull. And anyone familiar with the comics just tensed up a bit and really even if you aren't.. the fact that this is Cap's origin story, he's getting a full episode, and it's WWII kinda tells you this won't end well.. and it dosen't. Steve prepares to sacrifice himself.. only for Bucky to tell him "The world needs cap more than it needs bucky" and push him off. The Skull and the boy wonder apparently die .. and seemingly so does cap.

Well.. KINDA, as our last short happens: see the cap shorts kicked off with someone watching and we find out it's Kang, the Conquerer

For those who haven't heard of him or seen him thanks to the MCU, and the less said about his actor there the better, Kang is from the 30th century, a time of peace, love and no traffic accidents. And it was BORRRRRIIINNNGGGG to him, so longing for the past he only read about he stole a time machine, and ended up in a savage post apocalypse he eventually conquered and made the bedrock of his empire, using his time travel tech, vast army and genuine stategic knowhow to conquer civlizations throughout time and space.

Here though he seems to have just conquered this future, which is still a lot... but is about to be a little as it's in danger of being erased.. thanks to Cap. Kang is puzzled since if Steve DIED.. then how is he fucking up Kang's day? We get a really cool seuqence of Kang traveling through the previous parts of the episode, trying to figure out what he missed.. and finding steve frozen. Steve lived.. and thus his future will die. He plans to go back and stop this, but his future starts deteroating already, leaving him with just one warship. He TRIES to get his girlfriend Ravona on the ship in time.. but interfernce means she comes in and thus is stuck between fading out of existance. Kang's able to put her in stasis... but to save his empire steve rogers must die.. in about half a season.

Yeah Kang... dosen't come back up for a while and while it baffled me.. the more I thought about the actual two part premire.. the more i relaized why this was there.

The Man in the Anthill (The Man in the Anthill, Enter the Whirlwind, The Big House, Welcome to Wakanda) We end our slew of origin stories with the introduction of Ant Man and the Wasp, my faviorite avengers out of this intial lineup. I love all these characters but Hank and Janet are some of my faviorites in all of marvel. I became a huge fan of Hanks after reading Dan Slott's run on Mighty Avenger where Hank, follow his ex wife Jan's death, takes up the wasp mantle. He also gets into the greatest pissing contest in all of marvel history with reed richards... though in his defense, Red started it

It was a burn so fucking awesome that the rest of Reed's team were all asking him to please, for the love of god call back and apologize. He did not and suffered the consequences. Again story for another day.

With Jan it took some more time but this series and various awesome apperances, chiefly her time in Zeb Wells uncanny avengers and what i've read of Roger Sterns avengers, sold me on the winsome wasp. For good stories for each, for Hank there's the aformentiond Mighty Avengers, Avengers Academy where he serves as headmaster, and West Coast Avengers for his redemption after his mental breakdown and abuse of Jan. For Jan I recommend Stern's avengers, The Unstoppable Wasp which follows Hank's Daughter and Jan's adopted daughter Nadia but heavily features the OG wasp, and most recently the Wasp mini series from king of awesome Al Ewing and it's currently running Followup, Avengers Inc, both things I intend to cover some day.

So for those less familiar with them or more familiar with the MCU versions, Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne were founding avengers and the first Ant Man and Wasp, going in and out of the team to retire. They were in love.. but sadly hank's obession with work, undiagnosed bipolar disorder, and Janet marrying him while he thought he was someone else because Hank having a mental breakdown was the PERFECT time to marry him, the marriage fell apart, hank had a large scale mental breakdown and well.. you likely know the rest. Both would rebound with Janet finding a new indpendence and sense of self and Hank , after hitting rock bottom.. .finding the will to live on and atone for the various mistakes he made, first as just Hank Pym then as a superhero but not wearing a costume. I love these characters, their rich history, their powers just all of it. I also love these versions of them: With the baggage of his mental breakdown and the infamous and horrifying slap gone, Hank is back to his roots as a science hero, finding his work the neatest thing in the world, while Janet is back to being hank's younger girlfriend , a social butterfly, and the one helping him get to do all his science stuff by doing the promotion, the last one a clever addition. It takes her later swagger and better writing by writers who knew how women worked as opposed to silver age stan lee who while many impressive things.. could not write a woman who wasn't some form of a sexisim. Likewise Hank ignores jan but it's more "he's a workaholic" and less him ranting about her being a stupid woman and friviolus and I wish I was making this up. It takes the best of them in the silver age, mondernizes and makes it awesome

They also each get a short spotlighting them: The first has Hank researching some Vibranium near wakanda when he has to deal with Klaw. Klaw is a recurring avengers bad guy, black panther bad guy and general punching bag. He's not yet to full costumed villian here, instead just having a giant sound canon instead of having said canon as a new hand. He and some mercs break in to steal the vibranium.. and get utterly wrecked in the best way possible as Hank shrinks, easily dispatches them in a scene straight out of a hroror film as each mook goes unconcious, tehn in an awesome moment, when Klaw uses his really big gun fulla sound to try and blast hank, hank GETS BACK UP and presses a button.. shrinkign EVERYONE present. Also while again i'm not pointing out EVERY villian's va i'd be remiss if I didn't point out that Klaw's is mark fucking hamill.

As for Hanks, Hank is played by Wally Wingert, who for once for this show DIDN'T play this character again in Marvel Vs Capcom 3 because Capcom wasn't awesome enough to include an ant man. THey DID include MODOK who Wingert also plays and got to reprise so he still got a well deserved paycheck. He's also been in Bleach and is the voice of Cubot in Sonic. Who knew. I also love the ending: Jan comes in, we get her adorably just throwing her arms around hank.. and then hank casually asking his girlfriend to go save the mercinaries before his ants eat them

The next one focuses on Jan and also shows the contrast between the two. Hank has super powers.. but prefers his research and rehabilitating criminals, not wanting to fight them. In contrast Jan recognizes sometimes you gotta throw hands, action is her reward, and gladly speeds into battle. We also see that while this hank hasn't spiraled yet.. he still has control issues, showing up wot Jan's battle with Whirlwind and telling her to back down, despite her both making the vallid point they can help people and that she can handle herself. And given she stings teh fucker in the eye and beats a guy with tornado powers with just her stingers and some inginuity yeah, hank ease off there bud.

Jan is voiced by Colleen Ann O'Shaughnessey, a va I grew up with as the Voice of Sora on digimon, a role she STILL has to this day. And if that and Jan wasn't enough she's also Jazz Fenton, a characte ri'll be looking into next year. For now though she just rips as Jan, whose the best of the founding 5. I mean their all pretty great and Hank comes close, but Jan's sarcasm, energy but also her heart and talent make her hard NOT to love.

The third short and the final one focused on our duo is the big house which reveals the third of the prisons: The Big House. Focused more on rehabilitation, the Big House was made by hank, housing a LOT of characters i know. Whirlwind tries to escape. If your curious who this schmuck is, Whirlwind is the closest thing Jan has to an arch enemy: he started out fighting her and hank then started stalking Jan who didn't take it well. He's incapaciated as the big house shrink's it's prisoners. Whirlwind is put back inside.. but is insured by the Mad Thinker that they'll be out soon. It's just a matter of time. The Mad Thinker is a long time fantastic four villian, a mad genius and.. that's basically it. He does have an awesome android though

He's a very good dude.

As for Hank and Jan theyt alk to Nick Fury who wants to recruit them. Jan's all for it but Hank says no.. that being said, it's not just Hank not wanting to be a costumed superhero: he dosen't TRUST nick, dosen't think he genuinely wants to rehabilitate criminals, and dosen't trust shield. And given what we've seen.. he's right. Jan follows Hank's lead, if reluctantly while fury.. berates hank for actually carrying about reform and building villians "Comfier jailcells".

With that we get one last standalone to set up episodes later this season: we see the origin of The Black Panther as his dad dies in comnbat fighting Man Ape, whose not NEARLY as cool or nearly as fun in the comics or this cartoon. Man Ape kilsl his dad with help from Klaw while T'Challa's people.. all agree to this trial by combat bullshit.

T'Challa not taking this shit heads off, takes the Panther Mantel and plans to find Allies. To be continued next time, same as cap. I love the animation on The Black Panther as he skulks around. So damn cool. He's voiced by James C Mathis III a voice actor primarily known for playing the character in this and Marvel Vs Capcom.. infinite this time. He's fantastic. And with that it's time for the MAIN EVENT BABY

Breakout Parts 1 and 2

So here we are, the big one. The reason we're all here> the Main Event. Breakout is the proper premiere for the show, airing before the repackaged episodes above though taking place after. And like the MCU with those episodes in mind it feels like a well built up climax to almost everything in the shorts, while setting up the rest of the season, with what wasn't setup for this being setup for later in the season like Cap, Kang and Black Panther.

Part 1 has the characters still in their own corners of the marvel universe before fate assembles them: Tony breaks up an arms deal between AIM, a bunch of super scientests in neat beekeeper suits who function as world conquerers or arms dealers depending on the day, and Lucia Von Bardis, one of Doctor Doom's minons in Latveria. Iron Man easily stops the sale, especially since it's his tech their selling and warns Doom via his proxy: do not come for his stuff again. He then drops them off at the Vault, talking to Jimmy Woo who sadly isn't as in to close up magic here but has noticed it's security is off and asks Tony for help since he designed it and it's not a weapon. Tony agreees.. but also wants him to make an appointment because Tony is a lot of things.. but he's also a massive asshole no matter where in time and space you find him.

Banner is still in the cube, trying to warn Dr. Sampson of two things: the cube is not a jail but an incubator to make another hulk, and that filling a jail full of super strong gamma mutates and gamma research is a ticking time bomb... and given bruce blew himself up with one he should know.

Thor.. is having a far chiller day of stalking Jane as she does her job since as an EMT she finds trouble and he dosen't exactly have a thor signal. And because she fascinates him, not getting how creepy that sounds. Jane finds it charming, partly because he's built like a norse god and partly because she gets this is less "I need to call shield a god is stocking me" and more "He's REALLY that clueless he dosen't get this is a felony".

Finally we have Hank and Jan on the hellicarrier, with Hank doing mods to the big house and arguing with Nick and Jane sorry she can't take maria hill's offer... only to realize hank had a point when maria won't answer a simple whose that.

It's then chaos breaks out.. as does every super villian at the 4 prisons with the Hellicararrier, which houses the big house, also going offline. Oh and Nick's house just blew up, but that happens every tuesday. You can just ignore that one, don't know why I brought it up.

As you'd guess most of our heroes are soon caught in the middle of it: Iron man flies back to the Vault, getting a heads up from Pepper that SHIELD"S in chaos, but finds all his foes have already kitted up and gang up on him including Crimson Dynamo, his russian equilveant and Blizzard, a villian i've always had a soft spot for who gets a truly awesome look here

Is his look baiscally just captain cold and mr freeze smushed together now? Sure? Does it look fucking dope? yes.

Thanks to SHIELD being stupid though, Iron Man isn't the only hero there and despite nearly blasting him earlier, Hawkeye helps for a sec before fleeing to clear his name. I like this setup for hawkeye as in the comic's hawkeye also started as a costumed criminal thanks to a misunderstanding, a nice way of meshing his mcu/ultimate self with the og. Hawkeye is also one of my faviorite superheroes, and something I can gush about later when Clint properly returns to the story. For now he's just awesome as always.

So Tony decides to escape by BLOWING THE FUCKER UP with his enemies inside

Yeah the civilians have apparently evacuated and the villians scene DO come back but you'd think after a few months after this Tony's go to wouldn't be "Cave a building on them and let god sort it out". Then again this IS Tony Stark we're talking about....

Bruce is IN one of the prisons and thus has a harder time, though there is one silver lining: Dr. Sampson.. is now fully on his side, having realized from the buildling falling apart that Bruce was right about this being a powder keg and promising to help. Granted it's a bit too late but still. The radiation abound has also given the good Doc super strength

Zzzax shows up. Zzzax is an energy being the hulk fights on and off, a big zappy man made of electricty who has a name that's as fun to say as it is to type. Naturally this brings out the other guy and Hulk fights him, winning becasue of course.

In the core of the cube and it's control rooms is the Leader. The Leader is Hulk's arch enemy and polar opposite: Hulk is pure rage and strength, the Leader is a calculated super genius with the durability of any other guy. And unlike the other villians in the other prisons.. Leader has no intention of leaving, to the bafflement of Absorbing Man and Abomination. Abomination is Hulk's other arch enemy, a KGB agent who got caught in a gamma ray blast when Hulk tried to kill the hulk with.. .the same thing that makes the hulk, being almost as strong but retaining his mind.

Leader sends the two to fight hulk as a distraction but once Hulk has them down he flees with Sampson.. and the Leader has his minons back off, explaning WHY he wants to stay in prison: he's going to change the world. And impliclity, what better lair for a super genius gamma mutate than a giant gamma based lab and former prison? It's almost like putting the lab next to the dangerous criminals was a bad idea waiting to blow up in their faces.

Before we move on Leader is played by horror legend Jeffery Combs, most famous for playing Herbet West in Re-Animator and it's sequels. Combs is a large ham supreme, a true craftsman of playing hammy bastards with no morals, and is perfect casting for the Leader, and SHOULD have played him in the mcu. Then again given how little the MCU has acctually DONE with the leader thanks to universal, it's a blessing in disguise. They can use him another way. Lots of mad scientests with no morals in marvel. Leader's story will be continued later, but I coudln't just.. pass by Jeffery Combs. I'm not made of stone.

As for Hank he gets the shit beat out of him by the people he was genuinely trying to help. Which is just.. sad... the problem wasn't hank's idea, a deluxe prison with creepy robots where he genuinely tries to reform people.. it's just most of the criminals were either people he brought in, resenting him automatically, or simply didn't WANT to change. Had he tried it on like the beetle or screaming mimi or someone who genuinely had the potetial to reform who knows what he could've done. Thankfully he's backed up by Jan and the fact he can become a really big man, a GIANT man if you will.

While this goes on Thor.. has a date. Jane gladly listens to his daddy issues, Baldur the Brave had visited earlier.. and Odin hasn't let up on the "come home thing". Jane breaks down "ancient asgardian things beyond your understnading" into what it is "You had a fight with your dad" and tries to convince him to go home and patch things up.. but then thor hears the explosions in the distance and goes to help.

So the bad news is a bunch of our heroes villians are free, with the only ones who aren't.. now running the prison. The WORSE news is that there's one more prison that didn't have a superhero on duty as Thor was out to lunch: the raft, a secret fourth blacksite prison hinted at earlier, containing the highest security cases... and one of them just woke up from a ten year nap, radaiting with power and rocking the helicarrier.

This yelling bearded man is Graviton, also played by Fred Tastiscore, whose hamming it up from here to eternity. He wants Fury dead and tha'ts where part 1 ends.. with him holdling fury hostage and sinking the hellicarrier.

Part 2 opens up with the origin of Graviton: Franklin Hall was a physcist for SHIELD before Fury tried to shut him down... for good reason as while Fury was trying to do this Franklin not only refused but his experiments blew up in his face. Then rather than help Hall.. fury locked him unconcious in the raft. Even the breakout didn't let him out it turned out ot be Baron Zemo. Baron Zemo is one of my faviorite super villians, a genius tactician and son of a nazi what cap fought. Naturally he tells franklin he's been down here for a while, then skedaddles. Unsuprisingly we'll be seeing the martial artist whose so skilled and cunning he's in the same jail as the guy who can make gravity his bitch.

Graviton is distracted by Iron man, who shows up to fight.. but tony gets a refresher in Gravity and gets bounced all the way to the endless cornfields of Kansas. Trust me having been in the car as someone's driven through them, that joke is not an exageration. Ther'es plenty of towns, intresting places.. but also large stretches of corn and nothing. So much corn and nothing.

While Tony calls for a backup suit, Thor tags in, while Hank chews Fury out, especially relevant since Fury refuses to tell them anything at first calling it classified... despite the giant exploding gravity man fighting a god above them.

As for Hulk... Hulk needs a snack. Prison hasn't done wonders fo rhis appittite so he stops at a diner, asking them to get help for Sampson... when Hulk has another guest: his brain buddy bruce who urges Hulk to help as he's the only one that can. Hulk makes the valid if misnthropic poitn that if no one's helped him, why should he.. but Bruce poitns out all the good he can do.. he can be more than the monster they see him as and he knows it. SO Hulk agrees to serve as backup.. provided Bruce make one concession: Hulk becomes the dominant personality and bruce comes out , as we find out later, only once a month.

As we wait to see the results of that deal, Thor gets plumeted to the bottom of the sea and Jan decides she isn't going to stand by anymore.. while Hank is like "NO YOU'LL GET HURT. LISTEN TO ME. " because he hasn't gotten Jan dosen't CARE she can get hurt, knows the risk, and is doing the right thing comma jackass. Jan.. actually puts on a decent showing as her stingers, small lasers , aren't affected by gravity. She is.. but Hank catches her having gotten his giant head out of his ass, while Thor regains Mjonr and tony joins back up. The avengers have.. mostly assemebled.

They still can't make much of a dent though: not only are they still very new at this tea-m thing, but Graviton is still strong enough to body a god: a scientest, a fashioin icon, and billionare mass attempted murderer aren't really going to turn the tide. Unluckily for Franky he decides to get braggy.. and gives too good an intrance cue NOT for someone to stomp in and ruin his day

Graviton: I'm stronger than all of you! I'm the strongest one there is! (BOOM) Hulk: You sure about that?

Hulk is here and easily beats the stuffing out of Graviton. We get a truly EPIC moment too as Graviton tries increasing the gravity on him which only works for seconds at a time as Hulk KEEPS, GETTING, BACK UP. With the others helping, and sometims just.. rushing him, Hulk is able to land the final blow on Graviton. My faviorite moment during this is Wasp lasering a container in half, confused someone's helping him... before Janet helpfully pipes in he's the bad guy. THe two will be incredibly close after this and given they both like hitting things and impulsive desicions, easy to see why.

Well almost final, He still has time to weakly rant before Wasp shuts him up.

Naturally SHIELD"S response to Hulk saving the day, the future avengers lives, and stopping an evil they created.. is to point all their guns at him. This time though Hulk has something he didn't have back in Vegas: Friends. Iron Man refuses to let SHIELD take him and everyone else gladly joins in, Jan naturally being the second most vocal behind tony.

Fury reluctantly gives in, and admits he could use the five's help: the various prison breaks have unleashed 74 other super villians and someone needs to round them up.

Hank.. turns him down, getting one last callout and a very damming one: they CREATED this mess: while Franklin made himself into a living god instead of trying to cure him or turn him into a force for good they locked him away an dhoped he'd never wake up, and new york nearly got leveled. I forgot to mention it somehow but motherfucker LEVITATED manhattan.

Tony does concede Fury has a point:.. not about joining SHIELD, they suck dirty ass in thunderstorms. But about working as a team:

Iron Man: One on one, we can each take down a villain or two, but 74... none of us can do it alone. Together we have a chance. What we did here, it can change things. The world needs us, but not as S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. As a team of our own. Together, we can avenge the wrongs caused by all these villains. Wasp: We can be Avengers. Hulk: Huh. Good name.

And thus.. a team is born. Hulk agrees to stay for now and everyone else, even pacifist hank seems excited. And even Fury, while not exastic, dosen't really poop on their parade. He is worried about one thing though: Who was behind this?

So yeah.. the first 7 episodes of EMH, the breakout two parter in paticular, are amazing. It sets up the world, fleshes out the cast, and gives us some great hooks going in: how will this team mesh? can hulk be accepted by the rest of the world? Who caused the Breakouts? What's loki's plan? How is leader going to "Change the world"? What did steve do to destroy Kang's timeline? All valid questions we'll answer another time but for now we've got 7 pretty excellent episode an da great start to one of the greatest avengers tales ever

Sometime Next Year: The avengers loose a member, gain an icon and a king and deal with their growing pains, ionic men, dougboys, ape men, living sounds, and a bunch of hulks. See you then and thanks for reading.

[natty-light-of-my-life]

you are three one four me (pi day special)

summary: mechanic!reader celebrates pi day with their girlfriend in an unexpected way.

happy pi day, nerds!

The first thing you learn as a mechanic, often the hard way, is that the best designs keep it simple. The less complex a machine is, the fewer potential failure points they create. When you see contraptions with too many fittings, too few access points, and way too many dumb features, you know to stay far, far away. Well, you tried your best, anyways.

Working for Tony Stark, you’ve learned (often the hard way), is nauseatingly, annoyingly complex. The man was a genius. Weapons. Flight suits. He understood those concepts better than any other person on Earth, you’d reckon. You would trust Tony with your life on the battlefield. 

But not in the kitchen. Never again.

Friday, bless her soul, could control all the appliances in the kitchen, thanks to Tony’s integration of the AI with the Avengers compound. The AI could control the humidity of the room to a tenth of a percent. She could start running the faucet and fill the sink up with soapy water. She could place an order for the carton of eggs that you forgot to buy at the grocery store. It was great!

Except.

Except, sometimes, Friday would misinterpret a request. After all, a computer was only as smart as the programmer. And Tony, brilliant Tony, did not spend much time in the kitchen.

Which leads you to the current moment. The fire alarm screeched throughout the compound as you ran out into the hallway. The emergency lights flashed, refracting among the hazy, smoke-filled air. You ran towards the kitchen, where the smoke seemed to be heaviest, grabbing the red fire extinguisher from the wall. The floors were already damp, so you assumed that the sprinklers had been triggered. The smoke, however, had not stopped.

You spun around the kitchen, trying to locate the source of the smoke plume. Your eyes widened as you found the flames. The oven was on fire. A big fire at that. You knew the kitchen was all electric, so no natural gas, thank goodness. But still, the oven had somehow caught on fire while you were downstairs in the garage. You saw a bottle of wine broken on the counter, and next to that, a large grease fire where a jar of cooking oil was usually kept. 

If you weren’t drowning in smoke and coughing, you would have let out a string of expletives. Something your meemaw would not approve of and would make Steve blush. You coughed violently again before covering your nose and mouth with your shirt. You lifted the fire extinguisher and quickly turned towards the oven. Yanking the pin out, you took the nozzle and aimed quickly at the base of the fire. Squeezing the trigger, you generously doused the fire in a side-to-side motion. The smoke aggravated your throat and your eyes started tearing up from the heat. Of course, today would be the day when you were alone in the compound. Everyone else was at brunch. Whereas you were about to be turned into brunch. Toast. Char-broiled. Maybe they would serve you with a mimosa.

Eventually, you got the fire under control. With one last squeeze of the fire extinguisher, you snuffed out the last of the flames. You took a second to cough again and try to clear your watery eyes before you marched over to the patio doors. You jerked the glass door wide open, pausing to make sure they stayed in their position. Once you were satisfied that you had done everything you could, you went back to your room, grabbed your phone, and walked away. 

Not five minutes later, the sound of an approaching vehicle caught your attention. You were sitting on a bench outside the compound, trying to get fresh air into your lungs. It was working, but unfortunately your clothes had not fared as well. You were covered in soot and water and fire extinguisher chemicals. 

When the van arrived carrying Earth’s Mightiest Heroes skidded to a halt in front of you, the first thing you noticed was a blur of red hair engulfing your vision. She had jumped, out of a moving vehicle, mind you, and grabbed you by your shoulders. You stood still and gave her a little smile.

“I’m fine, Nat.”

She glared skeptically at you, “your voice sounds a little hoarse. I don’t know about that.”

Leaning down, you gave her a big, tight hug, “Don’t worry. Still at full strength, see?”. She grunted in annoyance, but you could hear the relieved sigh she let out. Her arms tightened around you.

“Glad to see you’re alive, MacGyver,” greeted Tony. You pulled away from your girlfriend.

“No thanks to you, Tin Man.”

“Me?” Tony gasped, “what did I do?”

You gestured to the building behind you. “Your kitchen caught fire, that’s what. And you didn’t equip your sprinklers to handle grease fires.”

Everyone headed upstairs as you explained what happened, and Tony’s face scrunched up in confusion.

“But why was the oven on in the first place?”

“No clue, Tony,” you shrugged, “I was in the garage all morning fixing Natasha’s bike. That she broke. Again.”

Nat chuckled, “Not my fault that those guys were shooting at me.”

“Um no,” Clint chimed in, “It was at least one-hundred and twenty percent your fault.” 

The Black Widow shrugged, “Occupational hazard.”

“I’m so sorry, guys, it’s my fault this happened!”

Everyone turned to Wanda, who shuffled in place and turned guiltily in your direction, “I’m sorry,” she repeated.

“Uh,” you started, “no worries. The bike is fine! And we caught the bad guys last week!”

“No,” she shook her head, looking down at her feet, “the fire. I think it’s my fault. Before we left the restaurant, I told Friday to preheat the oven to three-fifty.”

You scratched your neck, confused, “that’s nothing abnormal. Did you have anything in the oven? I didn’t check.”

Wanda shook her head, “No. I had a pie in the freezer that I was going to bake when we came back. But I needed the oven to preheat first, so I told Friday to turn the oven on while we were at brunch.”

“I don’t see how a three-hundred and fifty degree oven could cause all that trouble,” frowned Bruce.

You pointed to the spilled wine and jar of cooking oil. “I think it was just smoke at first, but then the sprinklers came on and the water knocked over the bottle of wine,” your index finger trailed a path from the broken bottle on the counter to the oil, “The alcohol probably ignited, and the sparks lept to the cooking oil. I reckon that’s what happened.”

Bruce nodded, “Sure. But what caused the smoke in the first place? Wanda set the oven to a perfectly normal operating temperature. I don’t see why it would start smoking like that.”

You shrugged.

“Wanda, what did you tell Friday to do, exactly?” Tony asked, trepidation lacing his tone. You glanced over at him curiously.

“I sent a text,” Wanda responded, pulling out her phone and reading her latest message, “‘Friday, please set the oven to 350’”.

“Ah shit,” Tony sighed, bringing his hand to his face.

Natasha raised an eyebrow at the man, “Share with the class, Stark.”

Tony chuckled nervously, “Don’t get mad buuuut I may have set up Friday in metric units.”

You let out an exasperated breath, “Tony….”

“Totally not your fault, Witchy! But you maaay have accidentally set the oven to three-fifty degrees celsius.” 

Clint frowned, “Doesn’t water boil at a hundred degrees celsius?”

You pat the man on the back, “Yup. Tony’s dumb and American, but he made his AI smart and European. The oven was set to approximately six hundred degrees fahrenheit.”

Natasha flicked Tony’s forehead in retaliation. But soon, a thought crossed your mind and you perked up, “Wait, does that mean there is still pie in the freezer?!?”

….3.14159265359….

It turned out that Natasha heard about your affinity for the fourteenth day of March, a.k.a Pi Day. As a science nerd in school, you near-religiously celebrated the holiday with all sorts of circle-shaped foods like cookies and pie. She thought it was cute, and wanted to make your first Pi Day together memorable. So she enlisted the help of Wanda to bake your favorite pecan pie. She and the rest of the team had used the excuse of brunch to go to your favorite restaurants for cookies, pizza, and even a shepherd's pie. 

However, Tony’s programming hiccup meant that instead of a lunch filled with laughter and pie, you ended up on the floor of the kitchen, installing a new oven and repairing everything the fire destroyed.

“Babe,” Natasha said, poking your thigh with her foot, “you really don’t need to fix everything right now. Don’t you want to take a break after going through the fire?”

You mumbled, as there was a flashlight in your mouth as you laid on the floor under the cabinet, “Nuh-uh, thuh soonuh I fis this, thuh soonuh weh geth pae.”

Natasha scoffed from her perch on the other counter, “Oh sure, babe. There’s nowhere else we can get pie. It’s not like we live in one of the food capitals of the world.”

You slid out from the cabinet and removed the flashlight from your mouth, “Not meemaw’s pecan pie! There’s no way we can find a proper pecan pie up here.”

She laughed, “Meemaw would forgive you if you settled for a subpar pecan pie.”

You shook your head, putting on an exaggerated faraway look in your eye, “You haven’t met my meemaw, Natty. Don’t even mention y’alls yankee doodle pies at Christmas or we’ll have to break up. Her heart can’t take that type of betrayal.”

Natasha blushed. “Oh, I’m going to Georgia for Christmas this year?”

You stuttered, the tools in your hands knocking into each other as you sat up, “I mean yeah if you want. I assumed that. Well if –”.

The redhead laughed and leaned down to look at you, an adoring smile on her face, “I would love to go home with you for Christmas, baby.”

You beamed up at her.

She kissed the crown of your head, scrunching her nose at the cloud of smoke that lingered on your person. “But let’s survive Pi Day first, alright?”

You pulled her down from the counter and she dropped into your lap with a huff of laughter. You nodded in agreement and pulled your girlfriend into a kiss. Sweeter than pie.

[earth-18104]

Young super heroes

Since I already made a list of characters for the X-Kids, might as well make one for other Young super-heroes groups. In my universe, Earth-18104, things are almost the same as the original universe, this includes the heroes, but I changed some things based on their ages to fit in my universe and make more sense.

This is list main goal is just to help me keep track of everyone’s ages while I write :P Here is the list of students of the Xavier's Intitute.

• The Power Pack.

The first group of young superheroes, outside the X-Men, was the Power Pack, the siblings Alex (12), Julie (10), Jack (8) and Kate Power (6). In 2009, while their parents were trying a new efficient source of power, the Anti-Matter Engine, the siblings encountered an alien that claimed that his some planet was destroyed by the same energy source their parents had found. Before his death, the alien passed his abilities to the children. 

After that, the Power Siblings became the Power Pack and went on different adventures as superheroes, while their parents remained clueless about their powers for the next years. The original members were just Alex as Zero-G, Julie as Lightspeed, Jack as Counterweight and Kate as Energizer.

In 2016, with the opening of the Future Foundation, Reed Richards’ new group of heroes, the Power Siblings split to different teams. Alex (19), Jack (15) and Kate (12) joined Richards and his “students”, while Julie (17) went along with the Runaways. 

In 2022, since the original Power Pack were all adults at this point, a new team was formed by Valeria Richards (15) as Brainstorm, Lunella Lafayette (11) and Devil Dinosaur, Jo-Venn and N’Kalla Grimm (11); and Jack Powers (25) and Franklin Richards (18) as their mentors. 

*Franklin Richards is older than his comic counterpart. The Infinity Gaulent Arc also happened in this universe and last six years, between 2004-2006. Franklin was one of the people turned into dust by Thanos, so he is also younger than he should be. N’Kalla and Jo-Venn are Ben Grimm and Alicia Reis adopted children.

• The Runaways.

In 2012, a group of teenagers, children of a group of super villains known as The Pride, discovered their parents’ evil plans and decided to escape together and frame their parents of murder. The “team” was formed by:

•  Alex Wilder (16), the leader, a big fan of superheroes.

• Nico Minoru (16), whose parents were dark wizards. She then became the holder of the Staff of One.

• Karolina Dean (16), whose parents were aliens exiled from their home planet, so she had her powers suppressed by a special bracelet.

• Chase Stein (17), the “brawn” of the team, who later gained the telepathic link to Old Lace, Gertrude’s dinosaur.

• Gertrude Yorkes (16), a smart and cynical girl, whose parents were time travellers and had genetically engineered a dinosaur, Old Lace, to share a telepathic link to her.

• Molly Hayes (11), the youngest of the group, also a fan of superheroes, who possessed super strength.

As time passed, the team lost some members and gained new, such as: the cyborg Victor Mancha; a skurll war prince named Xavin; Klara Prast, a girl coming from the past; Rufus the Cat and others.

*I thought the X-Men were weird, but the Runaways win this one.

• Young Avengers.

While the students of Academy X were facing the events after M-Day, a new group of superheroes was born. Nathaniel Richards (16) travelled back in time and ended up stuck in 2014. With so many tragedies happening in the last years, and knowing what future was coming, Nathaniel used Vision’s plan to recruit the next generation of Avengers to create the Young Avengers, looking for members that could replace the original Earth’s Mightiest Heroes.

• Kate Bishop / Hawkeye II (18), was not what he was looking for initially, but with her stubbornness, she became an important member and then later the leader.

• Jonas Vision was created by Nathaniel using Vision’s old body, to assist him in his mission.

• Eli Bradley / Patriot (16), the grandson of Isaiah Bradley, the “Black Captain America”, received the original Shield and became part of the team.

• Theodore Altman / Hulkling (16), the unknown son of the Skrull princess Anelle and Mar-Vell, had the abilities to shape-shift since a young age, and decided to join the team to use his powers to be a hero. Years later, Teddy assumed the throne of the Skrulls and Kree alongside his husband, Wiccan. 

• Billy Kaplan / Wiccan and Tommy Shepherd / Speed (16) are the reincarnations of Wanda Maximoff’s sons, that had been created using the magic of the Darkhold, before being erased from reality. Billy and Tommy reincarnated in different families, but kept the same appearances as the ‘originals”, as well the abilities they never manifested.

• Cassie Lang / Stinger (14), is the daughter of Ant-Man II. Since she was a child, Cassie wanted to be a hero like her father, so when she saw the opportunity to join a team of Avengers, she went along, even if she wasn't invited at first.

The Young Avengers were not accepted by the older heroes, but they continued their journey as crime fighters for years, facing different types of dangers together. In 2015, during the events of Kang’s Dinasty, they were among the many, many heroes that went to fight the tyrant, and Nataniel had to face his alternative self.

In 2016, during the Skrull Invasion, the Young Avengers helped defend New York and its civilians. They were invited by Henry Pym to join his new Avengers Academy in 2017, but mainly declined, but in the same year, the events of Young Avengers: Children's Crusade, not long after.

In 2019, the original team split up, Nathaniel (21) went to stay with the Richards/Storm in the Baxter Building and joined the Future Foundation with Jonas, Cassie (19) and Eli (21) went to Avengers Academy. While Kate (23) became leader of the West Coast Avengers, she was still part of the team with Billy, Teddy and Tommy (21). But they also had new members for the new team: 

• America Chavez (18), who had the abilities of teleportation, and soon became leader of this new team.

• The reincarnation of God of Mischief, Loki and his underworld “servant” Leah, a witch.

• Noh-Varr / Marvel Boy (21), a Kree Warrior that fallen on Earth and became a hero under Carol Danvers and Monica Rambeau’s tutelage. 

• David Alleyne / Prodigy (20), super genius, he was a former student at Academy X, but lost his powers after M-Day.

• Aña Corazón / Araña (15), one of the many ‘spider-people’ of New York, she joined the team on her free time. 

• Doreen Green / Squirrel Girl (21), a girl with the ability to communicate with squirrels, she has been trying to be a superhero since a very young age.

*I know that later Nate Richards / Iron Lad disappears and Jonas dies, but in this universe they stay. Nate is adopted by the FF and Jonas kinda becomes part of the family, and also Viv Vision is his sister too🙂

*Loki stays as a hero, he just grows normally like any kid, and him and Leah live together in New Asgard or somewhere else. In the comics, Aña and Doreen never joined the YA. Tommy and Billy also treat Viv, Vin and Jonas as siblings.

• Future Foundation.

Not really a team of superheroes, but more an agency to fund scientists and young genius that had potential, Reed Richards hoped that these individuals could plan a better future for the planet if he helped them and kept them in the right path. 

In 2016, the first members of the foundation were Richards himself, Susan Storm, Peter Parker, the reformed Dr. Olivia Octavius OC, Alex Powers (19) and his younger siblings Jack (15) and Kate (12), and the android Dragon Man. The younger members were: Valeria Richards / Brainstorm (9), Franklin Richards / Power House (12), the Moloids Tong, Turg, Mik and Korr, Bentley 23 (10), the Morlocks Artie Maddicks (20) and Dorian Leech (19).

Later, new members joined the Foundation, like Leech and Artie’s old friend, Takeshi Matsuya / Wiz-Kid (16), in 2017; Hunter Creed / Rescue (13) OC in 2019; Nathaniel Richards (21) and Jonas Vision in the same year;and Lunella Lafayette (10) in 2021, with Devil Dinosaur, of course.

*The Future Foundation is not a school or something like that, it is more like a program, if you show potential for science and other things related, Richards finances your project.

*Artie and Leech are older here, since the Massacre of the Morlocks happened in 1997, them and Wiz-Kid, were victims of the Snap, so they're is six years youngers than they should be, same thing to Franklin. Hunter Creed is one of my favorite OCs, he's just there :)

• Avengers Academy.

Following Norman Osborn’s plan of forming a new team of heroes, right after Dark Reign in 2016, the Avengers decided to open a place to train children with superpowers and protect them from the world, and so prevent them from losing control and becoming villains. So Henry Pym founded the Avengers Academy, a program similar to the Initiative.

Alongside Pym and other Avengers, Alex Powers (20), Julie Powers (19), Claudette and Nicolle St. Croix (27) were also instructor for the students. In 2017, the first year of the school, the students were:

• Humberto Lopez / Reptil (16), who has the ability to turn into different reptiles.

• Jeanne Foucault / Finesse (16), has the ability to master any skill. 

• Ken Mack / Mettle (17), suffered a transformation that gave him super strength and durability.

• Brandon Sharpe / Striker (17) who can manipulate and generate electricity.

• Mad Berry / Veil (17) is able to transform her body into gases.

• Jennifer Takeda / Hazmat (17), her unique biology can produce deadly substances.

The next year, the program received good results, so the school expanded and received new students: Aña Corazón / Araña (14), Jack Powers / Mass Master (17), Kate Powers / Energizer (15), Takeshi Matsuya / Wiz Kid (17), Joaquín Torres / Falcon II (14), Victor Alvarez / Power Man II (14), Ava Ayala / White Tiger (17), Kevin Masterson / Thunderstrike (16), Juston Seyfert / Sentinel (14), Michiko Musashi / Turbo (16), Jonhathon Gallo / Ricochet (18), Jimmy Santini / Batwing (14) and Emery Schaub / Butterball (15).

In 2019, Alani Ryan / Loa (18), Shela Sexton / Escapade (16) also joined the school, and after that, Brielle Brooks / Bloodline and Rebecca Marchand (18), in 2020, and in 2022, Norman Harold Osborn / Red Goblin (10) also joined.

• The Champions.

After their debut as superheroes, Kamala Khan, known as Ms. Marvel (17), the Nova Cadet  Sam Alexander, (15), and the new Spider-Man Miles Morales (16), started to accompany the Avengers on their missions, but soon became disillusioned by their behavior, believing they were not doing enough for the people. In 2021, Kamala Khan then formed a new team and became their leader. The first members, besides the original trio, were:

• Amadeus Cho (21), a young super genius that had suffered an accident with Gamma Radiation and became the new Totally Awesome Hulk, and later was called Brawn. His twin sister Maddy Cho sometimes joined the team as support.

• Hunter Creed / Rescue (15) OC, son of the villain Sabretooth, also a genius and former student at Jean Grey School, he helped with technology and equipments.

• Viv Vision, daughter of Vision, she is a sintezoide that helped the team with technology and to keep track of different events around the world in case the Champions need to help outside the country.

• Riri Williams / Iron Heart (16), a very intelligent girl who created her own equipments based on Iron Man’s armor.

The first team also had a young version of Scott Summers that travelled from another timeline, but he soon went back to the past and his actions created a different timeline. Later the team started operating globally, and new members joined:

• Nadya Pym / Wasp (19), Henry Pym’s lost daughter that has been raised in the Red Room since birth, she was brought to New York by Janet van Dyne, joined the team and took her place as the Wasp.

• Fernanda Rodriguez / The Locust (17), a young vigilante that inherited the tittle and armor of Red Locust from her family, to protect people in need.

• Victor Alvarez / Power Man II (19), student from the Avengers Academy, he gained super strength after absorbing the life force of the 107 people who were killed in a protest against Norman Osborn.

• Joaquín Torres / Falcon II (18), also a student from the Avengers Academy, he had suffered a transformation after being kidnapped by the Son of the Serpent and gained wings, becoming a hero working under Sam Wilson’s tutelage. 

• Rayshaun Lucas / Patriot II (17), Sam Wilson’s apprentice, he gained his own shield and has been training to be a hero one day.

• Qureshi Gupta / Pinpoint (14), who has the power to create portals, he became a superhero by himself back on his hometown.

• Abigail Boylen / Cloud 9 (17), a young human girl that once came in contact with an alien gas that gave her the ability to fly. At first, she was not interested in becoming a hero, but accepted being part of the team.

• Lana Baumgartner / Bombshell (19) was born with the capacity to create explosions and has been acting as a solo hero since she was young.

• Amka Aliyak / Snowguard (17), who gained the ability to turn into different animals after rescuing the Inua spirit, Sila.

At some point, Riri, the Cho twins, Nadya and Hunter helped Viv fix and reprogram her late brother Vincent Vision and bring him back, and later he became an honorary member of the team. One day, in 2023, during a mission, Viv went haywire and exploded, destroying Kamala Khan’s school and causing the authorities to pass a new Law, the Underage Superhuman Wellfire Act, that prohibited any individual under the age of 21 from acting as a superhero without supervision.

Kamala was outraged and promised that the Champions would keep fighting. Then, more members kept joining the team: Cindy Moon / Silk (23), Kareem / Red Dagger (19), Anã Corazón / Araña (18), Tiana Toomes / Starling (18), Lunella Lafayette (12) and Devil Dinosaur, Robbie Reyes / Ghost Rider (19), David Alleyne / Prodigy (24), Valeria Richards / Brainstorm (16), Jo-Venn and N’Kalla Grimm (12), Sooraya Qadir / Dust (24) and Gabby Kinney / Honey Badger (13).

• Strange Academy.

In order to train new sorcerers, Doctor Stephen Strange opened his Strange Academy with the help of other powerful individuals, like Nico Minoru and Doctor Vodoo, accepting to teach any child with the abilities for mysticism and magic.

Some of the student, all with different abilities, were: the twins Iric and Alvi Brorson (15); Doyle (15), the son of the terrific Dormammu; a frost giant called Guslag (14) sent to the school by Loki; Emily Bright (15) who was born with the ability to control magic; Zoe Laveau (16), a young lady from a long lineage of female magicians; Despair (16) or Dessy, daughter of the demon S’ym; Germán Aguilar (15), who can create animal projections; Calvin Morse (14) that was later possessed by Mister Misery; and Shaylee Moonpeddle (15), a half-fairy young girl, and others.

• The Next Avengers.

Other possible future heroes, working solo or as members of these famous teams, are: 

• Mayday Parker, who becomes Spider-Girl in 2024, she was born in 2009.

• Kaelynn Alexander, Sam Alexander’s sister and daughter of a Nova, born in 2009.

• Eleanor “Ellie” Camacho, Deadpool’s daughter, possible mutant who hadn’t activated her powers yet, born in 2009.

• Davey Maddox, Multiple Man’s son, born in 2009.

• Dylan Brock and Sleeper, sons of Eddie Brock, Anne Weying and Venom, born in 2011.

• Norman Harold Osborn / Red Goblin, Harry’s Osborn’s son, current student at Avengers Academy, born in 2012.

• Danielle Cage, daughter of Luke Cage and Jessica Jones, born in 2015.

• William Nelson, Tigra’s son, born in 2016.

• Gerald Drew, Jessica Drew’s son, future hero named Black Mamba, born in 2016.

• Shogo Lee, Jubilee’s adopted son, who has the ability to turn into a dragon, born in 2019.

• Benjamin “Benny” Parker, Mayday Parker’s younger brother, born in 2019.

[dailybugle-blr]

Uncovering the Truth Behind the Avengers: A Closer Look at Earth's Mightiest Heroes

by David Henwick, investigative journalist

Submitted photo

NEW YORK CITY - As an investigative journalist, it is my duty to delve beneath the surface and uncover the truth, no matter how uncomfortable or inconvenient it may be. And when it comes to the Avengers, Earth's mightiest heroes, there are certainly some questions that need answering.

While the Avengers have long been celebrated as the defenders of humanity, there are whispers of controversy and secrecy surrounding their operations. As I began to dig deeper, I discovered a web of intrigue and deception that raises serious concerns about the true motives and intentions of these so-called heroes.

One of the most pressing issues is the lack of transparency surrounding the Avengers' activities. Despite their immense power and influence, the public knows remarkably little about the inner workings of the team, including their funding sources, decision-making processes, and potential conflicts of interest.

"It's concerning," said Margaret Peterson, concerned citizen. "We put our trust in the Avengers to protect us, but how can we be sure they're acting in our best interests if we don't know what they're up to?"

But perhaps even more troubling is the apparent disregard for accountability and oversight within the Avengers' ranks. With no government regulation or supervision, they operate with unchecked authority, making decisions that impact the lives of millions without any checks and balances.

"We need to hold them accountable for their actions," said Kittrick Lanfrey, another concerned citizen. "Just because they have powers doesn't mean they're above the law. We deserve to know who they answer to and what their ultimate goals are."

As I continue to investigate, it becomes increasingly clear that there is much more to the Avengers than meets the eye. Behind their facade of heroism and bravery lies a world of secrets and uncertainty, leaving many to wonder: are the Avengers truly here to protect us, or are they just another group of self-serving individuals seeking power and glory?

It is my hope that through diligent investigation and relentless pursuit of the truth, we can shed light on the shadowy corners of the Avengers' operations and hold them accountable for their actions. The people of New York deserve nothing less.

[lunarspiral1127]

So, Secret Invasion....it sucked.

*SPOILERS*

Not since She-Hulk have I been so disappointed and frustrated on an MCU show. This could've been epic, but it wasn't. And, the ending, the finale just felt so off. Like, they give this hopeful ending to Fury while so much killing is happening. I've pointed out a lot of what's wrong with the show. Killing off Maria in the first episode, killing off Talos, a terrible character for a villain, stupid decisions characters have made, and many questions and plotholes left unanswered.

The best parts were Sonya, Talos, Fury, Varra, but the writing in this show was bad. This should've been a longer series, or even a movie that had more characters involved. Secret Invasion shouldn't be limited to a small group of characters. And, I hate that the writers told the director to not bother with the source material cause that's not what they're intentions were of this show. Why can't we just do proper adaptations to comic storylines with changes that makes sense and improve on the story?!

Honestly, this was the worst in Phase 5 so far. All the actors and the characters they portrayed deserved better. But, if you wanna watch a show that has Skrulls in it, I recommend the Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes animated show. I wonder if the people of Agents of Shield would do Secret Invasion better. Hell, I'm sure Agents of Shield had something similar and did it better. I haven't seen all of AoS so I don't know.

Anyway, that's my thoughts/rant on Secret Invasion. This deserved better. But, we still got Loki season 2, Echo, and the Marvels left this year. Hopefully, they'll be better than this, but I'll keep expectations low for now.

[savage-kult-of-gorthaur]

"EARTH'S MIGHTIEST HEROES ARE NO MORE... TONY STARK IS THE LAST MAN ALIVE."

PIC(S) INFO: Spotlight on sketch art of Tony Stark of Earth-9997, the reported "last man alive" and unaffected by Plague X, from "Earth X" Sketchbook Vol. 1 [a one-shot issue]. February, 1999. Marvel Comics. Artwork by Alex Ross.

PIC #2: Bonus sketch art of the Iron Avengers, robots designed by Tony himself with Iron Man technology, pre-programmed with the personalities and characteristics of all the dead Avengers. Arrwork/design by Alex Ross.

MINI-BIO: "Earth's Mightiest Heroes are no more. Most are dead. A few fled to the other side of the world. Only one remains.

Tony Stark is the last man alive. That is, he is untouched by whatever it is that has mutated his world. He is the man in the armored bubble -- the man who has expanded his armor around himself so far that he lives in utter isolation and utter sterilization.

In a way, though, Tony Stark has also lost his humanity. For humanity has a social existence. And he is alone and too proud to admit that in holding on to his natural form, he has become a stranger to the world."

-- X-51, a.k.a., "MACHINE MAN" (the new Watcher of Earth-9997), story/script by Jim Krueger

Source: https://thedorkreview.blogspot.com/2013/11/alex-ross-earth-x-sketchbook.html.

[therese-lokidottir]

The Avengers: Earth Mightiest Heroes series watch

Ultron-5 written by Brandon Auman

This episode starts off with the Avengers facing off against the Serpent Society in a subway station where they have taken hostages. Ant-Man tries to resolve the conflict peacefully, but King Cobra insists on fighting. Despite their efforts, the villains manage to escape, leading to Hank quitting the team. Later at The avengers mansion, Wasp asks Iron Man to convince Hank to stay, but Iron Man responds that they cannot force him to stay. The Wasp decides to talk to Hank by herself.

Tony is curious about what Cobra told him about Madame Viper sending him a message even though she is currently in S.H.I.E.L.D custody, and wonders who sent it. Thor asks Iron Man to help him return to Asgard, but they are interrupted by the arrival of Hulk and Black Panther, who have apprehended Red Ghost and his Super-Apes. The Black Panther reveals that the Red Ghost received schematics and security codes of the Baxter Building from an anonymous source. Tony tracks a transmission to the Avengers Mansion but the system malfunctions.

Wasp tries to convince Hank to stay with the Avengers, but he decides to leave. Ultron then attacks Hank and captures the Wasp. Iron Man's armor malfunctions and attacks Thor, while a Quinjet takes off into space with Hulk. The Avengers rush to investigate and find out that Hulk was shot into space, and remote-controlled Iron Man armor attacks the team.

Ultron trapped Wasp and he reveals he super villains after the Avengers after upgrading his programming and weapons. After disabling Iron Man's armor The rest of the Avengers regroup to save Wasp from Ultron. Thor is seemingly vaporized by Ultron's blast, leaving only his hammer. Wasp escapes Ultron's imprisonment by growing to giant size, and crushes Ultron, but immediately shrinks back down and is seriously weakened.

Captain America attacks But Ultron catches Cap's shield and knocks him out stating his intention to eliminate humanity to achieve peace. Wasp tries to stop him, but he dismisses her. The Quinjet carrying Hulk explodes, and he returns to Earth with the containment tanks. Hank tries to shut down ultron but fails. Ultron is about to attack Hank when Iron Man joins the battle in one of his older suits that Ultron can't hack. Hulk tears Ultron apart, and Hank removes Ultron's power core, finally shutting down the android.

Hank and Tony agree that the remaining Ultron shells and programming need to be destroyed. Hank stand by his decision to leave the Avengers and now feels guilty for Ultron killing Thor. Fortunately, Thor survived and wakes up in a serene field where the Amora is. She tells him that everything is alright as long as they are together.

This episode was fine. Everything with Hank was nicely built up to through the season. Hank's not really into being a superhero, he clearly more into the idea of helping people rehabilitate into society than beating. Hank and Janet are clearly meant to be foils to each other, with her 100% wanting to be a superhero and that being something very fulfilling for her. Wasp has clearly very friendly relations to everyone on the team, while Hank gives off more polite co-worker vibes and isn't close to anyone outside of Janet and has been repeatedly critical of Tony.

I'm mixed on who I think is right in the opening. On one side I do agree force is sometimes going to need to be used in the here and now and negotiations aren't going to work. But the other Avengers do have a tone that makes it sound like they think these people are entirely lost causes who can't be help. Which does not make them come off well at all.

As for the other characters I do appreciate Tony being respectful of Hank's choices her. There's some nice continuity with the growing respect between him and Thor.

Ultron, at this point is not much of the character, with the most interesting thing being Hank made sure he could never hurt else but didn't do the same for anyone else. Not even himself from what it seems.

[ordinaryschmuck]

Quick Thoughts on Secret Invasion...The Comic event. Not the Show.

So, with Secret Invasion coming out in a week, I thought I'd share my thoughts that no one asked for on the event it's based on. Because this is actually the first time I have read the entire source material before throwing myself into the adaptation, mainly because I had the time and was always curious about what it was about. And truth be told...it's okay?

I mean, I feel like this is one of the instances where the source material is outclassed by an adaptation. And I'm not talking about the MCU because...that's not out yet. I'm talking about Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes. Yeah, the show with a TV-Y7-FV rating somehow manages to do better than a comic event geared toward teens and adults. And there are a few reasons for that.

#1. The event rarely doesn’t move forward.

In the comics, so much about Secret Invasion focuses on flashbacks to explain how the invasion happened in the first place and tie-ins that show what other characters were doing at the time. While the flashbacks are necessary, it takes the momentum out of the present story. As for the tie-ins, they're unnecessary. Oh, don't get me wrong, there's some fun to be had, like...

Deadpool training Skrull clones of himself to become as insane as him.

War Machine turning into a giant mech to fight off enemy ships.

Thor defending a town from god-killing Skrulls

And Black Panther defending Wakanda from another faction of Skrulls.

There are a lot of fun side stories and tie-ins but could skip a lot of it and miss nothing. All you really need to keep track of are the Avengers and the Thunderbolts. Speaking of which...

#2. It focuses mostly on the Avengers.

Three comic titles were about the Avengers at this time. You have The New Avengers, The Mighty Avengers, and The Avengers Initiative. The only ones who had prominence in the event were the Thunderbolts, and that's about it. A fun thing about events is seeing how all the heroes react to it while feeling like they're part of a larger story, but here it's mostly about the Avengers. And sure, everyone was practically an Avenger at that time, but the universe doesn't always revolve around them. I want to see the X-Men, Fantastic Four, and even the Guardians of the Galaxy showing up for that final battle against the Skrulls or all of their fights to stop them from feeling like they make a difference rather than shoved off to the side in a skippable story.

I read a story where Thor wielded Mjölnir and Stormbreaker to kill a god-killing Skrull...and you can skip the whole thing. That's frustrating.

And it's extra frustrating because...

#3. The premise is great, but the execution is NOT.

The idea is that Earth has been invaded by Skrulls, only this time, it's done in a way where NO ONE can detect them. Not by spider-sense, magic, or telepathy. NOTHING. They're completely hidden, and Avengers have no idea who to trust. That is a fascinating idea for an event...There are just a few problems with that.

A. It's incredibly vague how the Skrulls can hide themselves so well. The best explanation we get is that a clone of Reed Richards figured something out...and that's it. They never say HOW he figured it out. They just say that he DID.

B. They only really play around with this premise in flashbacks, which, as I've said, ruins the momentum of the present story.

C. Most of this premise is wasted on Avengers fighting Super Skrulls instead of the ones inside their faction.

And D. The best usage of that premise is when it should be painfully obvious who's a Skrull and who isn't.

At one point, the NEW Avengers and the MIGHTY Avengers go to the Savage Lands to investigate a crashed ship that holds Skrulls disguised as them but in outfits from the seventies/eighties, all in a way to play with the Avenger's heads about whether or not the invasion has been planned for that long. Absolutely NO ONE should have fallen for that, yet they all do. It's honestly frustrating that these heroes who have been doing this shit for decades NEVER picked up an obvious trap as it was literally punching them in the face.

And it's here where I get to how Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes does all of this better.

It starts early on to tell the audience that Skrulls have invaded factions of superheroes, including the Avengers. For almost half of Season Two, we see our heroes deal with this as it happens in the background as the audience knows who the Skrull is while our heroes remain clueless.

It makes sense why it's about the Avengers because...Well, it's a SHOW about the AVENGERS. I mind it less when a big story focuses slowly on the Avengers when it's abundantly clear that the Avengers are the sole focus of the story and no one else. Especially when this show takes place in a universe where heroes are starting out and are more unprepared for something like a Secret Invasion.

And finally, it executes the premise perfectly, having a Skrull mess with the Avengers and subtly tricking them instead of letting a gigantic fight against Super Skrulls be the crux of the invasion. It's all interesting to see and a lot more of what I expected going in when reading this event from start to finish. Only to be... disappointed.

There are some fun stories, cool fights, and solid character work in Secret Invasion, but it's still an event that feels more carried by its premise than its actual story. A cool premise for sure, but too much bogs it down. I'd sooner attempt to read Secret Wars again. That actually had a cool premise with even better execution from the...VERY LITTLE that I've read.

Still, would this mean the MCU's take on the story will be any better? Well...depends on how well they play with this "Who can you trust?" aspet. But if you want a better version of the story, just watch Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes.

In fact, just watch that show in general. It's SO good.

[ironstrangeao3]

Pillow Biter

by XenOGax

More shameless IronStrange smut (although you probably can imagine any other person behind Stephen if you ignore the dialogue-)

Words: 0, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English

Fandoms: Marvel, Doctor Strange: The Sorcerer Supreme (2007), Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes

Rating: Mature

Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Categories: M/M

Characters: Tony Stark, Stephen Strange

Relationships: Tony Stark/Stephen Strange

Additional Tags: Top Tony Stark, Bottom Stephen Strange, Illustrations, Drawing

source https://archiveofourown.org/works/47018257