Andor Is Making Star Wars Culturally Relevant Again

I took part in the Low Kings March in Manhattan this past weekend. Despite weather and exceptionally cool weather for mid-June, the occasion at times felt like a healing exorcism—or at least a heavy sigh of relief after long-simmering sadness. A hundred thousand or so like-minded people participated in political commitment as well.

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Spider-Man has been known to drop off of points for a while because he is the world’s primary wallcrawler. But 27 times is pushing it, yet for him. Spidey has been waiting for a solution to the cliffhanger that ended Spider-Man: The Lively Series, a well-known cartoon series that aired on the Fox Network, for how long.

The line ended in &#8217, 98 with Spider-Man following Madame Web&#8217, s directions to find his wife Mary Jane, who had been lost in the world after being replaced by a copy in his own timeline. With the release of the upcoming four-issue miniseries Spider-Man &#8217, 94, starring legendary writer J. M. DeMatteis ( Kraven &#8217, s Last Hunt ) and artist Jim Towe, the two of them never actually reunited, which Marvel Comics will finally correct.

Spider-Man &#8217, 94 is just the latest film line of the time to get a smile in recent years. Nicholas Hoult, a writer for Dynamite Entertainment, just cited Clancy Brown‘s performance in Superman: The Active Series as an inspiration for his portrayal of Lex Luthor, as well as a fresh Captain Planet and the Planeteers comic book release this time. There is also the feeling that is Disney+&#8217, s X-Men &#8217, 97 ( which we should note even just got a green after Marvel Comics dipped its feet into nostalgia via the X-Men &#8217, 92 series in 2015 ). In other words, it’s becoming increasingly clear that the 90s were the only ones who could stand up for characters.

But as we wait for Spider-Man &#8217, 94 to finally find Spidey off that mountain, let&#8217, s look at some of the best film line of the time and what they did so well.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ( 1987-1996 )

Yes, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles debuted in the late &#8217, 80s, but the set hit its top in 1990 and set the stage for the superhero growth to occur. After all, the Turtles made their debut in comics produced by independent designers Peter Laird and Kevin Eastman in the series Daredevil, which had begun as a movie of Frank Miller &#8216.

For those of us who were children during the Turtles &#8217, first growth, the original manga were the stuff of legend: black and white and apparently trendy, they were a forbidden fruits that we all wanted to seek out but were afraid of what we&#8217, d get. However, looking back, it &#8217 is remarkable to see how much of the goofy Turtles lore originates directly from those first comics, including the alien Utroms ( represented by Krang in the cartoon ) and the psycho vigilante Casey Jones.

Whatever one feels about that revelation, the fact that the Ninja Turtles got fans to seek out indie comics is still remarkable. Although that urge did lead to a glut of indie comics-based cartoon shows, some excellent ( The Tick ) and some subpar ( Wild C. A. T. S. ), it also served as a reminder that superheroes could thrive outside of the Marvel and DC Universes, a principle that is still relevant today.

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Batman: The Animated Series ( 1992–1995 )

The animated superhero boom was perfected by Batman: The Animated Series, despite the fact that Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles may have started it. Created by Bruce Timm and Eric Radomski, Batman: TAS moved the genre forward by looking backward. Batman: TAS succeeded because of Timm&#8217, barrel-chested designs, and top-notch scripts from writers like Paul Dini, set during an era that was unrelated to Tim Burton and only tangentially related to Tim Burton films. Together they distilled the classic tropes and sagas from previous decades of comics into something that made the hero timeless.

The majority of Batman: TAS‘s standalone stories were told, similar to those in each Batman or Detective Comics issue from the Golden Age or the Bronze Age. Some sort of baddie—whether it be a costumed freak like Joker or Scarecrow, or a thug like Rupert Thorne—would threaten Gotham, and Batman would use all the tools at his disposal to stop them.

As straightforward as that premise was, Batman: TAS also discovered effective, and even definitive ways to find pathos in these archetypes. Mr. Freeze transitioned from a joke to a tragic figure, the Joker never felt so ominous (veering into gritty ugliness ), and Poison Ivy made her first steps toward becoming the antihero we know today &#8212, including by collaborating with a TAS original creation, Harley Quinn.

Batman: The Animated Series launched a host of spinoffs, including the aforementioned Superman, the future-set sequel Batman Beyond, and Justice League. The legacy lives on in every adaptation that attempts to convey compelling superhero tales to a broad audience, including Timm&#8217, Batman’s spiritual successor.

X-Men: The Animated Series ( 1992-1997 )

Let’s start by addressing the elephant in the room. Yes, X-Men &#8217, 97 technically resolved the Spider-Man: The Animated Series cliffhanger in the season one finale where we see a glimpse of Mary Jane standing next to Spidey, suggesting that the two did reunite and make their way home.

With that said, let’s get to what X-Men: The Animated Series did really well: it made the comics available to the masses. While Batman: The Animated Series deserves praise for its economic storytelling, that approach had largely been abandoned in its source material. In the early 1990s, superhero comics were frequently complicated soap opera-style stories with complex interpersonal relationships. No one did these types of stories better than Chris Claremont, who started writing the X-Men in 1975, transforming the team from Marvel c-listers into the biggest heroes on the newsstand by 1992.

X-Men: TAS adapted Claremont&#8217’s stories and used Jim Lee‘s most recent visual changes, following the leader, rather than trying to reinvent the wheel. Somehow it worked, bringing bonkers tales like the Mutant Massacre and Fall of the Mutants to the small screen. It captivated a whole new generation of fans. Of course the most pronounced successor to X-Men: The Animated Series is the Disney + series X-Men &#8217, 97, which continues the storylines of the original show and heightens the political messaging. However, X-Men: TAS also demonstrated to executives that general audience respect for comic-accurate material, opening the door to the current entertainment landscape, where Disney creates billion-dollar films based on The Infinity Gauntlet and Secret Wars.

Spider-Man: The Animated Series ( 1994–1998 )

Evidently, X-Men: The Animated Series is a major source of debt for Spider-Man: The Animated Series. Like his merry mutant cousins, Spider-Man got to recreate his overstuffed comic book adventures on the small screen. Spider-Man: The Animated Series simplified the comic book stories in a way that prepared for upcoming adaptations, even more than X-Men.

For evidence, take a look at the way the cartoon handled Venom. Spider-Man wore a black suit while he was a space alien in Secret Wars in the comics. For a while, Peter wore his black suit as his new costume, but eventually returned to his blue and red togs when he grew uncomfortable with having a symbiote. Eddie Brock, a new character, donned the costume and became Venom in 1988, four years after the black suit debuted.

While the slower pace helps build up the relationship between Spidey and Venom, cartoon viewers can&#8217, t wait four years for a fan-favorite baddie to exist. The symbiote also attaches itself to a meteor brought to Earth by astronaut John Jameson in the cartoon, which then jumps to Spidey and Eddie Brock before becoming a symbiote. The whole thing gets told in three episodes, without sacrificing any of the other-worldliness central to Venom. Additionally, it introduced the idea that the symbiote is capable of corrupting Peter Parker’s persona and causing him to gravitate toward the dark Spider-Man. &#8221, These are all elements that have been incorporated to some capacity in every future adaptation of the Venom character, on the small screen and the big.

Examples like those showed the directors of contemporary superhero films that it was possible to be creative with characters as long as you managed to be effective. It was a benchmark for Spider-Man: TAS, the first major adaptation of the comics to capture the soap operatic appeal of the character and his &#8220, days of lives &#8221, romances as a twentysomething in NYC&#8212, a core aspect of the character that arguably no film has balanced quite so well.

Superman: The Animated Series ( 1996-2000 )

On first glance, it would be easy to say Superman: The Animated Series is to Batman what Spider-Man: The Animated Series is to X-Men. That is a solid cartoon series that doesn’t quite live up to the name of the original. However, Superman: TAS also showed something important about creating Superman and Batman stories, something that certain people ( coughZackSnyderwithManofSteelcough ) forgot: Superman is n&#8217, t Batman and his stories need to be handled differently.

Superman: TAS draws from the optimism of the old World &#8217, s Fair celebrations, and 1950s sci-fi to give Metropolis the impression of being set in some undefined future, while Batman: TAS painted Gotham City in the film noir tones. There&#8217, s certainly a quaintness to the proceedings, what with its cackling businessman Luthor and robo-men like Metallo. However, that eccentricity never feels out of fashion.

Moreover, Superman: TAS showed how to tell compelling Superman stories on a regular basis without making the hero feel less super. Yes, this Superman adaptation was a little more vulnerable than his comic book counterpart, but he always fought for the weak and did what was right. #8230, which definitely sounds a lot like the Superman we’ll see on the big screen this summer.

Justice League Unlimited ( 2004-2006 )

Since Justice League Unlimited ran in the middle of the 2000s, we&#8217 are cheating a little bit here. But it is an offshoot of three major shows from the 1990s—Batman: The Animated Series, Superman: The Animated Series, and Batman Beyond—and has much more in common with them than it does other 2000s shows, such as Teen Titans or X-Men: Evolution.

The second Justice League cartoon based on the Batman: TAS universe is called Justice League Unlimited. Where the first incarnation focused largely on &#8220, the Big Seven&#8221, —Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Martian Manhunter, Green Lantern, Flash, and Hawkgirl— Unlimited expanded things, hence the name. The stories also included deep dives like Hawk and Dove, the Legion of Super-Heroes, and the Seven Soldiers of Victory, but the Big Seven remained operating concerns.

Like X-Men: The Animated Series, Justice League Unlimited did dabble in long-form serialized storytelling, with its majestic Cadmus arc and a fun, if less impressive, Legion of Doom arc. However, it also taught readers a valuable lesson about comic books, namely that even silly characters like Warlord and Vigilante can be interesting. Without Justice League Unlimited, we obviously would not have the current DC Comics ongoing Justice League Unlimited ( written by Mark Waid and penciled by Dan Mora ), nor might James Gunn be able to bring his lovable oddballs to the screen like Peacemaker and Metamorpho.

Fantastic Four ( 1994-1996 )

Okay, the Fantastic Four cartoon is n&#8217, t that memorable. It’s a passable cartoon, but the choppy animation and rote storytelling fall far short of the vibrant imagination of the Jack Kirby and Stan Lee comics that served as its inspiration. Somehow, the weird anime-inspired series Fantastic Four: World &#8217, s Greatest Heroes stands out better, even if it is n&#8217, t very good.

Do you understand what makes a memorable item? The show &#8217, s theme song, which you will now watch and have lodged in your head with every bit of promotion for The Fantastic Four: First Steps. You are most welcome, if you.

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