The
Fantastic Four – The Complete 1994-95 Animated Television Series
Picture: C+
Sound: B- Extras: C+ Episodes: B-
After issuing their terrific Spider-Man 1967 set,
many hoped that when a Fantastic Four set was issued, it would be the
original series from the same time.
Instead, they have issued the third animated series form the mid-1990s
in the set elaborately titled The Fantastic Four – The Complete 1994-95
Animated Television Series. Not as
colorful or natural as the first animated show, yet a bit closer to the second
late 1970s/early 1980s show with The Human Torch replaced by Herbie The Robot,
created because some “experts” thought crossing R2D2 with Twiki and having a
voice reminiscent of Cartman through a voice synthesizer minus obscenities
would stop children from setting themselves on fire and trying to fly!
As part of this cycle of Marvel animated series (often
included in the Marvel Action Hour), it was one of the first to combine
traditional hand-drawn animation with computer/videotaped/digital (and maybe
analog) images with them. This caused
some compositing problems that have not aged well, while the color schemes are
more like the magazine-print era of comic books than the traditional type. The episodes in this set are:
1)
The Origins Of The Fantastic Four (two
shows)
2)
Now Comes The Sub-Mariner
3)
Incursion Of The Skrull
4)
The Silver Surfer & The Coming Of Galactus (two
shows)
5)
Super Skrull
6)
The Mask Of Doom (three shows)
7)
Mole Man
8)
Behold The Negative Zone
9)
The Silver Surfer & The Return Of Galactus
10)
And A Blind
Man Shall Lead Them
11)
Inhumans
Saga (three shows)
12)
Worlds
Within Worlds
13)
To Battle
The Living Planet
14)
Prey Of The
Black Panther
15)
When Calls
Galactus
16)
Nightmare
In Green
17)
Behold, A
Distant Star
18)
Hopelessly
Impossible
19)
The Sentry
Sinister
20)
Doomsday
That makes for 26 shows in all. Around this time, the script for the feature film of the team
that just came out ten years later was penned, so Marvel thought they would
possibly be able to bring the team to the big screen and have a big hit the way
Warner & DC Comics were making money on the Batman franchise. Instead, this series stopped short, while a
combination of legalities and technology needing to catch up with that script
stopped the heroes from making the kind of splash the X-Men would a few
years later.
Unlike other Marvel animated series of the time, this one
has not dated in content as well. The
attempt to introduce a catchy theme song ala the 1967 Spider-Man was a
bust, while its mockery of the media as something funny now comes across as
desperate and stupid. Brian Austin
Green is not bad voicing Johnny Storm/The Torch, but Lori Alan as sister Sue
sounds like she is auditioning for either a serious drama or the Margaret
Thatcher story. In general, everyone
talks at each other too often and this becomes as pompous as the fronting in a
wrestling match trying to do Shakespeare.
Fans of the comic will enjoy how the show stays close enough to the
comic books, if not satisfying the biggest purists.
The full frame 1.33 X 1 image is color consistent, but the
technology used to make the show shows its age, with detail limits and
compositing errors a bit higher than on similar Marvel animated productions of
the time. Otherwise, these sources are
clean. The Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo has
Pro Logic surrounds that are lively enough, and maybe more so than expected at
times, though the audio shows its age at times. Giorgio Moroder did the music, though that theme does not seem
like his work. Extras include Stan
Lee’s personal introductions to all the episodes and a great Stan Lee’s
Soapbox on the group taped for this set as well. With the feature film finally out, there are many who will want
to look at these shows again and they have never looked or sounded this good. Let’s hope the other animated series make it
to DVD.
- Nicholas Sheffo
