Episode #52 Avengers Assemble
Original Airdate - November 11th, 2012 (Series Finale)
The Avengers have fought super villains, dinosaurs, time-travelling conquerors, and shape-shifting aliens, but that all pales in comparison with the arrival of the insatiable Galactus and his awe-inspiring heralds. In order to save the world, the galaxy and the universe, the Avengers have to rely on all the help they can get.
Written by Christopher Yost
Directed by Roy Burdine
Review by RoyalRubble
Media by Marvel Animation, Marvel Animation Age
Review:
And here we have it, the final episode of The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes. It's been a great run, with lots of awesome moments and some of the best characterizations for these Marvel Comics characters. It's sad to see it all end. As for this episode, it was pretty awesome, though not quite on the same level as the previous Kree story-arc. It felt rushed at certain moments but that's unavoidable, when you have this many heroes in a single episode. It's called "Avengers Assemble!" for a good reason, pretty much every other guest heroes that have appeared on the show before return to help the Avengers take down Galactus and his heralds. It was so much fun seeing all these characters in the same episode - though some of them didn't really get to do too much here and there were other heroes that weren't even featured in this episode - it turned out well in the end. It's not a perfect episode but it does have a lot of good stuff in it, and I think it works as a satisfying conclusion to this amazing show.
Very nice way to start the episode, with Iron Man and Captain America having a small conversation about the impact the Avengers will have on the world, about how history will remember them for all their actions. By the end of the episode they will save Earth from Galactus, which pretty much confirms their status as heroes and that their legend will live on. I like it when shows end not with a cliff-hanger, but with an open ending, offering a satisfying ending while also leaving enough room for even more adventures. The Avengers' adventures obviously won't end after this fight with Galactus, but sadly we won't be seeing any more episodes featuring them. Galactus was handled well here - I liked how he was first mentioned and foreshadowed back during the Skrull's Secret Invasion story-arc, making his appearance here on Earth not too random. Cap was the only one who knew about who Galactus is and what he does; probably another subtle hint that Cap will finally take over leadership of the team, something I was hoping we'd get to actually see during the course of the show. The interactions between members of the team have been presented wonderfully for the most part of the series, so I guess I can't really complain.
Even though I was hoping we'd get to see the Silver Surfer as one of Galactus' heralds, I didn't really mind his absence here. The heralds chosen to appear were all pretty awesome and each one of them representing one of the elements was a nice touch. Terrax was probably the one who got the most scenes here, but the others were cool too and quite the challenge for our heroes. I liked how the Avengers and the new recruited superheroes split into groups to defeat their enemies placed in different locations, though to be honest I couldn't really keep track of who was in which team. The action scenes were good and it was just great seeing all these heroes again on the show, even for short scenes. Spider-Man was obviously going to appear again since he was the only one of the guest-stars to be recruited as an honorary Avenger at the end of the episode "New Avengers". I liked seeing the second Ant-Man (Scott Lang) again, after he only appeared in one episode before ("To Steal an Ant-Man") - I am a little disappointed there was no episode where the team meets him prior to this. It was nice seeing the Fantastic Four again, especially since Galactus is primarily their enemy. The only heroes that have previously appeared but were absent here that come to mind are probably Mockingbird, Beta Ray Bill and Guardians of the Galaxy. But what we got in this episode was awesome enough even without them.
Now I think this is another one of those moments where comparisons to previous shows are pretty unavoidable as this whole finale seemed very similar to the the finales of two other superhero animated shows: Justice League Unlimited's "Destroyer", and from Marvel X-Men: Evolution's "Ascension" two-parter. All these episodes had dozens of heroes teaming up to stop the end of the world. And all of them are awesome and work pretty well as finales. I can't say if one of the other shows did this concept better or not; I love all of them. Sure it would have been great to have this episode be composed of two parts as well but as a whole it probably was the best way to end the show. I think ending a show by giving pretty much every character a chance to return and do something cool, as well as fighting some great villains is the way to go. It would have been nice to see some resolutions to some of the stuff that was mentioned a couple of times throughout this season and was never resolved, but it was probably building-up to the third season, which sadly won't happen. Apart from the Surtur story-arc which was present in two or three previous episodes, I don't think anything major was left unresolved.
Galactus is usually considered one of the most powerful villains in the Marvel Universe so I thought he was a good choice as the final challenge for the Avengers. I liked him here - his design looked cool and having him be silent for the entire episode was pretty cool. In all the previous animated shows where Galactus has showed up, he always talked at least a little so this was a nice, and pretty unexpected change. His heralds probably appeared in this episode more than Galactus himself but once he appears he proves to be much to powerful for the Avengers. I liked the clever way the heroes defeated him in the end, by sending him away to the Negative Zone where he can feed on all the anti-matter he wants. And I'm glad Mr. Fantastic was one of the characters that made this happen, since like I said Galactus is primarily an enemy of the Fantastic Four.
Every character that appeared in this episode got at least one scene, no matter how short, to show some of his or her skills. I thought the opening montage with all the heroes getting ready for battle was awesome. Likewise for Cap's speech about how they are about to face their greatest challenge. Seeing the assembled heroes in front of the Avengers' mansion was just awesome and it's the first and last time this show had such a large number of heroes in a single episode. Another very nice touch was at the end of the episode, after the battle was won, how the main Avengers stand while people are cheering for them, and their silhouettes morph into the show's opening card. I liked that, as well as the fact that this title card "evolved" throughout the shows' run: each time a hero joined or left the team, this card reflected this change. It might mean this was the Avengers' final team roster (at least for a while), but it was most likely done for dramatic purposes. Either way, I liked it.
Really impressed by most of this second season, and the series as a whole. While the latter half of this season wasn't really on par with the previous episodes, for the most part it was still good and had some pretty awesome moments. These last few episodes felt rushed, but still had at least some of the charm the show had in the beginning. This is one of the best Marvel animated series ever, and definitely the best Avengers animated series (though to be fair, the competition wasn't really that impressive in the first place). And by the look of things, it will keep this "title" for a while.
So in closing, a huge thank you to Christopher Yost, Joshua Fine and everyone else involved in the making of this show. Even the last, re-worked episodes, which I think could have been much worse. It's been an amazing show, and it's sad to see it go. Here's hoping the next Avengers show will be at least half as good as The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes.
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