With Disney owning ABC, and thus a share of Hulu, and soon to be bringing in 20th Century Fox, thus having two-thirds–sorry NBCUniversal, it’s not surprising that they would want to bring their stuff over there while still setting up their Disney Plus streaming service. Marvel recently ended most of their Netflix shows (or maybe all of them–I don’t have Netflix) and now we have four animated series making their way to Hulu.
Marvel has never really had their own version of the DC Animated Universe. At best they shared voice actor and character designs between shows but it always felt to me like they were just using a superhero they already had out there. Nothing ever really seemed to affect any of the other shows. This includes the recent shows on Disney XD from what I can tell. However, starting out with a crossover special entitled The Offenders, an obvious parody of Netflix’s The Defenders (which was the name of a superteam in the Marvel Universe at one point), the four cartoons that Hulu will have based on Marvel characters may be connected.
The interesting thing is they really aren’t doing the popular character, much like the recent Marvel Rising specials, but focusing on characters more obscure than even the Rising cast except to die-hard comic fans. Well, one of them is but he isn’t a hero. It’s an odd set of choices, but could they work? Through Variety let’s take a look at what’s coming.
The shows will be based on the following Marvel characters: Howard the Duck, M.O.D.O.K, Hit-Monkey, and Tigra and Dazzler. Like the Marvel-Netflix “Defenders” shows before them, the four characters will then team up in the animated special “The Offenders.” Marvel’s head of TV, Jeph Loeb, will executive produce each project. Disney–which owns Marvel–will become a majority shareholder in Hulu once the Fox-Disney merger is completed.
The question is, who are these characters? Most of them have made it out of the comics in one form or another. Everyone except the first one I’ll bring up.
BW’s Morning Article Link: Revisiting The Distribution Issue
Back In January I posted a Morning Article Link where a guest-writer for ICv2, comic store owner Phil Boyle, brought up suggestions to benefit the comic stores from having too much overstock and easing their burdens when it came to how it dealt with comic companies and virtual monopoly distributor Diamond. Now ICv2 has an update, as it appears some of the publishers are actually considering his words and seeing what is feasible to them. Time will tell though, as comic stores continue to hurt and comic readership continues to suffer.
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Posted by ShadowWing Tronix on February 13, 2019 in Comic Spotlight and tagged comic stores, comics, commentary.
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