Marvel's Iron Man: The Animated Series

Howdydoodleedoo!!! And for those of you that got that reference, yer aces, baby. With that in mind, hello and welcome back to Rotten Reelz Reviews. I am plucking series, movies and even games at random this week so it should be fun for all to read... but it is less than what you were hoping for, again rottenreelzreviews@gmail.com and of course I can be reached at the Facebook page as well at https://www.facebook.com/RottenReelzReviews/ so please reach out, make a suggestion or even a comment on the general flow of the reviews. Well this time around we are back to the land of the rising sun for another Marvel anime. Yup when you get contracted to make Marvel characters look awesome, you better bring your "A" game and that is exactly what Madhouse Productions (Hunter x Hunter, Death Paradise, "My Love Story", Overlord and Prince of Stride) brought and did. So how do you represent an egotistical billionaire playboy with about a million dollars of tech in his battle armor? With style of course. This is Iron Man: Anime.

Oh Stark, beside yourself again?

No stranger to acting or voice acting, Adrian Pasdar (Judging Amy, Desperate Housewives, Heroes, The Lying Game, Burn Notice, Avengers Assemble and Agents of SHIELD) has been tasked to put a voice to the brilliant yet reckless avenger Iron Man as he is in Japan bringing an arc reactor to power the nation. The concept to world peace it to provide clean and efficient energy without relying heavily on fossil fuels. Guess he better get started on arc reactors in cars, trucks and bikes as well. Well demonstrating his latest armor for Japan, Tony announces he will be stepping down as Iron Man and devoting his time to research...so no more Avengers picnics? Say it ain't so, Tony!

Damn import jobs never hold up.

But the demonstration goes a bit wonky which Tony took as a glitch in the new suit so off to run diagnostics and find out what all the hubbub is bub, when the armor with pilot takes off on its own, blasting any obstacle in its way. Stark must don his armor once more and find out what is going on. A young reporter Nanami (Eden Riegel of Prince of Egypt, American Pie, Young and the Restless and All My Children) has to chase Stark down for an interview and doesn't really think much of him. As she has adventures and near misses with death around him, she sees there is actually depth to Stark and his agendas. Circulated rumors about Stark bringing weapons construction follow adamantly and Stark attempts to defuse this with charm and grace... well as graceful as Stark can be. Is someone out to smear his company's name? Are there really WMDs (Weapons of Mass Destruction) being smuggled into Japan?

As I mentioned in the Blade Anime review, this process was a 12 episode story arc with some fair and clever conclusion. It's actual sad that there was not a renewal of contract because the art work is very impressive, the CG spliced with the hand drawn looks natural together and both Japanese and English voice cast bust their collective humps to bring life into the characters. It makes total sense to use existing storylines from the source material as Stark did set up a branch in Japan in the comics.

Award-winning graphic novelist Warren Ellis (Transmetropolitan, Fell, Minstry of Space, RED and Planetary) wrote outlines for each of the 12 episodes and given his mind, you already know it to be odd, clever and entertaining. Hey if you saw the flick RED, you are in good hands here.

Yeah, I know Thor.  Man why does everyone ask me that?