Category Archives: Cartoons
Low-Key Great: The Hit-Monkey Cartoon
You know what’s low-key great? The Hit-Monkey cartoon on Hulu. I just finished up the second season and I’m here to tell you that the showrunners go all-out for season 2! Honestly, I’m sure they were all surprised to even get a second season, so they really gave it their all. This show gets my highest recommendation!
Hit-Monkey is actually a Marvel cartoon, based on a fairly recent but now also obscure Marvel Comics character. He’s a monkey who wears a suit and is an assassin. I never read any of the comics, but Hit-Monkey was named way back in 2019 as one several shows being considered by then Marvel Television to turn random characters into shows.
Of that group, we only ever got M.O.D.O.K. — which was great! — and Hit-Monkey. The first season came out all the way back in 2021. I have very little memory of the season, but I’m confident I enjoyed it. And it’s just plain shocking that anybody involved greenlit this show for a second season an entire three years later! Marvel Television is no more, it’s all subsumed into Marvel Studios. There’s no M.O.D.O.K. season 2, for example.
But I’m not about to look this gift horse in the mouth!
This is just going to be a brief review/recommendation to go watch Hit-Monkey. The first season was good, from what I can remember, and the second season is damn great! The writing is awesome, the jokes are fun, the story really goes to some crazy places, episode-after-episode. It’s an ongoing, serialized story across the entire season, but they do something new and different each episode. The characters are a lot of fun and the voice acting is no slouch. Jason Sudeikis does not phone it in as the show’s real protagonist, Bryce, and then the likes of Olivia Munn, Leslie Jones, Stephanie Beatriz and Keith David round out an excellent cast.
The animation is awesome, the action is excellent, and it’s an adult cartoon with swearing and real violence, and that’s always a plus.
The show isn’t steeped in Marvel lore, so you don’t need to know anything to enjoy the show. There are a few minor characters throughout, like Fat Cobra in season one, and Lady Bullseye in both seasons, but it’s mostly a stand alone show that just happens to be based on a Marvel Comics character. It’s actually kind of crazy that, in 2024, we got a show starring Hit-Monkey, with Lady Bullseye in an ongoing subplot role. Madness!
Hit-Monkey is currently available to watch on Hulu, which I think is part of Disney+ now anyway, so all the Marvel stuff is in one place. Take it from me, this show is a damn fun watch!
————–
More Vox Machina Cartoon, Anyone?
On the one hand, I’m a big fan of the Critical Roll cartoon. On the other hand, I think I was so tired that I slept through a couple of the final episodes in the second season. I don’t remember how that season ended. But hey, it’s coming back for a third season, so awesome!
Looks fun! The Critical Rollers are going to hell! That’s their name, right?
Not that I’ve listened to any of their actual Critical Roll shows, but I like the Mighty Nein better and am really looking forward to that series! There’s a huge wealth of Mighty Nein animatics on YouTube that really show off the fun of those characters. So we’ll see when that gets a cartoon!
The Legend of Vox Machina returns to Amazon Prime on Oct. 3!
———————-
Nifty New Video Game Show Coming
This trailer landed last week and I’m only posting it now because I kept forgetting about it — but I promise it looks fun! Secret Level is made by the people behind Love + Death + Robots, and looks to be a series of short cartoons based on some popular video games. That sounds good to me!
Some of the games include God of War and Mega Man, which should be awesome. I would love a God of War short cartoon! And Mega Man in this hyper realistic style could be neat. I’m also a fan of some of the Warhammer games, so woohoo there! I’m not entirely sure of what other games will get shorts, but they’re listed. This could be a fun show! I enjoyed all the Love/Death/Robots stuff. So this looks good!
Secret Level comes to Amazon Prime on Dec. 10!
—————————
Lord of the Rings: The Anime
There’s a new Lord of the Rings movie coming out this year called The War of the Rohirrim. I don’t know much about LOTR lore, but I’m pretty sure the Rohirrim are those horseriders from Rohan. And I didn’t know much about this movie, only that it existed and was coming out.
Well, this first trailer sets everything up nicely: War of the Rohirrim looks to be a badass anime!
Looks awesome. I’m not the biggest fan of picking apart the original Lord of the Rings movie trilogy for any scraps that can be turned into a new story — even if I do enjoy The Rings of Power — but if they’re going to make good stuff, I’m down for that. I always like good stuff, and this looks pretty darn cool.
The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim comes to theaters in December.
———————–
How I Would Write Incredibles 3
One of the movies announced at D23 this year was an Incredibles threequel, which I think is a fine idea. The original The Incredibles from 2004 is a masterpiece of both animation and superhero storytelling. It’s the best Fantastic Four movie ever made, and it’s one of the best superhero movies ever made. It’s great. The Incredibles 2 came out in 2018 and it’s good, but it’s not the original. The sequel felt like everybody got together 14 years later and decided to make another Incredibles movie, so they did. It’s really just another entry in the series.
So the threequel should be something of the same. I wouldn’t be trying to recreate the glory days of Pixar, I’d just be trying to make another Incredibles movie with a good story and solid, relatable themes.
Apologies in advance, I’m probably going to write this thing like a stream of consciousness and just ramble my ideas onto this post. Or maybe I’ll clean it up later and it’ll be nicely presented. But I’ll mostly just riff. I’ve got ideas and I want to get them down on digital paper!
So join me after the jump for how I would write and plot The Incredibles 3. And feel free to share your own ideas in the comments below.
Read the rest of this entry
Henchman-4-Hire 