Avengers, Earth's Mightiest Heroes, Season 2, Episode 14: Behold the Vision
It's time for us to introduce a new Avenger -- or what would eventually become a new Avenger if you're at least somewhat familiar with the MCU at this point. And... and it's a bit unfortunate considering how much this season really likes to have episodes focusing on a single character with a couple of guest stars, which means that a lot of the established cast actually feels under-developed. None gets hit harder by this than Ms. Marvel, who honestly could really use some proper non-action screentime to develop her character. She just shows up for work and that's it? Also, no one even mentions the goddamn Hulk being kidnapped by the Hulkbusters?
Meanwhile, Vision goes around looking for certain objects, making yet another nod to the X-Men segment of the Marvel universe as he assaults the Weapon X facility to obtain a large amount of adamantium while displaying his bizarre and overpowered set of powers, while speaking in computer lingo. That's the cold open, before we cut away to four of our cast -- Cap, Black Panther, Thor and Hawkeye in Wakanda, trying to fix Captain America's broken shield with Wakandan science. Some of the friction from the Skrull war is apparently still around, because Hawkeye calls T'Challa out for bailing out on the Avengers when the going gets rough... but, again, this doesn't really get even properly being made into a B-plot, because we're so focused on the mysterious Vision.
Meanwhile, Vision attacks Jane Foster and Wasp while they're watching a horror movie in the Avengers mansion (that gotta be pretty scary, honestly, with Vision pulling out a page from The Ring). The sequence against the Wasp is pretty cool, but was it really necessary? It doesn't really add anything to the episode, and this is a part where a superior show would've actually worked in some characterization -- either show Vision's personality, or scrap the entire scene entirely and focus on the Hawkeye/T'Challa conflict.
But nope, it's just action scenes all the way, with the very bland Vision taking the plane to Wakanda, fighting the Avengers a bit, everyone marveling at how strong Vision is, but the Avengers drive him back, Cap's shield is fixed, T'Challa rejoins the Avengers and Vision reports to his master/father, Ultron. It's an episode that's as dry as Vision's dialogue, only existing to be a vehicle to introduce Vision and show off his power. The episode could've had the same storyline as far as an overarching plot goes, and still have a proper B-plot going on -- other Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes episodes certainly have no problem doing that, but Hawkeye and T'Challa's conflict can basically be summarized as Hawkeye taking some piss-shots at T'Challa in the first act, the conflict goes basically unsaid, and after the fight and without any proper character growth on T'Challa's part, he suddenly decides to apologize and rejoin the Avengers. It's pretty lazy writing, if we're being honest.
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