Following the success of the Marvel Cinematic Universe's first phase, Marvel began putting its heroes, which were now household names, into various projects to capitalize on the momentum. One of those ventures was Marvel Disk Wars: The Avengers. Though the Marvel Universe by then was no stranger to anime adaptations, this show's premise was especially off-kilter. Instead of focusing on its title heroes, the show basically recast the characters as Pokemon. With Future Avengers, the latest anime version of the Earth's Mightiest Heroes, soon heading to Disney+, here's a look back at the odd first anime series featuring the team.
Digital Vengeance
Marvel Disk Wars: The Avengers begins with Iron Man working with Japanese scientist Dr. Nozomu Akatsuki to develop a new technology called Digital Identity Securement Kits, or DISKs. These are meant to contain defeated supervillains, but unfortunately, the mischievous Loki has other plans. Freeing the villains that had previously been captured, Loki also imprisons Iron Man, Hulk, Thor, Captain America and Wasp within the DISKs.
Thankfully, Dr. Akatsuki's sons Akira and Hikaru, as well as three other kids named Edward, Chris and Jessica are able to obtain the Avengers' DISKs, and use them to summon the heroes for a limited time to keep the other DISKs out of evildoers' hands. The drawback with the technology is that the heroes can only be summoned for about five minutes. This puts the focus squarely on the kids, who summon the Avengers Captain Planet-style.
Earth's Mightiest Anime
The premise of the series causes the American superheroes to become glorified trading card characters or monsters -- essentially they're superhero versions of Pokemon or Yu-Gi-Oh! card avatars. In fact, the digital nature of their new existence means that the Avengers are literally Digimon in this series.
Linking the heroes to the children via biocodes also makes the series somewhat like Super Sentai/Power Rangers and Kamen Rider. The initial lineup of heroes is basically a cross between the first Avengers movie's team and the founding team of Avengers from the comics, but the show went on to introduce a wide array of additional characters during its 51-episode run, including Spider-Man, the X-Men, Doctor Strange and even Blade, the Vampire Hunter. Supporting cast members such as Pepper Potts showed up as well.
With such an unorthodox setup, the heroes themselves aren't characters so much as glorified weapons that battle monster-of-the-week villains. While that might be a disappointing setup for fans of more traditional Avengers and superhero fiction, it was an obvious choice for the target audience. Pitched to young pre-teen Japanese boys, the series competed with the likes of Pokemon, Yokai Watch and other shows that focused more on collectability than story or strong characters, functioning as a cross-media promotion for new merchandise and video games.
To increase their appeal to an Eastern audience, the heroes and villains were also slightly redesigned. This can especially be seen with Wasp and Captain America. Wasp resembles a more shojo version of her design from the Western cartoon Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, while Captain America looks like a futuristic riot cop. The latter look is similar to both the aforementioned heroes of Sentai/Kamen Rider, while also coming across as a more cartoonish version of Captain America's look in the upcoming Square Enix Avengers game.
The series was animated by Toei, a legendary company in anime that has been behind such hits as One Piece, Dragon Ball and the infamous first season/"lost" season of Yu-Gi-Oh!. Marvel Disk Wars: The Avengers was only the first Avengers anime series to be released in 2014. The Avengers Confidential: Black Widow & Punisher also debuted that year. This film was animated by Madhouse, and was done in the same style as the previous Marvel anime series that had already come out. No American release for Disk Wars has ever been planned or announced, though with Future Avengers finally making it overseas, there's definitely more of a chance for the first Avengers anime to come to the West.