Who's The Most Badass Kid Hero by TheUnisonReturns

!!!!SPOILER ALERT!!!!

These days people talk a lot in nostalgic praise about their favorite kid heroes. Deviantart, for example, is flooded with fan art which immortalizes modern kid superheroes from the early 2000's. Prepubescent warriors like Ben 10, Jake Long, Kim Possible, Danny Phantom, Generator Rex, and even the Teen Titans are commonly names you hear spoke in praise, but just who is the most badass kid hero in Animation History? As much as I hate sounding like a cynical bitter old man I have to honestly say that the kid heroes people praise today are pussy compared to some of the ones I grew up with, and my favorite kid hero from when I was a kid is none other than "The Mighty One" himself...Mighty Max!!

Now for those of you who are too young to remember, Mighty Max was a cartoon series that aired back during the early 90's (1993 to 1994 to be exact). It was a show which was made to promote the Mighty Max toyline created by Bluebird Toys back in 1992. The series follows the adventures of a preteen boy named Max who destiny has chosen to be the cap-bearing "Mighty One" as he travels around the world guided by an all-knowing Lemurian chicken and protected by a hulking immortal warrior bodyguard to thwart the evil designs of the diabolical Skullmaster.

Why do I deem Mighty Max to be more badass than more modern kid heroes? Well, most modern kid heroes often have strange superpowers, combat training, or high-tech gizmos and gadgets than give them an edge over their adversaries. Kim Possible, for example, was supplied a wide assortment of super high-tech gadgets by a 10-year old boy genius, Ben 10 had an alien watch which allowed him transform into a bunch of alien monsters, Danny Phantom had ghost powers, and fuckin' Jake Long could turn into freakin' dragon! Mighty Max on the other hand didn't have any that. All he had was baseball cap that doubled as a stargate, and while that may seem pretty extraordinary its wasn't all that helpful to him since he could only use it when he happened to be near a pre-existent portal, and he often need Virgil (the all-knowing chicken) to tell him where it was. The cap was also a burden to him since Skullmaster was hell-bent on killing him for it...I know we're told in the series that Skullmaster wanted the cap to help him conquer the world, but I can't help but laugh whenever I imagine that gruesome-looking fella walking around wearing a baseball cap, and still acting like a cold-blooded murderous warlord.

But despite the fact that Mighty Max had no powers, no combat training, and no high-tech weaponry he still managed to travel around the world (and even into space and the astral planes) battling monsters, aliens, the undead, lava creatures, gods, demons, snake-people, hyper-intelligent gorillas, and Skullmaster himself. Sure he had Virgil, the all-knowing chicken from Lemuria and Norman, the immortal warrior to help him, but it was always Mighty Max who ended up saving the day with some clever plan he cooked up, and that's why I think Mighty Max is the most badass kid hero ever. He didn't need special powers or gizmos to help him save the day. All he needed was his wits. He was like the Bugs Bunny of kid superheroes, complete with smart-aleck comments and sarcastic humor.

That of course brings me to my next point. I personally find Mighty Max to be a vastly more entertaining series than most of the more modern kid hero shows since it spared us that fuckin' teen angst/teen drama bullcrap that was such a big part of the shows from the early 2000's. With series like Kim Possible, Danny Phantom, American Dragon: Jake Long, and even Teen Titans they tried to blend the action/adventure of superhero stories with the sitcom format, and while that might be an appeal for some people (supposedly making the characters more realistic and relatable) I, for one, never cared to hear about their day-to-day problems and the coming-of-age/growing-is-hard bullshit. I watched those shows to see Danny Phantom bustin' ghosts, to see Jake Long kick various magical creatures' asses, and to see Kim Possible rip-off James Bond. I never cared for that dramatic sitcom crap, and as such I have to actually be in a special mood just to sit and watch the episodes of those shows, but I can always find pleasure in watching Mighty Max, because they never wasted too much of your time and attention with Max's daily life and real-world struggles. If they addressed those at all they were often as mere exposition before fate called upon Mighty Max to leap through another portal to meet up with Virgil and Norman for another hair-raising adventure. With Mighty Max they never scrimped on the action and adventure for some overly-dramatic teen drama shit, and that's a plus in my book.

And while we're on the topic of supposedly making characters "realistic and relatable", I'm actually very glad that they didn't do that with Mighty Max. Not only did they spare us the excessive drama of Max's gradual development into adulthood, but Max's personality in general was not very realistic to the mindset of a young preteen about to undergo puberty as they endured the heart-pumping and frequently frightening ordeals that Mighty Max faced. Given that Mighty Max was voiced by the legendary Rob Paulsen, his character and mannerisms were not much akin to a prepubescent kid, but were instead quite cartoonish; especially when counting his sardonic sense of humor. Mighty Max is basically just a less wackier version of Yakko Warner; which considering that I'm a huge fan of Animaniacs might largely explain why I love this show so much. One might even arguably say that Mighty Max was a big inspiration for my own teenage persona in my original series... theunisonreturns.deviantart.co…

Of course on top of everything else, Mighty Max's series is even more badass than the more modern series due to its much more graphic and dark tone. Despite all the humor presented by Max, this series is seriously dark. The series' main antagonist, Skullmaster, is a ruthless warlord sorcerer who has been banished to the Underworld (Hell) after bringing forth the downfall of Atlantis and Lemuria. This means he is singlehandedly responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent people. People frequently die throughout this series, and while their deaths are never shown the connotations suggest them to be very gruesome and unpleasant, and of course I'm not just talking about villain characters. Some of the darkest moments in the Mighty Max series are episodes like "Snakes & Laddies" where the opening scene shows us a young boy being sacrificed to an ancient snake god, and "The Axeman Cometh" where the evil Locknarr, spirit of violence and hate, straight-up murders at least one woman and maybe a family in a cottage in the woods. Not even the heroes are sparred from violent deaths in this series. In the episode, "The Magnificent Seven" Max, Virgil, and Norman travel around the world to recruit some of the Earth's most legendary heroes: Beowulf, Jonayaiyin, Modjadji, and Hanuman to storm Skull Mountain and shatter Skullmaster's Crystal of Souls, which is a major source of his power. Though the mission is a success and the crystal is shattered the four heroes of legend sacrifice themselves in order for Max, Virgil, and Norman to escape. The episode ends with Max leaving flowers at a small memorial he made for his fallen friends. Even the series' finale is dark for it is heavily suggested that both Norman and Virgil die leaving Max to battle Skullmaster alone, but unlike with most series where the hero would manage to defeat the villain against all odds, Max technically loses to Skullmaster; escaping through a time portal to when he first received the cosmic cap to try it all again from the top.

Now because this series ended with Max pushing the cosmic rewind button, it could technically be rebooted, and picked up right where it left off, but there are numerous reasons why I'm very wary about that idea. Considering the modern trend that cartoons have these days, the major entertainment companies would likely fuck it up royally and destroy everything about this show which was fun and appealing. They'd likely try and make it like all the other kid hero shows today and make Max more "realistic and relatable" by focusing more on his day-to-day life at home and school, and just do that crap I hate where they try to blend superhero action/adventure with sitcom drama. Also most of the voice actors are much older now and probably wouldn't return to reprise their roles; meaning Tim Curry probably wouldn't come back to do Skullmaster, Rob Paulsen would not return to voice Mighty Max, and Virgil's voice actor couldn't either way since Tony Jay is dead. So even though the idea of Mighty Max being rebooted is a seemingly pleasant concept it's rather frightening since they would undoubtedly find some way to fuck it up.