I loved growing up in the 90's. Say what you want, but I firmly believe that some of the strongest cartoons out there formed in this little era. I mean yeah, a lot of them were silly, pointless, and whatnot, but if you ask me, the late 90's and early 2000's house some of the best cartoons out there. You can argue that cartoons that came out in the early 2000's shouldn't really be considered for the 90's generation, but I make a few exceptions as I wasn't in high school until about 2005. But before those high school years, there was only one place I went for my cartoon doses. And a lot of you with me in the 90's nostalgia will immediately agree with me. Kids WB. If you had Kids WB, your life was set. Since I didn't have cable, I didn't grow up with Cartoon Network, but I didn't care. Everyday after school, it was rush down to the television to see what Kids WB had going on, every Saturday Morning, it was Kids WB. No FOX Kids, no ABC One Saturday Morning, it was all about the Kids WB. Everything cool was on there. Batman Beyond, Static Shock, Animaniacs, Batman Superman Adventures, Men in Black, The Zeta Project, Hysteria, Detention, do I need to go on? I could go on and on listing some of the shows I loved watching. Hell, it was where Pokémon Fever started in the US. I didn't need Toonami! In fact, Toonami moved to Kids WB for a while! Why wouldn't they? Kids WB was on top of the world! The WOOOOOOORRRRLD!!!!
But I will give praise to Kids WB probably another day. For now, I'm just gonna focus on a show that I didn't think I would enjoy so much when it was introduced...and yet it surprised me. I say that I didn't think I'd enjoy it, because the title character was a guy I wasn't too familiar with. It was something more my nextdoor neighbor childhood friend loved, as he was into the martial arts and whatnot. In fact, he still looks up to Jackie Chan as a bit of a life idol. And who can blame him? Back in the day, Jackie Chan was arguably the world's most famous stuntman. Capable of doing insane stunts regardless of how difficult it looked, and of course, those fast fists were always exciting to watch. He's become one of my favorite people to watch on screen. So when it was announced on Kids WB that a new show, simply entitled Jackie Chan Adventures was coming soon, I'm sure a lot of people were excited. Why wouldn't they be? Jackie Chan in real life is awesome enough to watch, but as a cartoon? The sky was the limit. My only concern though would have been that Jackie Chan was the star of a lot of Kung-fu movies. ANd while each is entertaining in and of itself, a lot of them are pretty dumb and forgettable movies. In fact, there's only a handful of them that I really enjoy and would watch again. So how could they make Jackie Chan Adventures something that would make me want to come and watch it again? Well...they did. Because even today, I think Jackie Chan Adventures is one of the best cartoons out there. It had a five season runtime, but I am gonna stick to the first season for now. Maybe another day, I'll give the other seasons a review, but let's just stick to season one for now.
The show stars the titular Jackie Chan, a rather talented "amateur" archeologist, who lives with his...uncle named Uncle. This is actually one of the show's biggest and most subtle joke. Never is he referred to as any other name. He's just Uncle. Jackie's niece, Jade, even brings this up in season two, when her parents call him Uncle, when she asks "Is Uncle everyone's uncle?" to which they respond "He's actually our cousin...aren't you?" It's a subtle joke that is all around humorous. Jade plays Jackie's niece, who is voiced ironically enough by Stacie Chan (though she is not related to Jackie Chan). And while I'm on the subject of voice actors, one thing that some people will complain about the show is that the titular character, Jackie Chan is not voiced by Jackie Chan himself. Instead, Jackie Chan appears in short live action bits at the end of the show, where he answers questions that kids who watched the show would ask him, and would serve as the show's executive producer. Honestly, the fact that Chan doesn't voice himself sits perfectly fine with me because if you've ever seen a movie with Jackie Chan, you will notice that he's not the best speaker of English. It made sense for someone more clear in the language to voice the main character, it made it easier for kids to understand. And strangely enough, it actually is a pretty dang good impersonation. So while some might find it annoying, I think it was one of the better moves. Anyway, back on track, Jade is the sidekick who always follows Jackie when he's off to collect an important artifact, or investigate something potentially dangerous, despite being told to stay where she is. She's a thrill seeker, who is very much impressed by what her Uncle does off the record as an archeologist. And that pretty much covers the bases for our main characters.
Jackie is recruited by a secret branch of government known as Section 13 for his knowledge in archeology. Section 13, led by a man named Captain Black, is in charge of monitoring all major criminal activities in America, primarily those run by an organization called the Dark Hand. Black informs Jackie that the Dark Hand recently began targeting historical artifacts, and they are hoping Jackie can help them find reasons to this. The Dark Hand is one of the coolest things of the show. You can argue that they're the clichéd villains who are always in over their head, but the show almost seems to just make fun of that. The organization primarily follows three elite henchmen named Finn (a man who is all about the cool), Ratso (a buff, tough, yet innocent at heart guy), and Chow (who is a bit of a wise-guy). In season one, they also had the large, big, and lovable Tohru as one of the main enforcers of the Dark Hand, though he would pull the classic bad guy gone good card in due time. The boss of the group is a man named Valmont, who is your typical criminal mastermind, though he can be a bit incompetent at times, yet just as threatening when he needs to be.
We learn in the first couple episodes that the Dark Hand is after twelve Talismans, which supposedly have an incredible power. The pacing of this is pretty impressive. For a while in the show, you'll be scratching your head wondering if the Talisman's are just "supposedly" magic, or really magic at all. In fact the pacing of magic of this show is just all around fun. The character Uncle for example, mainly starts out in the show as comedy relief, and kinda just a silly character. But as the show progresses, it's revealed that he was actually the student of a powerful Chi Wizard, and as silly as that sounds, he actually becomes one of the most loved characters of the show. Here, when each Talisman reveals just how much power they have, it's almost always satisfying to see. Each Talisman is named after an animal in the Chinese Zodiac, and each one wields a different power. Whether it's the ability to wield telekinesis, or travel super fast, or produce an explosive combustion blast, there is nearly always something cool in the Talisman lineup, though there are a few which seem relatively simple (which is again made fun of in season two, when Finn gets the three talismans which have "all the loser powers"). And each episode of season one is dedicated to a specific talisman, in which Jackie Chan races the Dark Hand to find. While Jackie is kept in the dark as to why the Dark Hand wants all twelve Talismans, it is revealed to us that the Dark Hand is collecting them for a demonic sorcerer trapped in a statue form named Shendu, who would become one of the show's bigger antagonists. Giving him all twelve would free him from his prison, and they would be rewarded with a large portion of treasure.
The episode format is pretty simple, and it can be said that each episode of each season follows a certain formula. That formula may be altered slightly with each passing season, but for the most part, Season One follows this simple formula. Jackie finds a talisman, Uncle does research on said Talisman, the Dark Hand tries to get it, they might get it for a certain amount of time, Jackie goes to get the Talisman back, Jade tags along, they discover the magic of the Talisman, and give the Dark Hand what's coming to them. For as repetitive as the formula is, the show does an impressive job of keeping it fresh. You don't get bored watching these episodes. Each episode presents different problems, different outcomes, and there are times when the Dark Hand wins. Heck, by the season finale, Shendu is of course resurrected when the Dark Hand acquires all twelve Talismans in one of the coolest ideas I've seen.
Let's talk about the action. It's easily the best thing about the show. As over the top as it can get, it's beyond fun to watch. And the show isn't afraid of pushing that over-the-top action, to the point where it makes fun of itself. It does this in the first episode, when Jackie fights the Dark Hand thugs for the first time. He's outnumbered three to one, his opponents have technologically advanced weaponry, and Jackie fights them off with fists and windshield wipers. Valmont simply says "Three of my best men, armed with advanced weaponry, were defeated by an archeologist?" To which Finn replies, "Uh, did we mention he had windshield wipers?" It doesn't stop there. It will push your limits of believability in some of the funniest ways I know. Another prime example is when the Dark Hand blows up a bridge, when the train Jackie is on is bound right for it. Anybody else would probably die. Jackie? He runs up a falling train on top of the cars, as the Dark Hand look on in absolute disbelief, before Jackie just barely makes it off the train as it falls into the gorge below, and Ratso delivers one of my favorite lines "No way he's human." Go Jackie. But for as fun as all the action is, I gotta say I am honestly kinda disappointed in the season finale, because the final fight between Jackie and Shendu is honestly, underwhelming. I mean yeah, it's still a fun fight in which Jackie is magically enhanced to remove the Talismans one by one from the walking breathing Shendu, who is preparing for a rampage that will destroy Asia. But it is kinda clunky, and it keeps cutting away to the agents and Uncle who keeps delivering his famous "Magic must defeat magic" line. I think it could have gone a little longer, but it's still a satisfying way to end the first season, and it does give us a satisfying way of showing us what we may be in for in Season Two.
The Talisman Hunts of Season One were arguably the strongest story arcs of this show, and one hell of a way to start a show that I love to this day. Season Two was still pretty good, but there are some gripings that one day I will get to. Season three was still enjoyable though it kinda recycled season one. But afterwards, you could see the show starting to get a little tiresome, so I guess it's a good thing it didn't last too long. But for what this show was, it was more than impressive. It was one of those shows that I couldn't miss after I got introduced to it. A world with fun martial arts fighting, with almost just the right amount of supernatural in it to make it one very fun adventure. Heck, in Season Two, there are episodes that I highly regard. One is a two part episode, which honestly I feel should have been made into an entire season, in which Shendu possesses Jackie Chan's body to find a magic book that alters history. It's a story that is beyond fun to watch, but deserved more than just two episodes. Season two also revisited Season one for us by giving us a few adventures that take place in the Talisman Hunt, which are not only fun to watch, but one of them is probably one of my all-time favorite episodes of the show. There was so much that this show had to offer, and even if it wasn't always serious in itself, it was always lighthearted fun and always left you on a high, wanting to pull off the moves that Jackie Chan could, and fight off evil demons or street thugs as he did. And if you're one of those fans of Chan's work, there are several references to the film work that Chan is famous for. And to all of you anime fans out there, the influence it takes from a lot of anime can be seen.
Jackie Chan Adventures Season One is a wonderful three and a half stars out of four. Sure there may be some clichés and whatnot in the show, but it doesn't detract from any enjoyability it has to offer. The characters may not be as developed as I would have liked, but each are fun and memorable in their own ways that other characters from other shows are not. If you didn't get a chance to see this show, I'd highly recommend it. You can catch the first and second seasons of the show for free on Crackle, or just stream them on other cartoon sites. Season's three through five are a bit harder to find. And none of this is helped by the fact that the show is near impossible to find on DVD. Why doesn't this show have it's own box set yet? I will buy each and every season if it does find its way to home media, but until then, it does have a home on the internet, and in my heart. I invite you to experience the thrill and adventure for yourself.
Please feel free to suggest a movie or show for me to review. Leave a comment down below about your thoughts on the show, and as always, thanks for reading.
Final Verdict: 3.5/4
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