Storm Hawks

Introduction

In Atmos, thousands of islands of rock called Terras shoot up from the clouds, each housing a variety of strange creatures and societies. Their only defence from an invading evil empire is a squadron of fearless Sky Knights who patrol the roads and skies with their powerful transforming vehicles, shifting from easy rider to easy glider at the flick of a switch. The Storm Hawks were the most legendary of all the Sky Knights until they were taken out by the dark forces invading the Terras. Now, with the threat of invasion looming again, it is up to five fearless teenagers to take up the Storm Hawks' mantle once again to save everything they hold dear.

Leading the new Storm Hawks is fearless 14 year old Aerrow, a brave and daring flyer who is already one of the most gifted Sky Knights. First officer and navigator Piper is the resident crystal expert who likes nothing more than to spend time alone in her lab tinkering with said crystals. The rather immodest Finn is a superb shot but his ego and boasting tends to get the Storm Hawks into more trouble than necessary. Pilot and goth/emo Stork is the exceptional pilot of the Condor (the Storm Hawks rather battered ship) and also resident pessimist. Mechanic Junko is a soft hearted teen but possesses the energy knuckle dusters, so don't annoy him. Finally Radarr is Aerrow's faithful companion and co-pilot, but don't ever refer to him as a pet…



Episode list (on check disc):

Best Friends Forever
The Black Gorge
Absolute Power
Velocity
Fire And Ice
King For A Day
Terra Deep
Storm Warning

Visual

A rather impressive animation style that looks great.

Audio

2.0 Stereo soundtracks in either English or French with English subtitles. Robert Buckley's soundtrack is suitably big and brash.

Extras

There's a free comic according the cover art provided, but I only got a single check disc instead of the 2 disc retail version so I have no idea what that's like. There are also other featurettes that haven't been included on my check disc. What I did get is the following:

On-line game

Cyclonians - brief clips of the main villains

Overall

Storm Hawks is apparently one of the popular new series to hit Cartoon Network, I haven't watched that channel for years since the likes of Dexter's Lab and Johnny Bravo were the staples of programming there. This series was a bit of a pleasant surprise, although it's an amalgam of a myriad of influences.

There are a number of influences at work both in the design of this series and also permeating the episodes highlighted on the preview disc I received. Battle of the Planets and Firefly are the first ones I picked up on, although you can also see Star Wars in there, most heavily in the episode that just about lifts the pod race whole from the Phantom Menace. The episodes King For A Day and Terra Deep also borrow quite liberally from Firefly and Serenity respectively.

That said, it's a lot of fun and this series has a nice sense of humour. More for the kids but I had a smile on my face just about all of the way through. Nice.