Ultimate Avengers (2006)

  This is an animated adaptation of the Ultimates run of comics and bears no relation to the live-action Marvel Avengers.  If you're familiar with the cinematic universe, this is a bit of a shock in how much it deviates with the storyline, but I'm guessing that if you prefer the comics, you'd appreciate this more.

Captain Steve Rogers (Justin Gross) is lost in the ice following a decisive battle with Herr Kleiser (Jim Ward), a Chitauri alien masquerading as a Nazi official.  Sixty years later, his body is recovered by Colonel Nick Fury (Andre Ware) in the hopes of revitalizing Dr. Banner's (Michael Massee) super soldier program.  Cap wakes up, which is more than anyone could have hoped for, but is disoriented and not really in the mood to help out.  Fury is authorized to begin the Avengers Protocol over his objections and recruits Iron Man (Marc Worden), Hank Pym (Nolan North), Janet Van Dyn (Grey DeLisle), and Thor (David Boat) under the command of Captain America and Black Widow (Olivia d'Abo).  Their first team outing does not go as well as hoped and the Chitauri score a major victory.  Only some serious team building will allow these ego-driven individuals to put their differences aside and come together to save the world.

I never read any of the Avengers comics so for me this is vastly different.  Hank Pym is a total asshole (in the comics, he's revealed to be physically abusive toward his wife), Bruce Banner is much more unstable, and Thor is too busy fighting whalers to really help out.  I can't say I really enjoyed watching it because it still felt like a retread, or a retcon I wasn't prepared for, but it's not a bad animated movie.  It just didn't feel like my Avengers.  Which isn't really fair, since it did come out six years before the live-action one but that's the one I saw first and the series I've been invested in.  We're now 14? 15 movies deep into the cinematic universe so it's hard for me to accept the existence of this alternate version.  Some people will probably have the exact opposite experience.  And that's cool.  There's enough Marvel for everyone.