What was supposed to be the strongest of the backup features on the Superman/Aquaman Hour of Adventure ended up actually being the weakest. The Justice League segments were missing two of the League's founding members--Batman & Wonder Woman, whose rights were both held by 20th Century Fox and William Dozier's Greenway Productions. Dozier had produced an unsold pilot for the Amazing Amazon that was far worse than Batman in terms of camp. Believe me, you don't even want to know how bad it was.
So, we were left with Superman (Bud Collyer, To Tell The Truth), Atom (Pat Harrington), Hawkman, Green Lantern (Gerald Mohr, Fantastic Four), & the Flash. Aquaman (Marvin Miller) was supposed to be in on the adventure, as advertised, but that was not the case.
In the first of 3 Justice League of America shorts, the League finds itself caught "Between Two Armies". Uploaded by TheJusticeLeaguers, and, of course, narrated by Ted Knight, who also voices most, if not all, of the warring factions.
I've said it before, but it bears repeating. Today, a 7 minute short would be expanded to a full half hour to allow for further plot development and drama. And they thought today's generation has a short attention span? What do you think they thought of children watching cartoons in 1967?
Rating: B.
2 comments:
It's true that 7 minute shorts just weren't enough to properly flesh out characters and stories, but then again, at that point in time, they weren't doing much of that in many live actions shows either!
What always bugged me about these JL shorts was the theme song. It seemed like a complete mismatch to the material. The happy sounding song seemed more appropriate for a variety or comedy show, not a superhero show.
That instrumental theme was the intro to the show itself, and later used as the close to Aquaman's solo series. Oh, well. I posted the intro several months back when I first started the archives. Believe me, you'd rather have the instrumental than the cheesy vocals......
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