For the 2nd straight year, Dick Clark (American Bandstand) was called on to host ABC's Saturday morning preview special in primetime. The freshman class of 1983:
Rubik, The Amazing Cube.
Monchichis.
The Littles.
Scooby & Scrappy-Doo was rechristened The New Scooby-Doo Mysteries, and would have that title for 2 seasons (1983-5).
Super Friends was actually off the air to start the season. By the time the ABC affiliate in the 518 resumed airing cartoons around Christmas, the series returned just in time.
We've reviewed all of the freshmen series, including the interstitals with Menudo.
Frank Welker is our announcer, after appearing on camera the previous year.
Super Friends turns 50 this month. No complete episodes of the original 16 episode season are available, so all we have are excerpts.
In "The Ultra Beam", it's a typical case of misguided scientists seeking to destroy all the gold in the world because they believe it's the root of all evil. Hate to break it to these guys, but it isn't. I'll bet they never cracked open a Bible.
The Bible tells us that love of money is the root of all evil, not gold. Making money by selling gold is one thing, but gold itself is not the root cause of evil, other than greed.
Next week marks the 45th anniversary for ABC's All-Star Saturday block, marking the premieres of Challenge of The Super Friends and Fangface. Scooby's All-Star Laff-a-Lympics was rechristened Scooby's All-Stars for its 2nd & final season. The Krofft Supershow was gone after 2 seasons, but the show's hosts, Kaptain Kool & The Kongs, spent some time on NBC's ill-fated Krofft Superstar Hour, though half the band (Michael Lembeck & Debra Clinger) were pulling double duty in primetime (One Day at a Time & The American Girls, respectively, for CBS). The Pink Panther, after 9 seasons on NBC, moved to ABC, but for some reason, the ABC launch was delayed three weeks.
Following is an ad for the Central time zone.
Yes, they were short on original programming again, hence Scooby-Doo Where Are You? reruns on the schedule. Not included is the ABC Weekend Special, which was also in its 2nd season. After a few weeks, the reruns were tossed aside, and Challenge was expanded to 90 minutes to include repeats from the previous season's All-New Super Friends Hour.
Mr. Mxyzptlk (Frank Welker) decides to torment our heroes by forcing them into a movie of his own making, using 5th dimensional magic. He'd try this again three years later in "Mxyzptlk's Flick", a shorter piece.
Here's "The Rise & Fall of The Super Friends":
A few months after this episode aired, the team met a less threatening, but just as delusional, filmmaker, Frowning Fritz Frazzle, in the Super Friends comic book.
Kenner took over the license from Mego to produce action figures based on the DC comics heroes in 1983.
The resulting Super Powers Collection line of action figures led to some changes for the Super Friends franchise on Saturday mornings the following year. For starters, the series was given the sub-title, The Legendary Super Powers Show, for the 1984-5 season. With just 8 episodes, the Wonder Twins were written out of the series after the series finale. As we know the final season was rechristened, Super Powers Team: Galactic Guardians, with narrator Bill Woodson all but removed. Unfortunately, the toy tie-ins had an adverse effect, as the series was cancelled, this time for good, after 13 years (1973-86), to be replaced by The Real Ghostbusters in the center of ABC's lineup.
For what it's worth, Zan & Jayna had to wait 26 more years before they got action figures.
Let's take a look at an early commercial for the action figures.
Stephen Colbert has been one of President Donald Trump's harshest critics via his Late Show on CBS.
Earlier this week, Colbert decided to have a little fun at the expense of the President, using footage from an old Challenge of The Super Friends episode, in which Lex Luthor has a little about face in the middle of a Legion of Doom caper. This follows a series of news clips.
No one is buying Trump's sudden about face, trying to be contrite in his last days in office, and while Colbert and friends dubbed over the original dialogue, let's remember that DC Comics decided to have Luthor himself be the President of the US in the DC Universe in 2000. That didn't end well, either.
Or, as a certain young lady might put it, real spacey.
A more detailed review appears over in The Land of Whatever, but we're crossing over for obvious reasons with "Look, up in The Sky: The Amazing Story of Superman", released as part of the run-up to 2006's "Superman Returns", and narrated by one of that film's stars, Kevin Spacey:
The Super Friends travel to the Wonder Twins' home planet of Exor (spelled with 2 x's in the title, which was incorrect) to battle a would-be dictator in "The Demons of Exor":
The team would soon return to Exor in the pages of the DC Comics version of the series, in a tale that would resolve the issue of the twins' departure from the space carnival they were touring with before venturing to Earth, something never addressed on television.
Let me remind that Zan & Jayna will get their own book, albeit a six part miniseries, debuting February 13 from DC. Looks promising.
The Wonder Twins hit the slopes to help a young woman trapped after a "Dangerous Prank" goes awry. Michael Bell & Louise "Liberty" Williams double as two of the teenagers.
Edit, 12/11/22: We've found a title card:
About the ping-pong game. Depending on what rules you use, since Zan was leading, 5-0, vs. Gleek, in some places that's a shutout. I should know. I went through that myself in school, often on the wrong end. Apparently, the artists couldn't be bothered to have Gleek use a stool, since you're not supposed to be standing on the table to play, even with that elastic tail......
Justice League week concludes with a Super Friends short from 1977.
Batman (Olan Soule), Robin (Casey Kasem), and guest star Rima (Shannon Farnon) take on the challenge of a forest "Fire". Soule is also heard as a fire marshal, Kasem as an escaped convict.
Edit, 6/17/22: I've added the episode title card.
Not sure if Rima had been created as a female version of Tarzan, but that's where she gets the ability to communicate with animals.
Lex Luthor (Stan Jones) plots to erase Superman, Wonder Woman, & Green Lantern from existence by going back in time and rewriting their, ah, origins, if ya will. Problem is, as you'll see in "Secret Origins of the Super Friends", even though Superman (Danny Dark) is erased pro tempore, Bizarro, the imperfect duplicate of the Man of Steel, isn't. That mistake kinda kills the vibe, don't ya think?
Comics historians know that Bizarro World wasn't created until well after Bizarro himself had been established as a recurring nemesis of Superman, since it was Luthor who'd created Bizarro in the first place. Logically, once Superman is erased from the timeline, Bizarro should've been gone as well, only to return when the timeline was restored.
Here's a Super Friends rarity. An episode featuring Batman, minus Robin.
In the comics, Batman & Superman were known as the World's Finest Heroes, having headlined the original World's Finest book for many years. In 1983's "Warpland", the Caped Crusader and the Man of Steel are pulled into another dimension, one where their counterparts are all animals.
Edit, 6/20/22: We've added a title card:
I'd like to think Hanna-Barbera & DC were testing the waters for possibly adapting another DC property, Captain Carrot, for television, by trying out characters like Super Frog. Needless to say, Captain Carrot never made it to television at that time.
The image of Superman as an eagle references the Metropolis Marvel's never ending battle for "truth, justice, & the American way", don't you think?
One of the better, more entertaining episodes of the 1973 Super Friends series saw the debut of a family of "Balloon People". Crim and his family have landed on Earth, and eventually become house guests of Marvin (Frank Welker). The Balloonians draw the attention of Noah Tall (Norman Alden in a dual role), and his marblemouthed sidekick, Twisty (Casey Kasem). Let's just see what happens:
Edit, 5/21/2020: Warner Bros. Online's channel on Dailymotion offers a small sample clip:
Unfortunately, when the series was revived four years later, no thought was given to revisiting the Balloonians or anyone else the Justice Leaguers encountered during the first season. Would've been a lot more fun.
We had this next Super Friends short up before, but it was deleted a ways back due to copyright issues. Thanks to Dailymotion, it's back. The Wonder Twins & Wonder Woman are trapped in "The Witch's Arcade" on what should've been a quiet day off.....
Edit, 12/5/22: We've found a title card:
One wonders which cartoon was recorded first. This one, or the debut of Videoman on Spider-Man & His Amazing Friends during the same season.
I had this up earlier this year, then took it down in a panic when Dailymotion got wonky for a spell. Now, it's back, this time to stay.
As we've talked about before the World's Greatest Super Friends season was mostly loose adaptations, if you could call it that at least, of literary tales most of us would be familiar with, such as Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.
Now, in the then-present of 1979, Superman, Batman, & Wonder Woman investigate when a modern-day Monster terrorizes the countryside at the behest of a descendant of Dr. Victor Frankenstein. But when the iconic heroes are captured, it's up to Robin (Casey Kasem) to make a daring rescue. Gleek has the same idea, improvising a small plane to follow through stormy weather. Where were the Wonder Twins for this one, anyway?
Edit, 6.17/22: I've found an excerpt:
Easily one of the better episodes of the season. Considering that only 8 were produced per year from 1979-85, that says a lot.
From The All New Super Friends Hour, though the graphics you'll see come from when it was reissued in the 80's:
Superman (Danny Dark) is on patrol when he sees a high school baseball player dragging on a cigarette during the game. I don't think that was actually allowed back then, and it certainly isn't today, but, as this short illustrates, smoking is like a PDD (Performance Diminishing Drug), if you get my drift.
When The All New Super Friends Hour launched on September 10, 1977, we were, of course, still in the last days of summer. This week, schools in the home district are enjoying their spring break (the colleges had spring break last month), so why not give the kiddo's a little beach action?
The Wonder Twins made their debut in the episode, "Joyride". This has to do with a couple of boys stealing a plane, unaware it has engine issues. How the Twins' costumes magically appeared at the end of the story, when Jayna was dressed in a 2 piece bikini, and Zan in swim trunks, at the start, is one of those unsolved mysteries of animation production. Bob Hastings, who was still on All in the Family at the time or about to transition to General Hospital, is heard as the mechanic and as Corky, the would-be pilot, as Corky sounds almost like a hero Hastings played a decade earlier----Superboy!
Edit, 6/17/22: An episode title card has been located.
Another blooper, as you can clearly see in the title card. The Twins' costumes make it appear as though the picture is backwards. As Jayna would say, the production department was a little, ah, spacey during post-production editing. "Joyride" marked one of Bob Hastings' last voice jobs for Hanna-Barbera, as he had worked on Clue Club a year earlier.
The Super Friends journey to the distant, Western-themed planet Texakana when the Capricorn Kid (Bill Calloway in a dual role) escapes jail after being initially captured by Batman & Robin (Olan Soule & Casey Kasem).
Seems the Kid feels embarrassed being captured by the Caped Crusaders, so he sets about getting revenge. See if you can spot one particular blooper in the course of "Batman: Dead or Alive":
When the Wonder Twins were captured, they weren't in costume, but when they're fished out of the flooding mine shaft, you can see that the artists mistakenly changed their attire. Make any excuse you want, but these errors were common back in the day.
I should note once again that during the Challenge season, the Legion of Doom episodes were in the 2nd half of the show, not the first half. I really wish some of these folks would get it right.
We have discussed Challenge of the Super Friends before, but now we're taking a look at the complete season DVD.
All 16 episodes with the Legion of Doom are included, but that's only half the show. The other half is a continuation from the previous season's format, to give the Wonder Twins something to do. When the series was broken down into half-hour increments for syndication, those episodes were kept to the side, since the LOD episodes were much more popular with comics fans.
However, there are some flaws in the writing of some of these stories, as well as some artistic gaffes. Take for example the episode, "Secret Origins of the Super Friends". Lex Luthor (Stan Jones) schemes to erase Superman, Wonder Woman, & Green Lantern from existence, and for a time, he succeeds. Problem is, and the writers completely whiffed on this point, with Superman gone pro tempore, his imperfect clone, Bizarro, should've been erased as well, because without the Man of Steel, there is no Bizarro.
As we noted in reviewing "History of Doom", Giganta (Ruth Forman) was originally a foe of Wonder Woman, but with the Cheetah (Marianne Aragon) already in the fold, the producers, ignoring the fact that Superman & Batman both had multiple foes on the Legion's roster, decided to assign Giganta to made-for-TV hero Apache Chief, as denoted in the show's opening sequence. The problem with that is, Giganta was attired in the same jungle gear she had in the books.
Funny thing: when Hanna-Barbera was commissioned by NBC to produce 2 live-action specials, they eventually posited Giganta as a girlfriend of the Atom. In the books, that would eventually happen, but not with the Atom we knew (Ray Palmer), but his successor, Ryan Choi. Like, who knew?
The documentary feature, Saturdays, Sleeping Bags, & Super Friends, has comments from comics creators such as Paul Dini, Alex Ross, and DC editor Dan DiDio (who can't write his way out of a paper bag). Whee.
Edit, 2/11/19: Unfortunately, the documentary has been deleted by Dailymotion due to a copyright claim from an international rights holder that is not WB. Instead, we're subbing in the series intro:
In essence, Dini and Bruce Timm and company reinvented the LOD as the DCAU's version of the Secret Society on Justice League Unlimited nearly 30 years later, but with a larger roster to match the Justice League's, and missing some original LOD members. Not to be confused with the pro wrestling Legion of Doom, which was condensed down to its most iconic members, the Road Warriors, in the 80's.
Looking back now, with the series 3 years away from its 40th anniversary, it's easier to see some of the mistakes the writers made, leaving fans to consider how it could've been done better.
