When the networks began programming full rosters of Saturday morning cartoons in the mid-1960s, superheroes played a significant part with shows like Frankenstein Jr. and The Impossibles, Space Ghost and Dino-Boy, The New Adventures of Superman, The Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, Samson and Goliath, Birdman and the Galaxy Trio, The Herculoids, Shazzan!, and Moby Dick and the Mighty Mightor thrilling kids across America. But parents’ watchdog group Action for Children’s Television (ACT) declared that these programs were too violent and pressured ABC, CBS, and NBC to cancel them and to turn to sunnier, more friendly shows.
It wouldn’t be until 1972 that superheroes returned to cartoons when Batman and Robin guest-starred in two episodes of The New Scooby-Doo Movies. Olan Soule and Casey Kasem, respectively, voiced the Dynamic Duo. (Kasem also, of course, voiced Shaggy on Scooby-Doo.) These two episodes were among the highest-rated of that season and ABC and Hanna-Barbera made plans to create an ongoing superhero show. Early on, it was planned as Scooby-Doo Meets the Superheroes, and surprisingly, HB was planning to team the canine crime solver with heroes from both DC and Marvel Comics.
However, eventually, this evolved into Super Friends, based solely on DC’s books, specifically the Justice League of America. Super Friends debuted in 1973. It wasn’t an immediate success and was not renewed for a second season. However, in later seasons, reruns proved to be more successful than some new ABC cartoons, so a second season was eventually ordered. The All-New Super Friends Hour debuted in 1977 and from there, the Super Friends dominated Saturday mornings until 1986.
Super Friends was an unquestionable smash for many years, at times airing in 90-minute blocks. Next to Scooby-Doo, it was possibly the most popular show on Saturdays and for a few years, it was the only superhero/action-adventure cartoon on the air.
Over the years, this series often aired simply under the names “Super Friends” or “Superfriends,” but a few seasons had expanded titles – Challenge of the Superfriends (1978-79), The World’s Greatest Super Friends (1979-80), Super Friends: The Legendary Super Powers Show (1984-85), and The Super Powers Team: Galactic Guardians (1985-86).
Through most of its history, Super Friends focused on five DC heroes: Aquaman, Batman, Robin, Superman, and Wonder Woman. Olan Soule and Casey Kasem returned from Scooby-Doo to voice Batman and Robin, respectively. Norman Alden provided the voice of Aquaman, while Danny Dark voiced Superman, and Shannon Farnon voiced Wonder Woman. Alden also voiced Green Arrow in a guest role in the first season. Alden was replaced as Aquaman by Bill Callaway in 1978. Soule was replaced as the voice of Batman in 1984 by Adam West, however, Soule remained as part of the cast as the voice of new character Martin Stein. Farnon was replaced that same year by Connie Cawlfield, who only lasted for one season, with B.J. Ward replacing her as Wonder Woman for the final season. Kasem and Dark remained in their roles for the duration of the series.
The first season consisted of hour-long episodes and because they were produced in the early 1970s, had a strong ecological slant. The heroes typically used their powers and abilities to prevent disasters and rescue people. There were no real supervillains in sight, except for one original creation, The Raven. Most episodes featured antagonists who were aliens or scientists who meant well and had merely concocted elaborate schemes to try and convince people to protect the environment and conserve resources.
Even though Hanna-Barbera had decided not to use Scooby-Doo and his friends on this series, they did saddle the Super Friends with two teenage sidekicks and a semi-anthropomorphic dog. The first season heavily focused on Wendy (voiced by Sherry Alberoni), Marvin, and Wonder Dog (both voiced by Frank Welker), who actually solved the mysteries of each episode while the heroes were busy thwarting catastrophes.
By the time The All-New Super Friends Hour premiered in 1977, the pressure from ACT had lessened and the heroes were actually able to fight real villains, although most of them were original creations. One comic book foe surfaced, The Gentleman Ghost, and the Aquaman villain Black Manta appeared, although he was altered to simply “Manta” and his suit was green.
Wendy, Marvin, and Wonder Dog, none of whom had superpowers, were dropped and replaced by two alien siblings, The Wonder Twins, Zan (Michael Bell) and Jayna (Liberty Williams), who had a space monkey, Gleek (also Bell). The twins pressed their fists together and chanted “Wonder Twin powers… Activate!” to shapeshift. Zan could become any form of water or ice, while Jayna could transform into any animal. Gleek had a stretchy tail and could magically summon a bucket anytime Zan turned into water.
While these episodes were an hour long, they were not one-hour-long stories, the way they had been in the first season. Each episode started with a short featuring two of the main Super Friends. (Except in episodes featuring Batman and Robin with another character.) That was followed by a short in which the Wonder Twins attempted to help kids in danger. That was followed by a thirty-minute segment starring the core Super Friends and the Wonder Twins. Finally, each episode ended with a short starring one of the core Super Friends and a guest-star.
These guests included DC characters The Atom, The Flash (who had also made an appearance in the first season), Green Lantern, Hawkman & Hawkgirl, and a rather surprising choice, Rima, the Jungle Girl. Rima had starred in her own DC Comic series, which lasted for seven issues in 1974-75. The character originated in the 1904 W.H. Hudson novel Green Mansions: A Romance of the Tropical Forest. That had been adapted into the 1959 movie Green Mansions with Audrey Hepburn starring as Rima.
Rima is Latina (possibly from Argentina), and to add more diversity, Hanna-Barbera created three new characters: the African American Black Vulcan, Native American Apache Chief, and Japanese Samurai.
All of the guest-stars appeared in two shorts during The All-New Super Friends Hour, except for The Flash, who only popped up once.
Challenge of the Superfriends may be the most popular iteration with fans today, as every episode featured 11 superheroes — Apache Chief, Aquaman, Batman, Black Vulcan, The Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman, Robin, Samurai, Superman, and Wonder Woman — battling the Legion of Doom, an alliance of DC comic book villains — Bizarro, Black Manta, Brainiac, Captain Cold, The Cheetah, Giganta, Gorilla Grodd, Lex Luthor, The Riddler, The Scarecrow, Sinestro, Solomon Grundy, and Toyman.
The Wonder Twins were not included in these segments, but were not completely absent, as, once again, this season was made up of hour-long episodes — a 30-minute Challenge clip and a 30-minute episode featuring just the core Super Friends and the Wonder Twins.
In addition to featuring a crap-ton of heroes and villains, the Challenge episodes were decidedly darker than those that had come before. One featured all of the Super Friends being killed! Another depicted the end of the world… and it was kind of the Super Friends’ fault! These darker storylines are also still appealing to fans to this day.
In subsequent years, the various guest-stars continued to appear periodically in episodes, as did various members of the Legion of Doom. In 1981, another Hanna-Barbera-created ethnic character debuted — El Dorado, who hailed from Mexico.
In 1984, the series was reinvented as Super Friends: The Legendary Super Powers Show, to promote the new Kenner toy line, The Super Powers Collection. That season featured redesigned versions of Brainiac and Lex Luthor, which reflected their new looks from the comics and the toy line, and introduced the Jack Kirby-created villains Darkseid, DeSaad, and Kalibak, who were also part of the toy line.
On the heroic side, this season also introduced the DC character, Firestorm, two men merged into one. Mark Taylor voiced Ronnie Raymond, the teenage (and primary) persona of Firestorm, while Olan Soule voiced his college physics professor, Martin Stein.
Unfortunately, Firestorm’s introduction forced out Aquaman, who only appeared in the opening title sequence of Super Friends: The Legendary Super Powers Show, but no episodes.
Interestingly, the first season of Super Friends was vastly different from the rest of the series and the same can be said of the final. The show actually dropped the name “Super Friends” entirely in 1985, when it became The Super Powers Team: Galactic Guardians. The art style was completely overhauled with the original art designs by Alex Toth tossed out in favor of animation inspired by Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez’s DC style guide which was also the artwork that was used for the Super Powers Collection toy packaging.
All of the Hanna-Barbera-created characters were dropped, with the exception of Samurai, who was included in the toy line. El Dorado made silent cameos and was intended to be part of the toy line, which was canceled before his action figure could be released.
In their place, the show added African American hero Cyborg, voiced by Ernie Hudson. In the absence of the Wonder Twins, the team had two new teenage members.
In the comics, Cyborg was a member of the Teen Titans, whereas the Super Friends/Super Powers Team was based on the Justice League. It wouldn’t be until 2011 that Cyborg would join the Justice League in the comics, paving the way for him to appear in the Justice League movie. But it could be said that this show helped set the stage.
The two stand-out episodes of The Super Powers Team: Galactic Guardians were “The Fear” and “The Death of Superman.” “The Fear” was the first time that Batman’s origin was ever depicted outside of the comics. “The Death of Superman” predated the comic book storyline of the same name by almost a decade. Interestingly, both episodes dealt with death, a topic that was typically off-limits on Saturday mornings.
After dominating TV during the ’70s and early ’80s, the era of the Super Friends came to an end in 1986. When it premiered, Super Friends was the only superhero/action-adventure cartoon on the air, but by the mid-’80s, it had been joined by a slew of newer programs, like Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends and Dungeons & Dragons. These were in addition to shows like G.I. Joe and Transformers on weekday afternoons.
The animation on Super Friends was limited to put it nicely. The writing could be downright atrocious at times. But for a generation, it was the highlight of Saturday mornings and its legacy lives on. Creators like Alex Ross, Geoff Johns, and Mark Waid openly profess their love for the series and its influence on their work.
Nearly all of the Hanna-Barbera-created original characters have been introduced in the comics, with The Wonder Twins recently starring in their own maxiseries. Elements like the Hall of Justice, Legion of Doom, and the Hall of Doom have also been adapted into comics and animation. The original HB characters were adapted into new forms for Justice League Unlimited and Young Justice.
Last winter, the Hall of Justice was introduced as part of the Arrowverse on The CW’s “Crisis on Infinite Earths” crossover, as was Gleek, hinting that The Wonder Twins could potentially debut in the Arrowverse at some point. (They previously appeared in live-action on Smallville.)
Even the name “Super Friends” has endured and is currently used as the brand for toys and children’s books. There have also been numerous toys and collectibles based on the original series made for adults who grew up with the series.
At this time, Super Friends is not available to stream, although it is only a matter of time before it surfaces on HBO Max. The entire original series was released on DVD but it has been a few years and may be hard to track down.
Were you a fan of Super Friends? Do you have a favorite season?
