“Spaaaaaaaaace Ghooooooost!” If you are a fan of cartoons, and specifically superhero cartoons, you know the battle cry of one of the most popular and enduring original Saturday morning champions of all time– Space Ghost.
Welcome back to Saturday Morning Superstars, my weekly column in which I examine the lost tradition of basically giving every kid in America a special holiday every week with a solid block of programming just for them. (As opposed to now, when anyone of any age can watch whatever they want whenever they want.)
Space Ghost was the main feature on the Hanna-Barbera series Space Ghost and Dino Boy in the Lost Valley. Each episode featured two Space Ghost shorts sandwiching a Dino Boy adventure. Some bumpers featured both characters, but they did not interact in their respective shorts. Dino Boy was then dropped from the last two episodes, which only included three Space Ghost shorts.
Space Ghost and Dino Boy in the Lost Valley originally aired in 1966 and consisted of one season, comprised of 20 episodes that were rerun in subsequent years. It aired on CBS.
Space Ghost was an interplanetary do-gooder who traveled the cosmos in his ship, the Phantom Cruiser, with his two teenage sidekicks, twins Jan and Jace, and their monkey, Blip.
Jan, Jace, and Blip are often mistaken, at least in name, with the Wonder Twins, Jayna, Zan, and Gleek, the sidekicks from the Super Friends cartoon. (The error goes both ways, as the Wonder Twins are often mistakenly called “Zan and Jan” or some such.) But it’s understandable– twin brother and sister with a monkey in space. I get it.
Space Ghost and his companions could breathe and talk in space. Space Ghost could also seemingly fly unassisted. Their other powers were derived from gadgets. Space Ghost’s belt allowed him to turn invisible. His wristbands could project various beams including energy, heat, and cold. The twins and Blip could also turn invisible with their belts and fly using jetpacks. They all communicated with each other by pressing the logos on their chests.
Among their enemies were the insectoid Zorak, the cat-like Brak, the heat-powered Moltar, the metallic… uh, Metallus, and the Black Widow (a.k.a. the Spider-Woman).
As was the norm with superhero shows of the period, no origin was provided and Space Ghost didn’t have a secret identity, despite the model sheet shown above which depicts an unmasked take.
The designs for the series were done by the legendary Alex Toth, who had previously worked on Jonny Quest, and went on to provide designs for many action-based cartoons including Super Friends and Thundarr the Barberian.
Space Ghost’s booming voice was provided by established TV announcer Gary Owens. Ginny Tyler voiced both Jan and the Black Widow. Tim Matheson (Jonny Quest) voiced Jace. Don Messick (Scooby-Doo) provided the voices for Blip, Sisto, Zorak, and the Creature King. Additional voices were supplied by Keye Luke (Brak) and Ted Cassidy (The Addams Family, Metallus, Moltar, Tarko the Terrible).
Space Ghost was one of the earliest cartoons created especially for Saturday mornings. In the earlier days of television, most kids’ programming was recycled from theaters or– like Jonny Quest, The Flintstones, and Yogi Bear, among others– created to air on weekday afternoons or in primetime.
It, along with Filmation’s The New Adventures of Superman, were so popular that they led to a flood of superhero shows on Saturdays the following year, including but not limited to The Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, Super President, Samson and Goliath, Birdman and the Galaxy Trio, The Herculoids, Shazzan!, and Moby Dick and the Mighty Mightor.
In fact, the last two episodes of Space Ghost and Dino Boy were used to help launch Hanna-Barbera’s upcoming shows with guest appearances by the characters from the Herculoids, Moby Dick, the Mighty Mightor, and Shazzan.
In all honesty, Space Ghost (and all these other shows) could be a little formulaic, but that could be because they were less than 10 minutes long. Kids didn’t mind. The show was action-packed and Space Ghost was just plain cool!
Unfortunately, parent groups like Action for Children’s Television (ACT) determined that superhero shows were too violent and due to their pressure, the networks canceled most of them by the end of the ’60s, but many aired in syndication afterward.
Space Ghost and his companions returned in the wake of the phenomenal success of Star Wars which took the world by storm in 1977. In 1981, NBC aired Space Stars, also created by Hanna-Barbera, which presented new shorts featuring Space Ghost and The Herculoids. Two original segments were created– Astro and the Space Mutts and Teen Force.
Astro and the Space Mutts actually starred The Jetson’s pet dog, Astro, as a space K9 police dog, along with other K9s, and their hapless wrangler, Space Ace. While the other segments were pretty straightforward action, this segment was more comedic.
Teen Force introduced a team comprised of the super-fast Kid Comet, telepathic/telekinetic Elektra, and shapeshifting Moleculad. They were accompanied by two chattering, blue-skinned aliens named Plutem and Glax. Their primary opponent was the conqueror Uglor, who also served as a general foe to the other characters on Space Stars.
Space Stars was an hour long and included two Space Ghost shorts, and one each of the others. (Once again, it was clear that Space Ghost was the main draw.) Each episode ended with a short called Space Stars Finale, a crossover between characters from the different solo segments. In addition, characters from the different shows frequently popped up on each other’s shorts.
It was established that Jan was dating Kid Comet from the Teen Force. Space Ghost was slightly redesigned with his hands being painted in flesh-tone, not white like the rest of his costume, as had been the case on the original series.
The most memorable contribution to Space Ghost lore to stem from Space Stars was Space Spectre, an evil, alternate universe version of the main hero.
Gary Owens returned to voice Space Ghost, with Alexandra Stoddart as Jan, Steve J. Spears as Jace, and Frank Welker as Blip. John Stephenson voiced Space Spectre and other characters in the series.
Space Stars only lasted for one season, comprised of 11 episodes and 66 segments. Most of the series was later rerun as part of the USA Cartoon Express. However, this version was whittled down to 30 minutes, with one short each for Space Ghost, Teen Force, and The Herculoids. Astro and the Space Mutts and Space Stars Finale were not included, although, if my memory is correct, the Astro characters did pop up as guest stars at least once.
Later, the Space Ghost, Herculoids, and Astro segments were aired on the Cartoon Network and Boomerang, but not Teen Force. (But… that was the best one!)
While 80s kids like me may fondly recall Space Stars, it didn’t make the biggest impression. Space Ghost would accomplish his greatest success in a completely new format.
Cartoon Network launched in 1994 and its programming was initially all reruns of shows from the Warner Bros. library which included most Hanna-Barbera series as well as some from the Turner collection (G-Force) and Ruby-Spears.
But very quickly, CN began introducing original creations. Space Ghost Coast-to-Coast was an adult-targeted late-night irreverent comedy series, which emulated the talk show format of The Tonight Show and Late Night With David Letterman. Space Ghost was cast as a chat show host with his villains, like Zorak, Brak, and Moltar working as the crew. The series frequently broke the fourth wall by showing the behind-the-scenes shenanigans that went into creating this show. (It was somewhat similar to HBO’s acclaimed The Larry Sanders Show, tbh.)
Space Ghost, who was given the alter ego Tad Ghostly on this series, would interview live-action celebrities which initially included fitness expert Susan Powter, the Bee-Gees, Ashley Judd, Bobcat Goldthwait, “Weird Al” Yankovic, and Adam West, Lee Meriwether, and Eartha Kitt from the 60s Batman series/movie.
Space Ghost went from a stoic and capable superhero to kind of a dullard which led to most of the show’s humor.
Space Ghost Coast-to-Coast went on to run for a whopping ELEVEN seasons and spawned the spinoffs Cartoon Planet and The Brak Show. (The celebrity guests also became increasingly more identifiable.)
But more importantly, it led to Cartoon Network establishing an entire line of late-night programming featuring weirdly hilarious shows aimed at grownups called Adult Swim. Notable segments to air as part of this block include Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Sealab 2021, and Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law.
A lot of the animation for Space Ghost Coast-to-Coast was recycled from the 60s series, and a similar approach was taken with Sealab 2021, and Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law.
George Lowe served as the voice of Space Ghost and the show’s announcer. Zorak and Moltar were voiced by C. Martin Croker. Andy Merrill voiced Brak and Lokar. Black Widow was voiced by the comedian Judy Tenuta, who also appeared on the show as a live-action guest.
Ultimately, there were 110 episodes of Space Ghost Coast-to-Coast plus four specials. The series ended its run on Adult Swim in 2014, but two additional seasons were released via the video game service GameTap.
For fans, fortunately, the majority of the Space Ghost oeveure is readily available on DVD. The original 60s series was released, complete with Dino Boy, commercially to the mass market. Space Stars was released by Warner Archive as a manufacture-on-demand release and is available through WB’s website and on Amazon. Unfortunately, not all of Space Ghost Cost-to-Coast is available. The fourth and fifth seasons and the final six episodes are no longer available to purchase but boxed sets of the bulk are out there. I do not believe any of these are available to legally stream anywhere at this point, but they could all wind up on HBO Max at some point.
While there wasn’t much licensing for Space Ghost back in the 60s or 80s, there have been many action figures and other items released within the last 20 years, some of them more “classic” and some based on Coast-to-Coast.
What’s your favorite iteration of Space Ghost? Comment below!
