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Wonder Twin powers ACTIVATE!
Shape of an out of chronological order DVD set! Form of borderline litigious crosses between Donnie and Marie and Vulcans joined by that popular trope that ruined many a Hanna Barbera cartoon in the 1970s and 1980s, the oft-nonsensical (oftener still-animal) sidekick (see: Fonzie's dog on the Happy Days time travel cartoon, the pig drill sergeant on Laverne and Shirley, Baby Plas on Plastic man, Son on Captain Caveman and Son, "the dangerous not to cities, just himself" Godzookie on Godzilla, and the anti-Christ: Scrappy-Doo) this time being Gleek, a blue monkey.
Yes, coming from the same period that saw the Fantastic Four trade in the Human Torch for H.E.R.B.I.E. (they were afraid kids would set themselves on fire, but replicating the piling on of rocks that turned Benjy Grimm into The Thing was perfectly fine) and predated those half hour commercials for products that would dominate the mid-late part of the 1980s (My Little Pony, Potato Head Kids, Care Bears, Transformers, Rainbow Brite. You played with them. Rep-ra-ZENT!) the latest installment of the HB releases of The Superfriends cartoon.
Is it good for nostalgia? Yeah, sure. It's just far enough on this side of "sane" that you aren't like the forty-something virgin denizens of comics shops who ditched their jobs to wait in line for Episode III (Gee, d'ya think he really turns into Vader at the end?) The animation isn't as bad as, say, the Filmation stuff from the late 1960s or the mid late1970s superherowise, but still, of all the periods of the cartoon, this was my least favorite.
Why the Marvin and Wendy period is being avoided like a hand grenade with Herpes, I have no idea. This is the same company that has yet to touch any of its late 1950s/early 1960s cartoons like Yogi Bear, Huckleberry Hound and/or Quickdraw McGraw. Who knows?
Signed,
epsteinsmutha
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I have Challenge of The Superfriends,now I have to get this and Superman:The Animated Series,and Wonder Woman,the Complete Third season. I loved watching Superfriends as a child,it was my favorite shows,I also loved Wonder Woman's invisable jet.
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Warner Bros. has my hats down for bringing out the Hanna Barbera Collection and now they are responsible for bring out the SuperFriends!! One of the best parts of growing up was watching Saturday Morning Cartoons!! While Challenge of the SuperFriends was a delight, there was a void in episodes involving the Wonder Twins!! Jayne and Zan were very much part of the Justice League and glad that they are now on DVD!!
We fans want MORE of the SuperFriends including ALL the Short-episodes of the Wonder Twins!!
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Only the combined superpowers of Earth's greatest heroes can stop the unthinkable dangers that jeopardize humanity in these 16 episodes from the beloved animated TV series! Superman, Batman and Robin, Aquaman, Wonder Woman and Zan and Jayna battle villains from the darkest regions of outer space to the depths of the ocean in their fight for truth and justice. They face extraordinary perils at the core of the Earth and defy the laws of nature to shrink to microscopic size to defeat a radioactive monster. Even Dracula returns from the grave to challenge the Super Friends to a showdown! And with this exciting compilation that boasts cool extras, you can join the Super Friends for the ultimate victory celebration!
Warner Bros announced the release of SuperFriends - The 2nd Season for May 24. These are all 16 episodes from the 1978 run of the show featuring Zan & Jayna: The Wonder Twins! This 2 disc set (365 mins) The release will sport a full frame (1.33:1) transfer, and English mono audio, with English, French and Spanish subtitles. Two bonus features were announced:
-Pajama-Rama: Super Friends Retrospective - A group of pop culture enthusiasts and fun celebrities share their memories of the world's greatest team of '70's super-heroes, The Super Friends!
-The Ballad of Zan & Jayna - A wild and wacky music video celebrating the Wonder Twins, and of course, their pet primate Gleek!
SHOW HISTORY:
1973 saw the original Superfriends show, featuring the heros followed by non-powered kids Wendy & Marvin, and their pet Wonderdog. There are not too many cartoons in that series, and they were repeated quite a bit on and off until 1977's All-New Superfirends Hour came along. That is the show where the tag-along teens were first replaced by the Wonder Twins, Zan & Jayna, and their space-monkey Gleek. In 1978, the show continued, retitled as simply Superfriends. That season is the one which aired the episodes announced today for DVD release. At the same time, Challenge of the Superfriends was running adjacent to this, featuring the episodes of the Justice League of America vs. The Legion of Doom. All 16 of *those* episodes are already on DVD in Challenge of the Superfriends - The 1st Season. Since they call that "the first season" and the new title "the second season", we honestly can't tell if Warner means to ignore the 1973 Wendy/Marvin/Wonderdog installments totally.
Zan, Jayna, & Gleek continued in 1979's World's Greatest Superfriends, with a few new episodes mixed with repeats of the older ones. 1980 saw more than 60 new shorts (under 10 minutes each in length) made featuring just the heroes, with no teenage sidekicks, and those were combined with old episodes into a new Superfriends Hour show. But then that show was shortened to a half-hour for 1981-83 and the show went under various names, accompanied by maybe about two dozen more new shorts...some of which were never aired in the original rotation, but which aired later in syndication. Then, in 1984, ABC wanted to revitalize the series, and that's when they did Super Friends: The Legendary Super Powers Show, using the new DC Comics name from the action figure lineup that was being marketed at the time. The cartoons mainly featured the heroes from the toy line, so now Cyborg (from the "Teen Titans" comics) and Firestorm (from "Firestorm: The Nuclear Man") were on the team. There were only 15 episodes produced under that name, and then they finished up the SuperFriends' TV run with The Super Powers Team: Galactic Guardians. That 1985 show had more of the heroes who hadn't been seen the previous year, especially fan favorites who had mostly been missing since Challenge, like Flash, Green Lantern, and Hawkman. There were approximately 10 episodes of that show.
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