Superman on Television

Episodes

Videos

Sounds

Pictures

Reviews

Merchandise

Hanna Barbera's Super Friends

Super Friends

1973's Super Friends' premise was for Superman to team up with other DC Comics superheroes (Aquaman, Batman and Robin, and Wonder Woman (Diana Prince) with her magic lasso, telepathy and invisible jet) along with eager young hero trainees Wendy, Marvin, and Wonder Dog for adventures. Their base of operation was called the Hall of Justice, where they responded to Trouble Alerts and information supplied by Col. Wilcox. Wendy demonstrated the brains, while Wonder Dog was similar to Hanna Barbera's Scooby Doo, and Marvin was enthusiastic but needed to learn the moral of each episode. The adventures were one hour long, and included occasional cameos by other heroes like Plastic Man and Flash (Barry Allen). Hanna Barbera artist Alex Toth did the character designs. This series was cancelled in 1975 after two seasons.

"Their mission: To fight Injustice. To right that which is wrong. And to serve all mankind!"

Credits

Executive Producers: William Hanna and Joseph Barbera
Directed by Charles A. Nichols
Creative Producer: Iwao Takamoto
Associate Producer: Lew Marshall
Story: Fred Freiberger, Bernie Kahn, Ken Rotcop, Art Weiss, Willie Gilbert, Dick Robbinsa, Henry Sharp, Marshall Williams
Story Direction: Bernard Atkins, Chuck Couch, Clark Haas, George Jorgensen, George Singer, Irv Spector, Howard Swift
Voices: Sherry Alberoni (Wendy Harris), Norman Alden (Aquaman/The Flash), Danny Dark (Clark Kent/Superman), Shannon Farnon (Wonder Woman), Casey Kasem (Robin The Teen Wonder/Trouble Alert Computer), Ted Knight (Narrator), Olan Soule (Batman), John Stephenson, Frank Welker (Marvin White/Wonderdog)
Titles: Iraj Paran
Dialogue Director: Wally Burr
Musical Director: Hoyt Curtin
Musical Supervision: Paul DeKorte
Character Design: Jerry Eisenberg, Alex Toth
Layout: Robert Smitt, Monty Wedd
Animation Supervisor: Alex Toth, Rudy Zamora
Animation: Jim Davis, Richard Dunn, Cam Ford, Peter Gardiner, Sue Gilcrist, Gerry Grabner, Richard Jones, Cynthia Leech, Ray Nowlan, Vivian Ray, Joe Shearer, Stan Walker
Background Styling: F. Montealegre, Albert Gmuer
Backgrounds: Graham Linley
Sound Direction: Richard Olson, Bill Getty
Supervising Film Editor: Larry Cowan
Music Editor: Richard Allen
Effects Editors: Sam Gernette, Terry Moore
Negative Consultant: William E. DeBoer
Post Production Supervisor: Joed Eaton
Camera: Joe Dugonics, Wayne Smith
Consultants: Carmine Infantino, Nelson Birdwell, Julius Schwartz

*Based upon the characters appearing in Justice League of America magazine published by National Periodical Publications, Inc.

A HANNA-BARBERA PRODUCTION Produced at ERIC PORTER STUDIOS

© 1973 National Periodical Publications, Inc. and Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc.

Episodes

• The Power Pirate
  The Trouble Alert at the Hall of Justice signals two trains are in danger of colliding in California. After Superman saves them, Aquaman must save a powerless ocean liner, Batman and Robin save workers from a crane, and a powerless dam threatens to cause a flood. At a steam power plant, Wendy notices someone named Sir Cedric has a dry umbrella, despite a rain storm. As power crises spread she mentions this to the other Super Friends. They track down the real Sir Cedric in a hospital. He tells them how an alien has taken on his identity. At a new nuclear power plant, the Super Friends capture the alien. The alien explains he was stealing power because his planet had not conserved its energies. Superman thinks of a way to supply the alien's planet with solar energy by polishing a moon.

• Professor Goodfellow's G.E.E.C.
  A test pilot finds the plane he is about to test flies off and performs routines by itself. Machinery begins performing without anyone. The Superfriends, accompanied by a government representative, are escorted to Professor Goodfellow's headquarters. He shows a massive computer, the G.E.E.C (Goodfellow Effort Eliminating Computer), which will handle all tasks that human labor currently does. He offers it to the government, but the representative turns him down. So the professor offers it to the public, and soon most people (including Marvin) are using the service, and living sedentary lives. Wendy and the Super Friends remain skeptical about how safe the G.E.E.C is, and how healthy a lifestyle it encourages. The G.E.E.C seems foolproof, until a mouse slips into the system, causing a malfunction. While Superman is busy preventing automated disasters, the heroes warn the professor. To turn off the system requires Superman causing the control satellite to crash into the ocean where Aquaman can disable it, since Goodfellow had included kryptonite to stop Superman from interfering. To get the mouse, Plastic Man is called in, to stretch an arm through an access tube. Thus, the Professor and Marvin learn the risks of a fully automated life.

• The Weather Maker
  In Florida, Marvin finds a swimming pool has frozen. The area's climate is changing causing emergencies. Wonder Woman saves a ship from a hurricane, and helps Superman save a vessel from icebergs. While investigating with Batman and Robin, Wendy and Marvin notice a figure who apparently is controlling the weather. The heroes follow in the Batmobile three suspects who escape. Wendy suggests getting information to find a pattern, so the Super Friends collect weather data, and pinpoint the source of the disturbance. While the other Super Friends continue handling emergencies, Batman, Robin, Wendy, and Marvin find a ship near a waterspout, which has a nozzle apparently causing the weather trouble. When Wendy and Marvin accidentally are left on the boat, they are found by the figure they had spotted. He is a scientist. His nozzle will shift the gulf stream so his small nation, Glacia, will no longer be frozen. He moves the boat, so the Super Friends must search again to find it. Aquaman's sea friends help locate it, and the scientist sets the nozzle irretrievably on. Watching Wonder Dog makes Batman think to have Aquaman shift the nozzle to point down, and have Superman push the tubing into the ground. This stops the gulf stream from being shifted. Wonder Woman finds it also has caused the nozzle to drill into a geothermal pocket that can safely warm Glacia.

• The Baffles Puzzle
  Batman and Superman tell Marvin to do his schoolwork in the library. At the library Marvin and Wendy meet Professor Mergen, and when Wonder Dog starts sneezing at the smell of almonds, the library's encyclopedias disappear. The Justice League is alerted to a threat by a Professor Baffles to make an exhibit of french lithographs disappear. Despite the Super Friends efforts the lithographs do disappear, and next Baffles makes a shipment of money disappear when a ransom is not paid by the government. Wendy has noticed the smell of almonds each time, and Wendy and Marvin end up following Mergen, and find he is Baffles. While held prisoner by two crooked assistants, Mergen explains he hoped if he used a chemical which destroys almost anything besides glass to make historical items disappear, people would behave better. While the crooked assistants hold Mergen, Wendy, and Marvin, Wonder Dog escapes to warn the Super Friends who are delayed by a series of isolated traps.

• The Shamon U
  Wendy and Marvin spot a mysterious 'U' shaped device, like a huge magnet, on Mystery Mountain. They tell the Super Friends, and Batman and Robin come to investigate. The magnet and a laser gun are from an underground facility of a Dr. Shamon. Shamon is using the laser to create golden meteors from a cosmic cloud, and the magnet to bring the meteors to his base. Wendy and Marvin manage to meet the doctor and a colleague, Madame LeBon. Madame is worried the process may have unknown effects, and leaves with Wendy and Marvin. Indeed, the process also causes strange gases that settle on animals and plants causing them to alter size. Superman rescues a farm from a giant orange tree; Aquaman saves a sea lab from a giant lobster. Batman and Robin return to find Shamon, and following them are Wendy, Marvin, and Wonder Dog who ends up growing. Shamon agrees to stop when seeing Wonder Dog. Madame LeBon and Wonder Woman confirm the cause of the size changes, and parallel with Wendy, that sunlight will reverse the effects. Superman uses a windmill to blow away the cosmic cloud, and a telescope mirror to beam sunlight over the night sky.

• Dr. Pelagian's War
  Wendy and Marvin see an albatross that gives a warning from Dr. Pelagian, and a demonstration of his power - a temporary tidal wave - while at a seaside carnival. The Super Friends get reports of Dr. Pelagian, and a demonstration of his power - a temporary tidal wave - while at a seaside carnival. The Super Friends get reports of Dr. Pelagian's warnings to stop polluting the seas from other places. Col. Wilcox reports industrialists have already agreed to take action, but three industrialists are holding out. The three refuse to change, despite being asked by the heroes, Wendy and Marvin, and being again warned by Dr. Pelagian. Aquaman confirms who Dr. Pelagian is, while Wendy and Marvin return to the carnival to track him. Wendy and Marvin finally meet him, and go on his sub. When they learn he plans to destroy the holdout's factories with tidal waves, they send Wonder Dog to warn the Super Friends. The heroes manage to save the factories, and then Superman and Aquaman manage to locate the sub. The three financiers finally agree to help stop polluting, while Dr. Pelagian understands his actions are wrong.

• Too Hot To Handle
  Wendy and Marvin spot ivy growing wildly over a museum in Gotham. Across the world, heat is increasing causing drought in dairylands, and melting glaciers. Col. Wilcox summons the Super Friends to an observatory, where they learn some magnetic force is causing the Earth to move towards the sun. Superman goes to India to bring in the Flash for help. Flash carries copper wire around the Earth to create a counter magnetic field. Meanwhile, Wendy and Marvin had spotted a bundled figure in SDI photostats of emergencies caused by the heat. Then they spot the figure at the observatory, but after telling the heroes, the figure has vanished. The heroes learn something behind the sun is again moving the Earth, and Superman goes and destroys a robot satellite. Meanwhile, Wendy and Marvin have stowed away in a vehicle used by the figure, after giving Wonder Dog a message. Batman and Aquaman find the volcanic island, where the figure and youngsters are from analyzing the message's paper. At the island the figure reveals it is an alien. His planet squandered its natural resources, and hoped to move to a warmer Earth. Flash, Superman, and Aquaman restore the alien planet's environment to give them a second chance.

• The Balloon People
  The Trouble Alert barely picks up a signal of an approaching flying saucer. A family from Balloonia land their miniature spaceship in Marvin's backyard near Wonder Dog's doghouse. The aliens meet Wendy, Marvin, Batman and Robin, becoming friends. The aliens tell how they had to leave their home planet when it became too polluted, and demonstrate telekinesis. The publicity attracts the attention of a misguided genius Noah Tall and his dimwit assistant Twisty. Tall decides to kidnap the aliens so that he can use their knowledge to take over the world. Tall and Twisty fail trying to kidnap the aliens when the aliens are being taken out on tours with Wendy and Marvin, Superman, and Aquaman. Although the Super Friends finally suspect someone is trying to kidnap the aliens, Tall and Twisty manage to catch the aliens, when they are left with Robin. Using a suggestion by Marvin, Wonder Woman builds thought boosters. The Super Friends use these to amplify the signals being sent by the aliens. The signals cause the aliens' flying saucer (with Wendy and Marvin) to go to Tall's secret island hideout. Despite Tall's attempts to fight off the Super Friends, Tall and Twisty are captured. The aliens move to Washington DC when the father is offered a government job in fighting pollution.

• The Androids
  A moon shot from Cape Courageous Space Port is sabotaged by a Dr. Rebos, who has replaced the two astronauts with two androids, and left a threat to continue if the government does not stop the space program. Dr. Rebos and his assistant Loco then create an android Wonder Dog to successfully sabotage a mission to Venus, despite Clark Kent being at the base, reporting for Galaxy Communications. Col. Wilcox accuses Wonder Dog of being a double agent, and Wendy and Marvin go with Wonder Dog to investigate the double. An undersea net by Aquaman helps guard a test of a Mars mission, but Dr. Rebos uses artificial kryptonite to kidnap and replace Superman. The android Superman sabotages another mission. Meanwhile Wendy and Marvin have found and being captured by Dr. Rebos. He explains he wants the money spent on the space program to be spent on helping poor and sick people. Batman and Robin have rescued Superman, and Wendy and Marvin escape to tell the Super Friends that Dr. Rebos has sent the android Superman to destroy a space base on Mars. Superman goes to save the base, while the other heroes go and stop Dr. Rebos.

• The Ultra Beam
  Two misguided scientists, Hank and Ben, have invented a blue beam that they fire from a Blue Jet at gold fields to extract gold quarks. They target gold since it is the "root of all evil". At their lab in a building labeled Ultratech, they use the containers of collected gold quarks with a rectifier device to convert the quarks into metals. Thus they feel their process benefits by eliminating gold, while allowing easy production of needed metals. Their beam, however, disrupts nearby mines and quarries, causing defective materials. The Super Friends discover these defective ores when accidents occur from a defective steel girder (iron), a failing dam (limestone), power lines (copper), and a blackboard (shale). At a seismological bureau a GETI machine which tracks tremors picks up a strange pattern. When that pattern allows Batman and Robin to spot the Blue Jet, Ben and Hank have to sabotage it so that it will cause false readings. When Wendy and Marvin at the bureau, with the director, fix the device, Wendy and Marvin decide to check another pattern, in case it's a mistake, before alerting the Super Friends. They find the Ultratech building where Ben and Hank explain their work, and let the kids accompany them on a flight. The director alerts the Super Friends, who track the jet to where the scientists plan to destroy a major government gold supply. When the blue beam disorients Wonder Woman in her plane, Superman uses a mirror from Mt. Palomar to stop them. Later the metals created from gold quarks have reverted to gold.

• The Fantastic Frerps
  While the Super Friends are demonstrating trick golf shots at a charity benefit, King Plasto with his assistant Styro use a frerp (fiber reinforced epoxy resin plastic) replica of a government G.R.E.P.S. lab to steal a delivery of raw plastic. King Plasto wants to steal more raw plastic that he will make more frerp out of to construct things for his ideal world: an island Frerpland. At the golf benefit, Marvin looking for a lost golfball ends up finding a van driven by King Plasto and his hideout hidden in a cliff, but when Marvin tries telling the Super Friends he's jumbled and a Trouble Alert telling of the plastic theft distracts the heroes. Plasto plans another theft of a shipment, and creates a Killer Whale and a flying saucer as distractions for Aquaman and Superman. Meanwhile, Wendy and Marvin have gone into Plasto's hideout, while Batman and Robin fail to catch up with Plasto after he steals the shipment. Examining frerp retrieved by Wendy and Marvin, Wonder Woman manages to invent a frerp solvent sprayed on more frerp distractions being dropped by frerp robot geese, before Wendy and Marvin, and Batman and Robin begin a final assault on King Plasto's hideout. With Wonder Woman and Superman aiding, King Plasto, Styro, and Polly Ethyl Lene (who was providing inside information from GREPS) are captured.

• The Mysterious Moles
  While biking in Cave County, Wendy and Marvin believe a tree and boulder have somehow moved, and spot odd tracks as if made by a giant chicken. They tell the Super Friends, and when Batman and Robin join to investigate find the tree and rock gone, and a woman in a nearby home (Mrs. Mole) says no tree or rock ever were there. Meanwhile, four buildings have had roof air-conditioning units stolen. Col. Wilcox informs of a unit stolen from a government medical laboratory. Wendy and Marvin go back to the Mole house and find the house has a trucking company garage facade on the opposite side, and follow new tracks to a hole. The hole leads them into a cave, where they follow Minnie and Maximus Mole. The Moles are spelunkers and have found Bottomless Cave which has an underground world with a lagoon that causes rocks and trees to come alive. The Moles are using the lagoon's 'walkwater' to animate trees and rocks to steal air-conditioning units so they can access a crater surrounded by huge diamonds. Batman, Robin, Wonder Woman, and Aquaman investigate the Moles and find the kids and the underground world, while Superman guards a power plant's new roof cooling unit. The Moles cause a distraction and instead steal the plant's dynamo to power their cooling units. When the Moles try to escape in their drill-mobile, after failing to stop the four heroes and kids underground, Superman - who has been tracking the dynamo theft - arrives to stop them.

• The Menace of the White Dwarf
  While adding air to his bicycle, Marvin and Wendy find the bicycle disappears. A spaceship has also made a locomotive, condemned building, and trucks disappear. Superman suspects it is caused somehow by a white dwarf. Investigating, Batman and Robin, with Wendy, Marvin, and Wonder Dog find the missing items, and a deaths-head ring from the Raven. The Raven is an evil scientist previously arrested by Superman. Superman and Wonder Woman check on the Raven who is supposed to be in a special prison. They find he has escaped, and then Raven steals the prison with his white dwarf device and uses an invisibility screen to escape. Next he tries stealing a sub which is saved by Aquaman, while Superman and Wonder Woman again fail to stop him. Plotting the Raven's flightpaths Wendy and Marvin locate a farmer who has a green rock surrounded by strange mushrooms. The farmer says Raven wants the rock, but lets them show it to the Super Friends. It is green kryptonite and the mushrooms are also from Krypton and cancel the gravity effects of a white dwarf. When the heroes are busy in a strategy session in Washington, Raven warns Wendy and Marvin that he will steal a historic building. The kids plan to warn the heroes, but Wonder Dog runs after a cat into a building. The kids follow and discover that is the building being stolen: the Washington Monument, which ends up on a hidden floating island with Raven. Superman agrees to hand over the kryptonite and the Raven sentences him to be imprisoned in the stolen prison. But Superman had secretly planted spores from the mushrooms on the floating island. When the island begins falling, Raven surrenders and is rescued by Superman.

• Gulliver's Gigantic Goof
  Dr. Hiram Gulliver decides to solve the problem of increasing population by shrinking all adults to two inches height. He demonstrates his sonic microwave reducer by shrinking the people at a space center, just before a ship is scheduled to leave for Mars, and next at Harbor City. He then sends his reducer in a balloon gondola towards another city, where Batman and Robin intercept it. They get shrunk when trying to sabotage the device, and Gulliver has them returned to his castle hideout. With the device sabotaged, Gulliver sets traps using a hand device to shrink Superman, then Aquaman and Wonder Woman. With the heroes captured, Gulliver next steals a star sapphire. Warned by Wonder Woman using her lasso via telepathy, Wendy and Marvin witness Gulliver's theft. Gulliver uses the sapphire to power a new reducer, which uses radio and television signals to shrink adults around the world. Wendy and Marvin summon Green Arrow (Oliver Queen) from Bornego, and their radio message causes him to shrink. Superman has used his x-ray vision to cause Gulliver's device to send a coded message. Green Arrow learns of the message from Col. Wilcox and finds Gulliver's castle. He frees the heroes, and Wonder Woman summons her plane, which happens to have Wendy and Marvin inside. Superman uses an idea of Marvin's to reverse the device's effect to restore everyone.

• The Planet Splitter
  The Trouble Alert detects a large diamond has been stolen from the County Museum of Art. Col. Wilcox reports other diamonds larger than 100 carats have also been replaced by zircon, after being hit by a red beam. The heroes split up to guard four remaining diamonds. Wendy and Marvin join Superman as Clark Kent to guard one diamond at a charity circus. Wendy witnesses a red beam from a circus wagon hit the tent where the diamond is. Superman is decoyed by balloons, while the crooks escape. He returns to the Hall of Justice, where the heroes decide to install microdots which will transmit a homing signal on the remaining diamonds. Meanwhile, Wendy and Marvin follow the circus wagon and discover the quarters of Doctor Luscius LeBon and his assistant Wilbur. Doctor LeBon is stealing the diamonds to power a device which will split the planet Cygnus-Uno, so that half of the planet's minerals can be used to replace depleted natural resources. Wendy and Marvin are discovered stowing away on the doctor's spaceship he uses to check on the planet. When Wilbur says he is a Superman fan, Wendy tells Superman's origin: of being sent to Earth by Jor-El and Lara, found by a couple who take him to an orphanage, and how the orphanage quickly decides to let the couple have the powerful baby. LeBon next steals another diamond in England, allowing Superman to follow the signal. Wonder Woman and Aquaman follow in her plane, as do Batman and Robin in their plane. LeBon activates his splitter but finds it has little power because Wilbur has disappeared stealing the diamonds. Superman arrests LeBon while the others stop Wilbur. Later, Batman and Superman say that the planet splitter would not have worked because Wilbur had faked test results.

• The Waterman
  Superman and Wonder Woman respond to emergencies: a coral reef is breaking up causing flooding, and a 'red tide' is reported by Col. Wilcox. Batman, Robin, with Wendy and Marvin go to a professor with a submarine. Marvin thinks he sees two people walking on water, but they have gone when Wendy looks. They are Holo and Zara - two aliens from a waterworld. Their mother spaceship is in a lake. It needs fuel created from silicon, after being damaged in a meteor storm. The aliens are using a smaller ship to process seawater, extracting silicon. Unfortunately, the process causes the red tide, and sterilizes the seawater. Holo delays Batman and the heroes with the professor, while Zara moves the ship to an algae forest, and then another move. Eventually, Aquaman nearly captures Holo and sees the small ship. Batman and Robin are able to track down the lake where Holo hides. Superman and Wonder Woman help catch the mothership. When the aliens explain their problem the lake where Holo hides. Superman and Wonder Woman help catch the mothership. When the aliens explain their problem, they are offered help processing beach sand.