Redartz: Welcome to another 'animated' discussion of cartoon goodness! It's a double treat today. Everyone loves cartoons, and everyone loves monsters. So how much cooler can it be to have animated monsters? Let's find out...
We will look at four shows, spanning the mid 60's to the 80's, beginning with the earliest. That show would be "King Kong", running from 1966 through 1969. This show was my first exposure to Anime, in a sense; it was produced by Toei Animation of Japan for Rankin/Bass productions. Accordingly, the animation was a bit different from anything I'd seen before, but I liked it.
Rather than being portrayed as a monster, in this show Kong is a friendly, likeable pal to the Bond family, particularly young Bobby. In the best Jonny Quest tradition, the Bond family (led by Professor Bond, those scientists were pretty adventurous) travel the world getting into scrapes, which require Kong's assistance (and of course the big fella isn't so friendly to the various evildoers the Bond family encounter). One major foe in the series is a character by the name of Dr. Who, a bald fellow with no relation to the Dr. with the Tardis.
This show was part of the dynamite ABC Saturday morning schedule in 67-68, which also included Spider-Man and the FF. Coincidentally, some of the same voice actors from that Spider-Man series also worked on King Kong.
This show also featured a very cool intro, which we present above. Not a show you hear much about, but it was good viewing, and had dinosaurs- so you just had to watch.
A few years later, a different group of monsters popped up on Saturday mornings. These were the "Groovie Goolies", comic takes on the classic Universal monsters Frankenstein, Dracula and Wolf Man. It ran from 1970-71, and was produced by Norm Prescott/Lou Scheimer; the studio responsible for the popular Archie Show. "Goolies"was actually very similar to the "Archie" cartoon, with songs, jokes, and skits. And it actually also featured Archie Comic's Sabrina, the Teenage Witch- who commonly bantered with Drac, Frankie and Wolfie.
"The Groovie Goolies" was funny, sometimes corny, but always amusing. They made great use of many other monsters as well: mummies, witches, ghosts, Napoleonic skeletons, and so on. (Quick side question: does anyone else find it odd that the Comics Code prohibited such monsters for years, but on tv cartoons they were considered acceptable?). Incidentally, one of the tunes featured in the show's musical segment became a top 40 hit: "Chick-a-Boom", recorded by Daddy Dewdrop. I still hear it occasionally, and visualize those Goolies.
Moving ahead a few more years to 1978- another Japanese/US joint effort hit the small screen: Godzilla. A tandem effort from Toho Ltd. and Hanna-Barbera, this show ran until 1981, presented in several formats (varying from half-hour episodes to 90 minute shows with other features- "The Godzilla Super 90").
As this was the late 70's, violence was taboo on Saturday mornings, so the big lizard served as rescuer of his friends, a team of scientists on a research boat. Kind of like King Kong, actually. Additionally, there was the 'nephew' of Godzilla: a small creature called "Godzooky" who served as comic relief, often in his attempts at flight.
Godzilla wasn't my favorite show by any stretch, but I did watch it. Especially when it was teamed with Jonny Quest under the 90 minute format. "Jana of the Jungle" was the third feature; later Godzilla was paired with the "Harlem Globetrotters" and "Hong Kong Fooey". Don't ask me why...
Finally, 1980 brought a short-lived gem: Drak Pack. Produced by Hanna-Barbera, it ran on CBS for less than a season. Nonetheless, it earned a warm spot in my memory due to the characters and the voice acting.
The Drak Pack were three guys (Drak, Frankie and Howler) who appeared as normal humans, but when called into heroic action, took the identities of the descendants of the classic monsters. Count Dracula himself served as the team's advisor, he apparently was Drak's ancestor. The show's action largely followed the "Scooby Doo" formula of chases and escapes, usually involving "OGRE".
"OGRE", the Pack's chief opponents, were a team of villains led by "Dr. Dred"; memorably voiced by Hans Conreid. Dred had several underlings, among them Mummyman, Fly, and Vampira. My favorite by far, though, was "Toad", a short humorous bumbler voiced by Don Messick. To my final breath, I will smile remembering Toad's frequent self-deprecating outburst: "Bad Toad, Baaaaaad Toad!".
Another show not frequently remembered , but you can see a few on YouTube, and the show was released some years ago on DVD. If you haven't seen it, it's worth a look. Fun stuff.
So there you have four of Saturday morning's most 'monstrous' offerings. What did you think of them? Worthy tributes to those classic film monsters, or forgettable imitations? Are there other cartoon monsters you enjoyed? Tell us all about it...
12 comments:
I recall the latter two, as they were in my time.
Like you, I watched the Godzilla cartoon without necessarily liking it very much, and I really did not like Godzooky.
On the other hand, I recall really liking Drak Pack quite a bit. One of my favorite things about it, though, was that OGRE was an acronym: Organization for Generally Rotten Enterprises. That's arguably the best ever name for a group of evil-doers.
Probably watched Godzilla the most out of those listed. Like Edo was not a fan of Godzooky.
I did like the Groovy Goolies from the early seventies. Presented in a Laugh In format.
I used to really like monster heroes in cartoons when I was a kid.
I especially loved The Herculoids. It was just such a bizarre and random assortment of human and monster characters that were somehow a super team.
A family of barbarian warriors teamed up with a granite King Kong, a laser shooting dragon, a multi-legged triceratops, and some amorphous globs. One of the strangest cartoons of all time when you think about it. But it worked.
Interesting note on how the advent of using the likes of Dracula and other Hollywood monsters (some not-quite-living...) in both live action and animated series on Saturday mornings now became accepted back in the late '70s...,
Perhaps the relaxation of the Comics Code had some other 'tertiary' or follow-on effects, shall we say..? Interesting to ponder upon.
I was a fan of most of these shows, either in first run or syndication. Godzilla wasn't perfect, but it was fun. I enjoyed Drack Pack too.
I received the Herculoids dvd as a gift a few years ago and it holds up well, even if some of the plots and dialogue are a bit silly:
Example:
Dorno(after bad guys have been defeated):
"Dad, why did they come to our planet."
Zandor:"I don't know son...but I'm sure it was for something evil."
I laughed for about 30 minutes after that exchange. The other thing I noticed was that villains appeared to killed at the end of some Herculoids episodes, something that was edited out of the series when it re-ran in the 70s and 80s.
I love Godzooky and will fight you all to defend him! :)
I vaguely remember Drac Pack and saw some Groovy Ghoulies reruns, but my favorite Saturday morning monsters were the Herculoids. Speaking of the recent DC comic book FutureQuest combines Johnny Quest, Space Ghost, Dino Boy and the Herculoids, and was exquisitely drawn.
Hmm, I was only commenting on the cartoons mentioned in the original post; otherwise, I think the Herculoids were probably my favorites as well. As William said, it was barbarians teamed up with giant monsters that included a triceratops-looking beastie that shot fireballs out of one of his horns (Ceratopsians were always my favorite dinosaurs as a kid). What's not to love?
Osvaldo, I've seen quite a few images of Future Quest and heard many good things about it - that's yet another of those series I'd love to get around to reading one day. As for Godzooky, man, of all the things we could fight over, are you really sure that's the hill that you want to plant your flag on? :P
To all who mentioned "The Herculoids", well done. I loved them too; especially Gloop and Gleep. How did I miss them?!? Yes, the stories were a bit repetitious (like Space Ghost, actually) but the characters were so cool it didn't matter.
Osvaldo- yes, Future Quest was appealing. I also found the "Flintstones" 'reboot' pretty interesting.
David_b- yes, it just seems odd that monsters were fine on TV, but in comics for so long were verboten. You may well be right about the Code; it seemed to start losing it's grip in the early 70's, which coincides nicely with many of those Saturday morning shows. Anyone have anything concrete about this?
Huh, I had no idea there was a King Kong cartoon. Cool to see the big ape as a sympathetic protagonist, though. I'm not familiar with any of these other shows either.
Loved the Groovy Ghoulies big time. I still remember those corny jokes on that show and the various Archie shows and, yes, I still use them occasionally.
Loved the King Kong cartoon at the time. I didn't get to see the movie (King Kong Escapes) its linked too for many many years.
The Godzilla cartoon was notable as it was among the great work of Doug Wildey, the man who gave us Jonny Quest (my all-time favorite cartoon).
Rip Off
Rip- didn't realize Doug Wildey's involvement in "Godzilla". Thanks for pointing that out. Wildly was a great talent, a phenomenal illustrator.
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