Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Forgotten Toons: Freedom Force

I will preface this whole thing with this statement: if any of you have seen this, I would be surprised.

To begin, this show is actually a spin-off of another forgotten cartoon entitled Space Sentinels, which I will cover at a later date. It was produced by Filmation in the late '70s and aired on a show collection entitled Tarzan and the Super 7. This was a popular idea back in the day and used often by Filmation, but I digress.

The premise of Freedom Force was simple: make a group of Super Friends that were Filmation characters, both old and new. Their choices are what make the show unique though...

*Hercules
*Isis
*Sinbad
*Merlin
*Super Samurai

Does one of them sound like they are out of place there? Yeah, they stuck a generic superhero on the team amongst the famous icons. I should note that this Hercules is a bit different, as I will cover in my piece on Space Sentinels.

The plots are weird. One of them involves a fellow with similar powers to Super Samurai tricking him, although my favorite is odder still. A scientist from the future comes back in time to be a hero with his giant robot. However, he also causes the events that require saving too- nice guy. He learns his lesson when he improperly caps a volcano, despite the fact that he has mastered time-travel and advanced robotics.

Sadly, this show died a quick death. It failed to connect with kids and only got its original 5 episode run. On the plus side, it is weird as hell and obscure to boot.

Up next, a popular comic strip character goes to the future and brings along some odd art design in the process. Stay tuned...

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