Super Friends!:
The Complete Collection
review by Bobby Blakey
These days there are so many comics related to movies and TV shows that fans can’t get enough of or are already burned out, but this wasn’t always the case. These properties used to be fewer and far between with most of their success during the 70s and 80s, mostly in animated form. From 1973 to 1985 DC Comics hero trinity of Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman dominated leading the animated series Super Friends! Bringing together more of DC’s iconic heroes along with some new additions.
Super Friends follows the greatest heroes of our time, banded together to stamp out the forces of evil wherever and whenever they might appear! Based on DC Comics' long-running Justice League of America series, the show featured the Justice League (Superman, Batman & Robin, Aquaman, and Wonder Woman together with 'apprentice' super-heroes Marvin, Wendy, and Wonder Dog and other DC luminaries such as the Flash and the Atom who make cameos.
Throughout the series run it changed its line up and title to bring different variations and characters to the forefront with Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman always front and center. The original series offered up new original characters of Wendy, Marvin and Wonder Dog to connect with
younger viewers in the vein of Scooby Doo. At the end of the original Super Friends series and its cancellation these characters were replaced by the newly created Wonder Twins in the follow-up series The All-New Super Friends Hour in 1977.
This revamped series brought more of the same to the mix with even more heroes joining the adventures and The Wonder Twins given some of their own spotlight. As silly as I thought their powers were, as a kid I still loved them, and they made way more sense to the series than the filly Marvin and Wendy characters. The next series Challenge of the Super Friends! Initially kept the same formula before introducing fans to the Legion of Doom and leaning closer to the comics than ever before.
Through all the series that followed The World’s Greatest Super Friends, Super Friends: The Legendary Super Powers Show and The Super Powers Team: Galactic Guardians all stuck to the new formula bringing in even more heroes, line-up changes and better art and animation as it moved forward. Each new season seemed to lean closer to the comics and less into trying to just connect with smaller kids allowing it to flow better for older audiences and do the characters justice.
This new set brings all these series together in one place and despite some of the early ones being somewhat cheesy at times, all hold up and entertain well. I am so glad they brought these all to one place as I had forgotten that so many variations even existed with the Galactic Guardians series one I totally missed out on somehow. This is the perfect classic collection for old school fans and a great chance for the new audiences to discover it for the first time in a great way.
Join the legendary Super Friends on their fantastic adventures to defend the universe with the Super Friends!: The Complete Collection available now on DVD just in time to celebrate Batman day on September 21st.
