Super Friends - Season 1, Vol. 1

This is the first in the Superfriends series that I loved as a kid and am slowly collecting them all to share with my kids. I have toddlers and a teenager and we all enjoy watching these classic superhero shows. None of the current superhero shows are appropriate for anyone under 7 or 8 with the way they are cut and the way the characters talk. The kids enjoyed these, but now we are on The All New Superfriends hour with the Wonder Twins and they like those better. We will eventually move on to Challenge of the Superfriends which were my favorite as a kid since the introduce the Legion of Doom. Now if only they would release Spiderman and His Amazing Friends in a US DVD version I would be able to show my kids how I was introduced to the Marvel Universe.

This is it!! If you started collecting from the first DVD release, then you know it wasn't a journey but a struggle. Warner Bros releases of this cartoon were tortue. They released the series in no particular order. Like 1977 was first, 1983 second then maybe 1980 then 1985 show and given stupid names like "Lost episodes". The only thing lost were our patients. Arrrghhh!! but here it is. I made a list for those who want them in original airing dates. Season 1 Super Friends (1973) Vol. 1 Super Friends (1973) Vol. 2 Season 2 Super Friends (1977) The All New Super Friends Hour Vol. 1 Super Friends (1977) The All New Super Friends Hour Vol. 2 Season 3 Super Friends (1978) Challenge of the Super Friends Vol 1 Super Friends (1978) Challenge of the Super Friends Vol 2 Season 4 Super Friends (1979) World's Greatest Super Friends Season 5 Super Friends (1980-81) A Dangerous Fate Season 6 Super Friends (1981-82) Legacy of Super Powers Season 7 Super Friends (1983) The Lost Episodes Season 8 Super Friends (1984) The Legendary Super Powers Show Season 9 Super Friends (1985) The Super Powers Team, Galactic Guardians

Goofy and silly, this DVD set brings back so many memories of Saturday morning cartoons. What a wonderful blast of nostalgia. A highlight is the episode "The Planet Splitter," where we get Superman's origin. And, I'm almost certain that this episode was the first time I'd learned of Krypton from the original air date back in 1973.

This is the very first volume for the Super Friends Saga. I enjoyed watching this. Expect lots of campiness. I could care less for Marvin, Wendy and Wonder Dog but still, it's a great show to watch. What I don't like about this volume is that it lacks any Comics villains. This Volume's Villains include some goofy oddball characters. Don't know why the popular enemies were never included till much later. Special Features is a plus.

This is it! Superman! Wonder Woman! Aquaman! Batman & Robin! The very first Super Friends incarnation, with Wendy, Marvin & Wonderdog is finally coming to DVD! Fans have been waiting years for this and now it's here! The show was comprised of 16 hour long episodes (about 45 minutes without commercials) and included some rare guest appearances such as Green Arrow & Plastic Man among others. Warner Brothers is releasing the 1973 Season in Two 8 episode Volumes, which are both 2 discs each. Episodes included with Volume 1: Disc 1: 01) The Power Pirate 02) The Baffles Puzzle 03) Professor Goodfellow's G.E.E.C. 04) The Weather Maker Disc 2: 05) Dr. Pelagian's War 06) The Shamon 'U' 07) Too Hot To Handle 08) The Androids There will be a Super Friends interactive Trivia Challenge Quiz game included as bonus material. Depending on how well it sells will have an affect on when Volume 2 is released. This is great news for Super Friends fans every where! :-)

for those of you completists out there, all that remains UNreleased now is released 1973-1974 Super Friends!: Season One, Vol. Two (8x 46 minutes) released 1979-1980 WORLD'S GREATEST SUPERFRIENDS (8x 22 minutes) TARGET STORE EXCLUSIVE 4/23/13 1980-1981 SUPERFRIENDS HOUR SHORTS (18x 7 minutes) 1981-1982 SUPERFRIENDS HOUR SHORTS (24x 7 minutes) i would expect to see the shorts in one release, since they are basically the same as 7x 45 minutes all together thats roughly 14 hours without commercials edit: apparently, i had bad info or made a mistake about the '79 season being 1 hour episodes, so corrected that finally. 'Mr.' has a better review listing everything, posted on the '73 vol 2 season set, just check his review for everything. its just the shorts arent on dvd now, but they are on amazon digital as seasons 4 & 5, represented as 6x 21minutes & 8x 21minutes. after that, id hope to see a release of the animated superboy episodes.

I like it from a nostalgia perspective and as a good non-violent superhero option for my 4 year old son. But I agree with those who point out a lot of the value is we remember sitting down on Saturday morning in the 70s and drinking this in like there was no tomorow. There wasn't much else you could turn to on telelvision back then if you were a superhero fan. George Reeves' Superman, Morgan Freeman's cameos as Spiderman on the Electric Company? That was about it. So this was great stuff, and still is if you look at it through that lens. In today's light, the stories are heavy on talk, light on action and get a touch repetitive. And the bad guys are boring as they are just regular people (not super villians). My 4 year old is kind of bored with the shows already, but it is still enjoyable for me to remember and was worth $10 to stroll down memory lane and take him with me. I am going to try Challenge of the SuperFriends and see if adding the more colorful villians helps the entertainment value a bit.

These are the 45 minute episodes with Wendy, Marvin and Wonderdog! These episodes are BEFORE the Wondertwins and the League of Doom. Not a whole lot of action...but a lot of good lessons about the environment, pollution, overpopulation...and Ted Knight is an awesome narrator. You only get 8 episodes on 2 dvds. My understanding is that if this dvd is successful, they'll release the second volume. One more thing, the manufacturers have completely misrepresented which series this is by not putting the Jr. Superfriends (Wendy etc) on the dvd cover. I have been searching for these episodes for years..if I hadn't read the reviews here at Amazon (and had just relied on the dvd cover), I would have never realized that these were the episodes I've been looking for!

Excellent

Excellent sound and picture quality bought these to complete my seasons

lets face it, the cartoons of this era are a lost art form. What you didn't know is that the cartoons from the 70's dealt with environmental issues constantly. They aren't even being subtle about it. To watch them again as an adult and see that they were talking about the state of our earth 40 years ago is really spooky. On the fun side it is great to hear Casey Kasem as robin again and to see the glaring errors on background paintings is a laugh too. Get them and re-live your child hood and pay attention to the messages.

There's very little I can say in this review, as I purchased the DVD collections because I wanted to have something superhero related that my 5 year old daughter could watch. I did watch a couple of the episodes, and although to me the 45 minute length is just too long for my patience, I'm glad to report that my daughter loves watching them. Since that was ultimately the goal, then I can only rate the purchase as a complete success.

It's nostalgic (re)watching cartoons which I remember as a child. Thanks Amazon for carrying this!