DVD Review: "The Herculoids: The Complete Original Series"

UPDATED: See note at end of post

• Series premiere: Sept. 9, 1967 on CBS


• DVD release: June 14, 2011
  
• Created by: Alex Toth


• Stories by: Ken Spears, Joe Ruby, David Scott


• Voices: Mike Road (Zandor, Zok, Igoo, Tundro); Virginia Gregg (Tara); Ted Eccles (Dorno); Don Messick (Gloop, Gleep)

Let me say up front: I have been waiting for this release ever since the DVD format became public. I was a huge fan of The Herculoids when I was a child, watching these strange but lovable creatures and their battles with the nefarious forces - some from off-planet, some native to the planet - who sought to destroy, enslave, or exploit the planet Amzot and its inhabitants.

And as I saw Warner Home Video release series after series of Hanna-Barbera cartoons like The Jetsons, The Flintstones, Wacky Races, The Perils of Penelope Pitstop, Josie and the Pussycats, Birdman and the Galaxy Trio and Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? (as well as the other two series that, together with The Herculoids makes up my own "holy trinity" of H-B action cartoons, Jonny Quest and Space Ghost and Dino Boy), my heart held hope that some day Zok, Tara, Tundro, Gloop and their friends would join their brethren on my DVD shelf. That day has come at last with the release of The Herculoids: The Complete Original Animated Series on the Warner Archive label.

Okay, let me get this out of the way: I'm disappointed that WB Home Video (WBHV) didn't see fit to give The Herculoids the same "deluxe" treatment that Jonny Quest and Space Ghost got, nicely remastered with a good (if not extensive) selection of bonus materials. (Even the one bonus feature The Herculoids gets is recycled from an earlier WBHV release; more about that later.) I'd have liked to see galleries of concept art, storyboards, model sheets, etc.; I even fantasized about a bonus CD of soundtrack music.

But given the economic realities of the times, and the declining sales of DVDs lately, I can't fault WBHV for not going all-out for this set. The Herculoids debuted in 1967: 44 years ago! Most of its original fans are *ahem* as old as me, and the series is not well-known even by knowledgeable fans of Hanna-Barbera. So WBHV (probably correctly) saw at best a niche market for a release of the original series; were it not for manufacture-on-demand (MOD) technology, we probably wouldn't be able to enjoy even this release. So, while I'm disappointed that the kind of "deluxe" release I'd hoped for will more than likely never see the light of day, I am grateful that at least we have the original cartoons in a collectible form.

As stated on the product page at the Warner Archives site, these episodes have not been "remastered or restored specifically" for DVD, so there's a little dust and other flaws in the transfer. But honestly, there are so many instances of dirt on the production cels themselves that it's hard to tell which is which; in any event, what there may be is not so noticeable as to be distracting unless you're a demanding videophile, so I'll rate picture quality as "good, not quite great", although this is the best these cartoons have looked in years! (These cartoons will actually look better on smaller screens.)

The sound is the original mono from the original broadcasts; back in the day stereo soundtracks weren't produced even for prime time shows. These episodes sound as good as they can be expected to sound given the age of the materials involved, so once again, I'm rating "good, not great".

As for the content: as I mentioned before, I was a huge Herculoids fan when I was a child, and even today I carry a great fondness for the concept and the characters. Looking at these cartoons as an adult (moreover, as an adult who was inspired by shows like this, Space Ghost, et al to become an illustrator/cartoonist who dabbles in action/adventure comics), I see an imaginative and spectacular concept that didn't reach its full potential due to tight production schedules, minuscule budgets, and the decision that each half-hour program would consist of two 10-to-11 minute episodes instead of one full-length episode. The short running times reduce many of the stories to "shorthand" versions of plots that become somewhat repetitive and formulaic, because almost no time could be devoted to character interactions or explorations of the potentially fascinating creatures and cultures featured in some episodes (such as "The Raider Apes", the Parrot Men from "The Beaked People", or the Reptons from "Ruler of the Reptons").

But having said that, there's still a lot of fun to be had from watching the Herculoids in action; whether it's Tundro shooting energy rocks from his forehead horn, Zok firing "laser" beams from his eyes, or Gloop and/or Gleep assuming their many and varied forms!

I have a couple of quibbles with the presentation, however: I'd have liked to see the shows presented in their original broadcast order [SEE UPDATE BELOW], and some reassurance that the episodes are complete and unedited, especially as regards the prologues to the second cartoon in the half-hour program. (In their original broadcasts, the first cartoon would start after the first commercial break following the opening credits. At the conclusion of the first cartoon, a brief prologue teased the next adventure. These prologues were often edited out of the episodes during their rebroadcasts on the Cartoon Network and Boomerang cable channels.) "Time Creatures" on Disc 1, in particular, seems to start very abruptly as Dorno confronts invaders from Amzot's future, and I wonder if this episode is missing a prologue. It's hard to tell without knowing whether it's the first or the second episode in the show. (Although according to both the Wikipedia article and the Big Cartoon Database entry, "Time Creatures" is the first episode of the show, so maybe the abrupt start is a bit of experimentation on the part of the writers and animators.)

There's no mention of it on the case, but there is one bonus feature, recycled from an earlier WBHV release, "Saturday Morning Cartoons: 1960s Volume 1": a short (4 1/2 minute) mini-doc entitled "The Herculoids" First family of Quasar". It's mostly talking heads, animation historians like Jerry Beck and animation professionals like Paul Dini and Mark Evanier talking about the appeal of the Herculoids to young (mostly male) viewers (one interviewee refers to the concept as "dinosaurs in space" which really isn't far off the mark), the contributions of designer Alex Toth on Saturday morning animation, and the influences on and of The Herculoids. The highlights of the feature are the (all-too-brief) glimpses we get of concept art, model sheets, and storyboards. (My own wishlist for bonus features would have been to have a gallery of this production art on the DVD.)

(Odd that the feature is entitled "First Family of Quasar", though, since the name "Quasar" wasn't used for the Herculoids' home planet until the 1980s "Space Stars" revival of the characters; the few times their planet wasn't referred to as "Zandor's planet" or other such nickname, it was known as "Amzot", which I think is a much cooler name anyway.)

Bottom line: this is a "must-have" for fans of the show; it might be an acquired taste for those unfamiliar with the show from its original run or its Cartoon Network/Boomerang repeats. And I salute Warner Archive for finally making The Herculoids available on DVD!

UPDATE, June 30 2011: According to a tweet I received from @WarnerArchive, the episodes are presented in original production order, e.g. the order in which they were made.

Tara and the Old-Time Radio Connection

Internet institution James Lileks recently wrote about "the moment when you discover that the voices of your favorite childhood Disney movies had long careers that preceded their appearances in the cartoons. The fun in life? Filling in the details, making connections."

Well, I'm still finding the fun in life, because I'm still making these connections.

Anyone who's watched as many cartoons as I have over lo these many decades - and paid attention to the talented men and women who made them possible - will see a certain number of the same names pop up again and again as the voice artists. Mel Blanc is most famous for the classic Warner Bros. cartoons, but he pops up again and again in the credits for other animation studios as well; he's the original voice of Woody Woodpecker and Barney Rubble, just to name two out of hundreds. June Foray, the voice of Rocky the flying squirrel from Bullwinkle And Friends, Witch Hazel (Warner Bros.) and Cindy-Lou Who (How the Grinch Stole Christmas) could be considered the "female Mel Blanc", so numerous are her credits. Paul Frees, Daws Butler, Janet Waldo, the list of names you see over and over in the voice cast credits is almost endless.

So when an unfamiliar name shows up as the voice of a major character, you can't help (at least I can't) but want to find out more about the actor. So it was with the woman who supplied the voice of my favorite (human) Herculoids character, Tara.

I was already familiar with the credited voice actors Mike Road and Don Messick from their roles as Race Bannon and Dr. Benton Quest, respectively, from Jonny Quest (my fave cartoon series until Space Ghost and The Herculoids came along). Although I was surprised that the rich baritone voice of Zandor (Mike Road) was also creating the growls and screeches for Igoo, Tundro and Zok! Ted ("Teddy") Eccles, the voice of Dorno, was a pretty generic "pre-teenager" voice, and apparently hasn't had much of a career in show business since the series. But the voice of Tara - Virginia Gregg? Never heard of her.

So I looked her up… and whaddaya know? Gregg had a long career in TV and radio; her name is all over the casts for many of the classic "old time radio" (OTR) shows like Dragnet, Yours Truly Johnny Dollar and The Adventures of Phillip Marlowe.

She was born in 1916, so she'd have been 50 years old in 1967 when she voiced Tara in the original series… and 64 (!) when she reprised the role for the 1981 Space Stars revival! She certainly sounded younger than that! (Especially considering that she was one of two uncredited actresses who did the voice for Norman Bates' mother in Psycho, and reprised the role for the two sequels.) Tragically, Gregg would die some 5 years after Space Stars, at age 70 in 1986.

Virginia Gregg isn't the only reason for my recent interest in OTR; but she's certainly one of several, as it was my curiosity about the roles outside of cartoons that some of my favorite voice actors like Paul Frees took on that led me to start listening and appreciating "Golden Age" radio dramas. (And imagine my surprise to find out that Gerald Mohr, the voice of Reed Richards in Hanna-Barbera's Fantastic Four, was Philip Marlowe in the aforementioned radio series! So he and Gregg would have worked together quite a lot.)

Episode Review EXTRA: Space Ghost, "The Molten Monsters of Moltar" - Sept. 16, 1967

(Warning! Spoilers, Will Robinson!)



Synopsis:

(NOTE: "The Molten Monsters of Moltar" is Episode 4 of the six-episode "Council of Doom" story. This episode resolves the previous installment's cliffhanger, and ends with a new cliffhanger to lead into the next episode.)

The Council of Doom - Brak, Creature King, Zorak, Spider Woman, and Metallus (unseen for now) - eagerly watch on a crystal viewscreen as their sixth member, Moltar, traps Space Ghost, Jan, Jace and Blip in a funnel-shaped oven.



"I've prepared a 'warm welcome' for you, Space Ghost," gloats Moltar as he pulls a lever on his control panel that sends a stream of molten metal - or perhaps lava - down a chute that empties into the top of the funnel.





As the molten metal fills the funnel, it glows red-hot, swells, then bursts open…



…to reveal Space Ghost et al safe; the molten stream runs over an invisible force-field projected by Space Ghost's power bands. Space Ghosts blasts a hole through the side of the cavern, through which he, the twins and the monkey escape.





But Moltar sends his "molten fire rockets" after our heroes. "Now, seek and destroy!" he orders, as the three rockets launch one after the other.

A "scatter ray" breaks their formation, after which Space Ghost's "destructo-ray" destroys them. "I'm going in after him!" Space Ghost announces. "Turn on your inviso-power and stay clear!"



Moltar launches six bird-like "senso-thermal robots", but orders them to "Get the ones who travel with Space Ghost!"



Jace is at first confident that their invisibility will protect them - until the robots begin firing on them! Jace, Jan and Blip attempt to evade the robots, but are cornered on a rocky spire.



Space Ghosts blasts his way into Moltar's control room, only to be confronted by the sight, on Moltar's viewscreen, of his crew surrounded by the birdlike robots. Moltar demands Space Ghost's surrender, "or they will be blown into heat vapors!"



Moltar's ultimatum: "take a long trip" accompanied by Moltar's two giant, humanoid "molten monsters". "Take Space Ghost to the planet Amzot," Moltar orders the monsters. "And remember, Space Ghost, if my ship is not back within the hour, your friends are finished." Reluctantly, Space Ghost agrees.







Landing on Amzot, Space Ghost and his two "escorts" are confronted by The Herculoids.



Zandor demands to know "Why have you come here? And why are you holding that man prisoner?"





One of the molten giants fires a ray-beam at the humans…



…Gloop forms a shield that deflects the beam. "Run!" Space Ghost warns. "Or these molten creatures will destroy you!"



But Zandor is determined to rescue Space Ghost, and orders Tundro to fire energy rocks. The explosive stones take out one of the giants; while a boulder thrown by Igoo stuns the other.



Zok finishes the job by destroying the giant with his eye- and tail-beams.



"Thank you, Zandor," says a grateful Space Ghost as he shakes Zandor's hand. "And thanks to your animals, the Herculoids. But I must hurry back!"



"Good luck, Space Ghost," replies Zandor as Space Ghost boards Moltar's rocket to save his own friends.



Watching the return of the rocket, unaware that Space Ghost is aboard, Moltar evilly laughs. "With Space Ghost taken care of, I can dispose of my hostages anyway!"





Space Ghost flies out of the rocket, shouting orders to Jan, Jace and Blip to "Quick, jet up!" They do so just before the rocket smashes into the robots, destroying them.



"Now, let's see if Moltar can stand a little of my heat!" Space Ghost fires a beam into the open peak of Moltar's mountain…



…the beam overheats one of Moltar's molten pits. Moltar runs for his life as the pits boil over.



The Council of Doom watch, frustrated and angry, as a column of fire erupts from Moltar's mountain lair, signaling the defeat of yet another member of the Council.



But Brak is confident that his "arsenal of rays" will "destroy him for good!"



Space Ghost and company make their way back to the Ghost Ship - "and it won't be too soon for Blip," laughs Jace. "He's tired!" - when they are confronted by a "space cyclone" controlled by Brak.



As the cyclone engulfs our heroes, the narrator implores us to "Watch next exciting episode" to find out if they escape!

Comments: I'm featuring this episode of Space Ghost at this point in the review queue because this marked the fifth appearance of the Herculoids, after two shows (four episodes) of their own.

This episode is notable for being the first reference to "Amzot" as the name of the Herculoids' planet. Other than that, not really a whole lot to say about this, the Herculoids' first (and, until the 1981 Hanna-Barbera Space Stars series, only) guest appearance in another series. Their role occupies a whole minute and five seconds of a six-minute thirteen-second cartoon; not a whole lot of time to introduce new characters, showcase their abilities, and show them interacting with the series' star (since they also have to resolve the previous episode's cliffhanger, tell the story of this episode, and set up the next episode). So to save time, they have to have Moltar's rocket land literally next to where the Herculoids happen to be standing, all gathered in a group, within shouting distance.

So we get really brief samples of the Herculoids' powers: Gloop stretches out and forms a power-beam-proof shield over the humans, Tundro fires a few energy rocks, Igoo pitches a boulder, and Zok zaps an enemy with his "laser" beams. (And since Gleep is a smaller version of Gloop, we can infer that he'd have the same abilities.)

And poor Tara doesn't even get to speak! Why couldn't she have been the one to deliver the line "Good luck, Space Ghost!" spoken by Zandor as SG departs? Would it have killed them to have had Virginia Gregg (the voice of Tara) speak that one extra line during her recording sessions for their own series? Hell, Dorno gets a line! "A strange ship is landing, Zandor!" (Yeah, I know I gripe a lot about how criminally underutilized Tara is during the original series.)

But I do have a few choice words about the rest of the episode, heh heh heh…

Don't get me wrong: as a kid, I loved Space Ghost; until The Herculoids came along, it and Jonny Quest were my favorite cartoons. As a matter of fact, I still like the series enough that I could not stomach what they did to him years later in Space Ghost Coast To Coast. I still consider that egotistical buffoon to be an imposter. Or, to paraphrase Sen. Lloyd Bentsen during his 1988 vice-presidential debate: "I knew Space Ghost. I was a fan of Space Ghost. You're no Space Ghost."

Having said that…

There's still a lot about this episode that just doesn't work. Most of what's wrong (but not by any means all) stems from the restrictive time format (if nine to ten minutes isn't long enough to tell many of the Herculoids' stories effectively, think how much worse six minutes is!), and the decision to feature the stars of another series as guest stars.

In fact, the entire "Council of Doom" story arc suffers from what must have been an executive decision (perhaps even promulgated by the network, CBS) to use these Space Ghost episodes as introductions to the stars of the new Saturday morning shows debuting that year (1967). So you get Space Ghost meeting The Mighty Mightor in the second part, "Clutches of Creature King" and the genie Shazzan in episode 6, "The Final Encounter" (as well as the Herculoids here in episode 4), and Jan, Jace and Blip encounter - I'm not kidding - Moby Dick in the third installment, "The Deady Trap".

So instead of what could have been a gripping mega-saga of Space Ghost's arch-enemies pooling their talents to destroy him, we get a "tag-team" series of encounters in which each villain takes on Space Ghost one at a time! What's worse is that these people seem to have forgotten everything they knew about Space Ghost's abilities, and the variety of rays and force fields at his command via his power bands. Witness the fact that Moltar is surprised that Space Ghost and his companions survived his molten oven*; didn't it occur to him that SG would use some kind of force field to protect them from the boiling lava?

The "Oh, Come ON!" Moment comes near the end of the episode: Space Ghost returns from Amzot to find his wards Jace and Jan trapped against a spire of rock by Moltar's six senso-thermal robots. The twins (and Blip) are surrounded on every side - horizontally, at least - and sense somehow that the robots are seconds away from firing on them at point-blank range. So how does Space Ghost rescue them? He shouts to them, "Quick, jet up!" And they do. Because there was nothing preventing them from doing so. There were no robots above them. Which means that they could've "jetted up" anytime they wanted. But, durrhh, they have to wait for Space Ghost to tell them when to escape. (It's actually hard to tell who's having the bigger "idiot moment" here: Moltar, for not having one of the robots cut off their possible vertical escape route, or Jan and Jace for not taking advantage of it sooner.)

I try not to pick on anything in these cartoons that I feel is merely the product of low budgets and tight schedules (so criticism of the animation, for the most part, is off-limits). But this was just poor storytelling! Maybe having Space Ghost destroy the robots with a destructo-ray, or projecting a force-shield around Jan and Jace, was just too "been there, done that".

I notice, also, throughout the "Council of Doom" arc that their spaceship is referred to as the "Ghost Ship". Did the writers forget that its name is "The Phantom Cruiser"? And I can't help but wonder if Gary Owens, the voice of Space Ghost, remembered that and brought it up during the recording sessions, only to be told "don't worry about it, just recite what's written."

Looking back, maybe it's a good idea that the second "season" of Space Ghost consisted only of the six Council of Doom" episodes. The writers, I think, were running out of ideas for challenging opponents and situations for SG; better to just rerun the first season episodes for one more year.
---------
*Geez, everything's "molten" with this Moltar guy - molten pits, molten ovens, molten fire-rockets...

Episode Review: #3, "The Pod Creatures" - Sept. 16, 1967

(Spoilers, spoilers, getcher red hot spoilers rat cheer!)



Prologue: A saucer-shaped space craft enters the atmosphere of Amzot.

"We have reached the jungle planet," intones a mechanically-filtered voice. "Prepare to drop pods. And remember: no life is to survive." Circular ports ringing the bottom edge of the saucer open, and pods like tailless lawn darts drop to the planet's surface.



Cue the title card...





The strange sounds caused by the deployment of the pods do not go unnoticed by Tara and Zandor, though they are puzzled by the cause. Zandor summons Zok from a nearby cave, and they fly off to investigate. "If you find Dorno and Igoo, tell them to stay close to home," asks Tara.

An airborne search proves fruitless for the moment, and Zandor decides to start a ground search, sending Zok to find Dorno and Igoo.



Dorno is apparently having "Iggy" do his chores for him: as the boy relaxes against Gleep, Igoo uproots trees with segmented trunks, and karate-chops them into shorter logs for firewood.



"That's enough firewood, Iggy. Gleep and I are tired just from watching!" But the bucolic moment is cut short by the strange noises again; "Let's go see what it is."



The saucer continues to drop pods, row upon row; conceivably hundreds, if not thousands, have now landed.



Finally the saucer's ports close, as Gleep, Igoo and Dorno (carried in one of Igoo's giant hands) approach. They come upon a patch of pods, which Dorno describes as looking "like some kind of weird vegetable."



A pod opens behind Igoo, revealing a strange creature shaped like a large bullet. "It's alive!" exclaims Dorno.



Pods are suddenly splitting open all around them, the creatures inside extending thin black tentacles toward Dorno and Igoo. "They're after us... head for the caves!"



A tentacle grabs Gleep, but at Dorno's urging the protoploid separates in two, slipping out of the tendril's grasp. The creature's tentacles continue to pursue Gleep, as another creature's tentacles wrap themselves around Igoo. The stone ape breaks their grip, and fights them off with karate-like chops of his hands.



Gleep joins Dorno in the shelter of the cave, as the boy urges Igoo to get to safety as well. But Igoo is surrounded on two sides by pod things, which hover on rocket-like engines. Grabbing the tentacles of one group of pods, Igoo flings them against a cliff face, repeating the stunt with the other group.





A creature flies straight for Igoo, punching him squarely in the midriff... and putting himself right into the ape's mighty grasp. Igoo slams the thing into the ground. Three more creatures launch themselves at Igoo, who catches them, shoves them into the ground, and proceeds to pound them even deeper into dirt like the pegs in a child's workbench toy.



Commercial...



Tara hears Igoo's battle roars, and asks Tundro to call for Zandor; Tundro does so by projecting his growl through his hollow forehead horn. Zandor hears Tundro's summons, and bounces off tightly stretched vines. Zok hears Tundro as well, and joins Zandor, Tundro, Gloop and Tara in a nearby clearing.

Zandor orders Zok and Tundro to follow him to aid Igoo and Dorno, and Gloop to stay behind and guard Tara (which he does by surrounding her with multiples of himself).



Igoo is beset by more pod creatures, whose tentacles are apparently becoming harder to repel. Dorno is grabbed by a creature until Igoo chops its tendrils away and smashes it. Still more pods attack Igoo.





Gleep ties himself into a knot around a pursuing tentacle, causing the hydraulic pressure on either side of the knot to split the tendril apart.



But the creatures press their attack, and their numbers seem endless..



Zandor, Zok and Tundro finally arrive on the scene, to find Dorno and Igoo helplessly bound in tentacles, being dragged toward a group of pod things. Energy rocks fired from Zandor's slingshot and Tundro's horn prove to be very effective weapons against the creatures.



Zok struggles to break free of tentacles; Zandor throws his shield and severs Zok's bonds. Zok destroys several creatures with his eye and tail beams, as Zandor wrecks a few more with another expert throw of his shield, and Tundro makes like a shooting gallery...



Finally, all the pod creatures are destroyed. "But I have an idea that there are a lot more where they came from," Zandor muses. As the saucer rises into the air and fleees the planet, he adds, "I suspect that that spaceship could give us all the answers."



"And our answer to them was our animal army," Dorno replies, as they all return home.

Comments: Remember what I've written, about how some episodes would benefit from being expanded to a half-hour story? "The Pod Creatures" is not one of them.

This episode is about as basic as you can get: a mysterious alien race infiltrates the planet, and the Herculoids drive them off. So bare-bones, in fact, that it wouldn't be surprising to find out that the staff actually had trouble filling nine minutes; there certainly seems to be a lot of reused and repeated footage, especially of Igoo fighting off the tentacles.

This episode is actually pretty typical of one type of Herculoids story: the mysterious extraterrestrial invasion force. An unnamed alien culture comes to Amzot and drops warriors, machines or creatures onto the surface to conquer, colonize, and/or "cleanse" the planet of its existing life (as in this case). And it's up to Zandor and co. to save the planet from the threat of annihilation or conquest.

I believe that's Paul Frees doing the voice of the saucer.



The "Oh, Come ON!" Moment: This episode didn't really have a notable OCO, at least not one which took me out of the story or made me wonder about the intelligence and/or competence of the character(s) involved. There are a few scenes that get me scratching my head, though:

• Isn't it convenient that the tree Igoo is chopping up grows a segmented trunk that separates easily into equal-sized logs? I'm not saying that couldn't happen…


• Why doesn't Zok use his power beams on the pod things holding him captive? Why does Zandor have to free him first, using a shield that is apparently razor edged?


• I guess the closest to an OCO we have in this episode is that Zandor's shield returns unerringly to him, no matter how many objects it's struck in its trajectory. But I have that same gripe about Captain America's shield, so it's not like Zandor is unique in that regard. (It's certain that Cap was the inspiration for this "boomerang shield" thing in the first place.)


• And: why is Zandor so nonchalant about the departing spacecraft that tried to wipe out all life on Amzot (once again unnamed, referred to only as "the jungle planet")? I think I would've jumped on Zok's back and pursued that thing, to at least find out what section of space it probably came from. (And they could've pursued it quite a distance, even into interplanetary space, as we'll see in the next episode.)

This is the first episode that shows what would become a recurring image in future cartoons: Zandor bouncing between tightly-stretched vines. The purpose, I'm guessing, is to build up speed to be "launched" at… what, exactly? After Zandor flies away from the final vine, we're never shown where he lands! Is this to get him on Zok's back? There have to be easier ways, like maybe Zok kneeling down so his rider can climb onto his shoulder? This has always been the most mystifying aspect of the series, because there's simply no need for this elaborate procedure.



This is also the first occurrence we see of what becomes (for me, anyway) a rather annoying habit of Zandor's: his insistence that Tara stay behind, and that Gloop (or sometimes Gleep) guard her while the rest of the crew go off to face the latest danger to their existence. I understand the impulse; hey, I'd want my wife to stay safe if I think I'm about to face danger, but -- Zandor's taking his son (who looks to be anywhere from ten to thirteen years old) with him! Besides, we've already seen what a great shot Tara is with the family weapon (the slingshot), and that she's capable of great courage, so it seems to me that she'd be an asset on any mission they'd undertake. But the pop culture of the time still wasn't quite comfortable with the idea of a truly heroic female (with the exception of Wonder Woman, perhaps), so stay behind like a good little wifey she does. (If there's one thing that I think the Space Stars revival did better than the original series, it was to give Tara a bigger role in their adventures.)



It's fortunate that the pod creatures are, individually, easy to destroy. It's the sheer number of them that make them a formidable foe. I also wonder, too, why is a fleet of creatures whose purpose is the destruction of all life on a planet not equipped with a broader array of weapons? Tentacles? that's a "capture and hold" weapon, not a "destroy everything that lives" weapon.



So one wonders how the Herculoids would fare against an invasion force whose numbers are as great as the pod creatures', but one in which each individual unit is practically invincible? …yes, if you remember the show, or have watched it recently, you know which episode I'm referring to. And it'll be coming up for review in just a few weeks.

Finally: another shot of Tara, just because I like her…



…and the dirty old man in me wishes that Tara hadn't been left behind, and had fallen victim to the pod things herself…