Super Friends Debuted 43 Years Ago Today

Super Friends, the Hanna-Barbera animated series that introduced a new generation to DC Comics’s superhero characters in the ’70s and ’80s, debuted on this day 43 years ago.

The series ran for almost exactly 13 years; in fact, the final new episode of Super Friends aired on September 6, 1986 — thirty years ago this week.

There were a total of 109 episodes and two “backdoor pilot” episodes of The New Scooby-Doo Movies, each of those featuring Batman and Robin. Over the course of its long history, it would occasionally change its superhero lineup, and even occasionally its own title, being titled things like Challenge of the Super Friends and Super Friends: The Legendary Super Powers Show for a time.

Creators who worked on the TV show included legendary animator Alex toth and comic book superstar E. Nelson Bridwell.

Super Friends featured Batman, Superman, Robin and Wonder Woman as a base, but also featured a number of Justice League members regularly, including The Atom, Firestorm, The Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman and Hawkgirl. They also brought in characters like Cyborg, who hadn’t at that point been a Justice League member yet in the comics, and created new characters like Apache Chief, Black Vulcan, El Dorado, Samurai, and the Wonder Twins.

The League most commonly battled different iterations of the Legion of Doom in the show, although dozens of villains, including those tied to Darkseid and the New Gods, were featured over the years.

There were a number of Super Friends comic books over the years. The first was just a 1975 reprint digest that collected existing Justice League of America material, but DC published a Super Friends ongoing series from November 1976 to August 1981. The comic book series was launched by E. Nelson Bridwell and artist Ric Estrada.

The series also spawned short-lived spinoffs for Superman, Batman, Plastic Man, and the New Teen Titans. Years later, the DC Super Friends brand would return in the form of a toy line, including a 2010 DVD movie included with some of the toys.

At this point, all 109 episodes of Super Friends are available on DVD or streaming platforms. Becuase of the staggered and sometimes seemingly-random nature of the releases, some episodes took until 2013 to become available.