The Warner Archive has continued its commitment to releasing rare movies and TV in their Manufacture-On-Demand program by releasing what might be two of the worst hours in television history – the DC Comics-inspired Legends of the Super Heroes.
These two specials – “Legends of The Super Heroes” and “Legends of the Super Heroes: The Roast” originally aired in 1978. I’d actually seen a very bad videotape bootleg of the shows years ago, so to see them in full clarity, despite their badness, is a marvel. These 30+ year old prints look fantastic.
Although I label Legends of the Super Heroes as two of the worst hours in TV history, I should also point out that it is very much “the good kind of bad.” I own The Brady Bunch Variety Hour on DVD; I know what I’m talking about on this subject. Only here would we see a Flash who bounces around like a Raston warrior from Doctor Who, or Hawkman being roasted by his mother. Only here would we see the “secret” romance between The Atom and Giganta. Only these specials give us the geriatric “Retired Man” and the almost-racist “Ghetto Man” and think they’re actually funny. Don’t get me started on how ridiculous characters like Hawkman look.
One amazing thing about these specials is that they marked the first TV appearances of many DC Comics favorites. Black Canary and Huntress are present, as are the Flash, Hawkman, and Green Lantern. On the villains side, we have Green Lantern foe Sinestro, the Weather Wizard, Mordru, Giganta, and Solomon Grundy… and, oh yeah, Adam West, Burt Ward, and Frank Gorshin reprise their roles as Batman, Robin, and The Riddler. It’s all ridiculous. And by ridiculous I mean somewhat awesome. Captain Marvel is there too, but he’s not played by either of the actors from the Shazam! series. Wonder Woman and Superman were too busy to appear in the special, as WW was being played by Lynda Carter in her own TV series and Christopher Reeve was portraying the Man of Steel in the Superman film.
These specials were done with the intention of humor, and I can’t imagine that even in the era of Donny and Marie that these would have ever been funny. There’s a laugh track, but I think the only time I genuinely laughed myself is just over how ridiculous it is. You really have to see this DVD to know what I’m talking about.
Despite the age of the product this set gives us deleted scenes and outtakes! Kudos to whoever it was who found them in the WB vault.
I love that the Warner Archive put this TV rarity on DVD. I may have said some mean things about it, but I highly recommend that you give it a look sometime to see just how bad it can get. There’s Halle Berry’s Catwoman, which was not even a fun kind of bad, and then there’s … this. I have a feeling I’ll be breaking out this DVD often just to show people what passed for television 32 years ago.
Legends of the Super Heroes is now available exclusively at WarnerArchive.com.
Seriously. Just look at them… how can you pass on this?
2 Comments
Hey at least they had Solomon Grundy…I’ve wanted to see him in Live action form for a while but I’ll take what I can get.
I still think Smallville should get Lou Ferrigno as Solomon Grundy.