Network ABC Original Air Date 1973-1986

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The amazing Hanna-Barbera cheese-fest that made up most of the Super Friends run was nevertheless a wonderful thing back in the mid- to late-'70s. Here we had not just Batman (and Robin, of course), but also Superman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and, uh, Wendy, Marvin, and Wonderdog. So, yeah, like we said -- there was cheese. But this was not just one of the earliest filmed incarnations of the Justice League, serving to entice us with the possibility of what these characters could be like together on the screen, but as the series progressed through its many permutations over the next 13 years, more and more characters from the DC universe were introduced, not the least of which was the villainous Legion of Doom, making their first appearance here but featuring a baker's dozen of familiar comic-book baddies. Eventually the series took on various secondary titles, as in its last two seasons with the monikers The Legendary Super Powers Show and finally The Super Powers Team: Galactic Guardians, where the cosmic evil dude called Darkseid showed up and things actually got kind of, well, dark story-wise (even Batman's origin story was told here, which is certainly lightyears away from the content of the old Wendy and Marvin stories).

But perhaps the best part of the Super Friends cartoon was that it introduced the world to the Wonder Twins, which in turn has given us the never-ending joke about "form of a bucket of water" and "shape of a gopher"! Adult Swim had a lot of fun with the pair too with a series of shorts in 2002.