Thundarr the Barbarian

release year: 1980-81
genre: 1980s Saturday-morning cartoon fantasy/sci-fi
viewing setting: home DVD, 7/16-20/14

synopsis: The year 1994: From out of space comes a runaway planet, hurtling between the Earth and the Moon, unleashing cosmic destruction. Man's civilization is cast in ruin. Two thousand years later, Earth is reborn...a strange new world rises from the old: a world of savagery, super science, and sorcery. But one man bursts his bonds to fight for justice! With his companions Ookla the Mok and Princess Ariel, he pits his strength, his courage, and his fabulous Sunsword against the forces of evil. He is Thundarr, the Barbarian!

impressions: This was a staple of my childhood’s Saturday mornings, and even now, more than three decades later, I can see why: it offered a possible future world where the ruins are actually the Earth of today. It's always cool to see people running through ruins when you can recognize the skyscrapers and other landmarks, and it sure didn’t hurt that there were wizards, barbarians, monsters, and so on. The plot was often silly, of course, but was also still entertaining for kids of all ages. There were plot holes, of course, some of them bordering on the ridiculous (for example, if you didn’t know better, you’d swear that the good guys’ horses could fly.) Also, Thundarr had the tendency to attack first and ask questions later, and not utilize his lightsaber to its full potential in battle, but such was the lot of a cartoon barbarian in 1980. Anyway, here’s a chart with basic information about all of the episodes:

#	name	setting	evil wizard	evil race	old technology used	misc funny bit
1	Secret of the Black Pearl	New York	Gemini	rat-men	motorcycles and helicopter	leader of human tribe wears an old lampshade on his head
2	Harvest of Doom	Mexico	(unnamed)	lizard-men	train and motorboat	Thundarr uses a beaten snake as a rope
3	Mindok the Mind Menace	Cape Canaveral	Mindok	none/minions	big amphibious Sandcrawler-like vessel	Thundarr sends the wizard into orbit
4	Raiders of the Abyss	(unknown)	Morag	Jawas riding giant bats	wrecked ocean liner and Concorde	Thundarr slides down a big waterfall
5	Treasure of the Moks	Norfolk, Virginia (naval base)	Captain Kordon (pirate, not wizard)	”River Rats” (pirates)	old aircraft carrier	Ookla makes a pirate walk the plank
6	Attack of the Amazon Women	Mt. Rushmore	Strya (shark-woman witch)	amphibious amazons riding sharks	old missile	Ariel says that throwing the shark-woman into the water she came from puts her “far enough away that she won’t trouble us again“
7	The Brotherhood of Night	Washington DC	Infernus	werewolves	none	the leader of the werewolves is named Zevon
8	Challenge of the Wizards	Las Vegas	Sholo, Chom, Mazim, Scorpos	none	none	they leave the evil wizard trapped in a slot machine
9	Valley of the Man-Apes	California	Simius (ape, not wizard)	man-apes	giant mechanical King Kong	during a fight in an old bar,the piano starts playing during the fighting
10	Stalker From the Stars	(unknown)	none (alien vampire monster)	none	none	the village girl’s name is Mina
11	Portal Into Time	Alamo, Texas	Krom	none	old military trucks with lasers attached	Ookla trying to watch TV in the past
12	Battle of the Barbarians	Chinatown	Koblai	robot warriors	none	Ookla trying to use chopsticks
13	Den of the Sleeping Demon	Grand Canyon	Judag (wizard wannabe)	cat-men	genetic experiment	the Wonder Twins make an appearance, with different names but still annoying Ariel: “What adventures do you think they’ll find out there?” Thundarr: “None, I hope.”
14	Wizard Wars	St. Louis	Skullus, Octagon	mind-controlled humans	none	Skullus just looks stupid
15	City of Evil	Boston	Sarott	robot warriors	miniaturized city from the past	Ookla tries to dance
16	Island of the Body Snatchers	London	Circe	man-toads	old helicopter	Ookla switches the king and queen’s heads in the wax museum
17	Last Train to Doomsday	(unknown)	Janus/Gemini (also a mummy)	bird-men	old train	Ookla cracks up while reading an old comic book
18	Prophecy of Peril	(unnamed)	Vashtar	robot warriors	nothing	nothing
19	Fortress of Fear	Los Angeles	Argoth	monkey-men	none	the world’s dumbest wizard
20	Master of the Stolen Sun Sword	Hollywood	Yando (fake wizard)	two weird hench-things	none	Ookla plays with a dummy
21	Trial By Terror	Atlanta	Artemis	pig-men	old police cars	the general stupid stereotype of Southerners

acting: n/a, since it's animated, but the same handful of voice actors did great jobs creating a variety of distinctive voices

final word: entertaining classic sci-fi cartoon from times past

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