The Skatebirds

I remember seeing this show when I was a kid, and as far as I can remember, this show was exactly like The Banana Splits, only a 70's version of it. This show did have animated shorts such as The Three Robonic Stooges (which later became a solo cartoon show), Wonder Wheels, and Mystery Island (exactly like Danger Island on The Banana Splits), just to name a few. One of the voices that I remember was Scatman Crothers (who was the voice of Hong Kong Phooey, and one the Harlem Globetrotters), who was the voice of "Scat Cat." This show aired on CBS (in Philadelphia, on channel 10) on Saturday mornings, prior to more hard hitting shows like Shazam, the Batman/ Tarzan Adventure Hour and Fat Albert and Cosby Kids, which Filmation made great. This show was something to watch (not necessarily to enjoy) before the "better" shows came on CBS at that time.

I first saw this show on a Boomerang preview on Cartoon Network a week or so ago, and I thought it was the most goofiest thing I ever saw. The show features a bunch of birds running around on roller skates, doing goofy stuff while avoiding a cat who is also on roller skates. Like the "Banana Splits" almost a decade earlier, "The Skatebirds" also had animated shorts. One of course being "The 3 robotic stooges" (the 3 stooges as crime fighting robots. What's up with that?). Truly bizarre show, but the "Banana Splits" is the far better (and more frekier) show.

This had to be one of the lamest Saturday morning shows of all time. As another person said it was very reminiscent of Hanna Barbera's classic Saturday morning show of the late 1960's, "The Banana Splits". The comedy blackouts featuring three rollerskating birds (hence the title) being chased by a rollerskating cat that made Sylvester look like Albert Einstein. Also, the shorts that were on this show lacked anything close to memorable, except for "The Robotic Stooges", which wound up being spun off on its own. The other shorts, "Wonder Wheels" (an obvious rip off of the Krofft brothers' "Wonder Bug" shorts) and "Mystery Island" made me change the channel whenever they came on. The "Mystery Island" shorts were especially horrific, due to the fact that it was pretty much a rehash of the H.B.'s live action classic, "Danger Island". At least that show had some action and some memorable characters. Also, you know that this is a bad show when they have to use one of their earlier creations, "The Clue Club" in a heavilly edited version and re-name it "Whoofer and Whimper" after the two dogs. However, the main thing this show lacked was the inventivness of a couple of former H.B. productions employees, Sid and Marty Krofft. They were busy producing a show which this show was obviously inspired by, "The Krofft Supershow".

A Saturday morning kid's show that included ten minute episodes of a serial called Mystery Island.

This review will only centre on Mystery Island because I don't care about the rest of Skatebirds.

Mystery Island (not to be confused with Danger Island) is about three people (adult male, girl, boy) and a robot who are on a plane that is brought down on an island...run by a guy who wants to rule the world.

16 ten minute episodes of Mystery Island were made and they all feature the original Lost In Space robot, painted white, given a different voice, changed in other ways, but you can never shake the feeling that you are watching the original LIS robot!!!??? Weird.

Do you remember The Fossil Man from Irwin Allen's Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea? His look-a-like is on the island as well.

Various Irwin Allen/Batcave computer banks fill the bad guy's home.

In one episode the gang are all frozen in time.

Does this sound like some long lost Irwin Allen production? Yes and no. Allen did not make it. It is not as good as Allen's 1960s science fiction shows, not as good as Allen's 1978 Captain Nemo, but it sort of gets you hooked even when watched today on YouTube.

Give it a go.

I know of few people that even heard of this show. On the other hand, some people might have seen it and not realized it. How? This show was exactly like The Banana Splits, a show that Hanna-Barbera (the same company) created not even ten years prior! The only difference is that Skatebirds didn't have any animated shorts. Talk about no originality.