Defensores da Terra

The 80's were the best time ever for cartoons and Defenders of the Earth was one of many fantastic shows.

For starters, the Defenders consisted of a team of brilliant heroes. There was Flash Gordon, comic book heroes The Phantom and Mandrake the Magician and Lothar. Each of them had a child who helped them battle the truly diabolical Ming the Merciless.

The shows were really good; the music was brilliant and the action was top-notch. Flash Gordon needs no introduction and neither do the other heroes. Each week they pooled their resources to foil Ming's plans.

If you like 80's cartoons then you will love this.

Defenders of the Earth gathered hero like Flash Gordon and the Phantom to fight Ming and his forces. However the Defenders had kids or something, Flash has a son named Rick. The Phantom has a daughter with the black panther or puma. Then there's a magician and some guy with rope and there are two more kids too. A lot of this show revolves around the kids, similar to the Mister T cartoon. It's your typical cartoon with kids. They fight, get into trouble, then find a lesson in it all.

Defenders of the Earth is an anomaly in superhero entertainment: it was produced during a time when superhero cinema was barely getting started (the Superman films were then still recent blockbuster smashes) and the concept of shared universes remained a strong-point in sci-fi novels rather than in regular movies or television. Defenders is oddly entertaining considering it's a superhero show that ISN'T from either MARVEL (which supplied the animation for this show) or DC Comics; these were superheroes from syndicated newspaper comic strips, not wholly comic-book oriented magazines. It's interesting that Defenders exists at all frankly; the 80s were a great time for Saturday-morning 'toons: Robotech, Transformers, GI Joe, Jem, He-Man, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, ThunderCats, Ghostbusters, Duck Tales, the list goes on from there. So how does a show starring Flash Gordon, The Phantom and Mandrake the Magician compare to all those classics? It's watchable; cheesy admittedly but genuinely watchable nonetheless.

I give this time-capsule of a show 4/5 stars.

This show had the interesting idea of bringing together the stars of the four greatest adventure strips that were distributed by King Features Syndicate and team them with their children to fight Ming and his son. Too bad it only lasted a short time because I really enjoyed the cross generational concept. This show probably would have succeeded if it had come on perhaps during the late sixties at a time when the strips featuring the principals were still popular and at a time when super hero shows were at their peak.

80's really were a creative era and Defenders are a good example of the cartoons of that decade. The Defenders of the Earth were a team that united some characters such as The Phantom, Flash Gordon and Mandrake all of them are classics of the comic-strips. The whole idea of getting them together was great but this cartoon also had good and interesting stories that also had the unavoidable moral-message to young kids. And also all of them were the source of inspirations for the superheroes that came with the birth of Superman.

The premise is simple and it was already successful with shows such as GI.Joe and others, a group a brave men gather their forces to fight the threat of the Day. In this case the group of brave men is formed for fabulous creations of geniuses such as Alex Raymond and Lee Falk. But they also have to take care of their young children (they wee added to had characters more down to earth and young), teaching them and trying to keep them away from trouble. Anyway Mandrake and the rest were the star and the favorites. Lothar is an interesting case he was portrayed as the obvious strong guy but he also was much more intelligent than previous incarnations. The need of change is rooted in be more politically correct because the modern times have had trouble with the previous status quo of Lothar. The nemesis in this case was Ming who is probably one of the best fictional villains.

Even comparing this classic to some of today's cartoon it has energy and a good pace that if it is given a chance could capture the attention of a new generation of children who want to see adventures and heroes.