Doctor Dolittle

For those who remembered the great animated director/producer Friz Freleng, this was the animated Saturday Morning series to the 1967 musical version with starred Rex Harrison as the man who can talk with the animals. However,this was the cartoon format with the good doctor alongside his impressive array of animal friends. However,the good doctor had to match wits with a villainous pirate as he sometimes had to rescue his animal friends from great danger. Someone asked me if I remembered this series from the golden age of great Saturday Morning TV, I told them,yes! I remembered that it came out right after H.R. Pufnstuf or either The Pink Panther Show(which Freleng produced)during NBC's galaxy of cartoon shows back in the 1970's. By the way....WE the children of 70's Saturday Morning shows knew this was the morning fever that ran us toward the set. The series is based on the Award-winning children's books by Hugh Lofton. The show ran from 1970-1972 on NBC-TV producing 23 episodes and the executive producers of this series were Friz Freleng and David DePatie under their production company,DFE Films through the association with Mirisch/United Artists Television.

This was one of those cartoons that do NOT play on both child and adult levels. Unlike the Hugh Lofting books or even the Rex Harrison movie, this was 100 percent played for laughs.

I liked it in seventh grade. And frankly, I would still rate it closer to the original than that hip Eddie Murphy version.

I didn't like the villain, though. The name Sam Scurvy implies a pirate, but he wears the fedora and pinstripes of a 1920s Chicago gangster.

A better ongoing villain, truer to the times, would have been a 19th century capitalist out after the secret, as if there were one, and we could contrast his materialism with the Good Doctor's more philosophical and compassionate side.

But I forgot. That would have required playing on the adult level, as well.