THURSDAY THEME SONG: AQUAMAN

This week's Thursday Theme Song, and going along with the Underwater Adventures theme, is the very first aquatic superhero:

Aqualad and Aquaman

Aquaman

Filmation, most know for their 80s nostalgia hit He-Man, got into the animation business quite early. 1963 saw the debut of their first show, Rod Rocket, and 1966 saw the debut of their second show, The New Adventures of Superman.

In 1967, Filmation repackaged Superman into a new hour-long series called The Superman/Aquaman Hour of Adventure which featured reruns of the six-minute Superman episodes and new six-minute Aquaman cartoons.

Also included in the show were rotating 'guest star' episodes feature many DC Comics stars, including the Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman, the Atom, Superboy, the Justice League of America and Teen Titans. Most of these heroes were seen for the first time in this series and would go on to their own series in later years.

"Superman! I'm open!"

The animation in this show is very limited as was the practice by Filmation. Budgets were very small so animation was reused as much as possible and characters only moved if they really needed to. This became Filmation's signature in animation and lasted all throughout the studio's life.

In 1968, Aquaman got his own series which was a 30-minute version of the Superman/Aquaman Hour of Adventure, only without Superman.

Aquaman's voice was provided by Marvin Miller, who is best know for his work as Robby the Robot in Forbidden Planet. Aqualad was voiced by Hanna-Barbera regular Jerry Dexter.

The voice you will hear in this theme song is none other than Ted Knight who was the narrator in many cartoons of this era including Super Friends. His most well know work is Ted Baxter from the Mary Tyler Moore Show.