That's MY pet!!!!!

[Lord Liaden]

Kaboobie was a camel with wings, so I guess that might be considered "super." It was certainly a pet, unless your resistance to horses as pets extends to camels.   But I wasn't counting Shazan! because, as I'm sure you'll agree, he was the star and hero of that show, and the humans were his sidekicks (although they technically counted as his masters). Once Shazan was summoned, he never needed help from anyone to deal with whatever menace threatened them.

 

And the Galaxy Trio were my second favorites, as well. Genuine superheroes in space. And another group I would have liked origin stories for.

 

(Geez, we're a bunch of old farts for remembering all this stuff.) 👴

Edited December 1, 2023 by Lord Liaden

[Lord Liaden]

16 hours ago, Sketchpad said:

 

While not really a pet, I always preferred Hellcow for my bovine supers fun.

 

 

I had to look that up, I had no idea that was a real thing. I still have trouble believing it's a real thing. 🥴

[Rich McGee]

Honestly, is Hellcow really any more peculiar than most of the stuff Steve Gerber was involved in creating?  Remember the Elf With A Gun?

 

Hmmm, I wonder what happens if you mix Hellcow vampire milk with the milk from those original Skrulls Reed hypnotized into turning into dairy cows and then left unmonitored in upstate NY for years (which worked out as badly as you'd expect - the eventual follow-up story made Carpenter's Thing seem tame)?  Maybe find some radioactive cereal to go with it and we're getting into Villains & Vigilantes random power generation territory.

 

27 minutes ago, Lord Liaden said:

Once Shazan was summoned, he never needed help from anyone to deal with whatever menace threatened them.

I found that one of his most appealing characteristics.  He just never stops laughing as his opponents flail around helplessly trying to deal with him before he does something awful to them.  It's like watching a more jovial Golden Age Specter at work.

28 minutes ago, Lord Liaden said:

And the Galaxy Trio were my second favorites, as well. Genuine superheroes in space. And another group I would have liked origin stories for.

They reminded me of a slimmed-down Legion of Super-Heroes, which is solidly in the Good Thing category for me.  Enjoyed them a lot more than the later and very similar Teen Force, which fell flat for me.

 

On topic, does Jabberjaw qualify as a super-pet?  An amphibious uplifted intelligent drum-playing shark feels kind of super, and the show's villains were occasionally pretty supervillainous, at least up to Bind villain mastermind standards.  Certainly more super than Sebastian the cat over in Josie - although if they'd stuck with comic canon he'd have been a former warlock who granted Alexandra spellcasting powers when in physical contact.

 

Definitely an old fart. 

[Lord Liaden]

Jabberjaw's shape-changing ability probably counts as "super," but his band, the Neptunes, definitely weren't. The OP specified pets for superheroes.

 

I try not to think of the cartoon "superheroes" who were played almost completely for laughs. I love the genre, and seeing it relentlessly mocked rubs me the wrong way. (And please don't get me started on Deadpool.)

[steriaca]

6 hours ago, assault said:

 

Scooby Doo?

Well, he counts also.

 

But not Scooby Dum. Nor Scrapy Doo.

 

Defently not Scrapy Doo.

Edited November 29, 2023 by steriaca

[Mark Rand]

I remember most of those cartoons, too.  But then, being 73, I'm an old fart, too.

[DShomshak]

One of the last story arcs in Kurt Busiek's Astro City was the saga of G-Dog, a hero who was a man mystically merged with his pet corgi. In one of those one-panel toss-offs Busiek does so well, at one point G-Dog led a team of super-powered animals... one of which, a cat with Desolidification IIRC, had appeared in an earlier story as the pet of two superheroines -- who didn't know their kitty had powers and was assisting them.

 

Dean Shomshak

[Gauntlet]

What was the pets name the wonder twins had on the Superfriends cartoon?

[Mark Rand]

11 minutes ago, Gauntlet said:

What was the pets name the wonder twins had on the Superfriends cartoon?

Gleek.  He was a blue space monkey with a prehensile tail. 

[Gauntlet]

No, it was a dog in the Superfriends. The Blue Space Monkey was a different cartoon.

[Mark Rand]

You're think of Wonder Dog, who was with Wendy and Marvin in the first Super Friends series.  Gleek was with The Wonder Twins in the second series.

[Gauntlet]

Wendy and Marvin is who I was thinking of, I just gave them the wrong name.

[Sketchpad]

 

There's also Mighty Man and Yukk.

[Scott Ruggels]

 I have a lot of Herculoid Episodes on bootleg DVDs I picked up in the depths of the Dealers room at San Diego Comic-con. Always preferred the Adventure to the humor, because the humor never could get me to laugh.  
 

SO does the little donkey Zazoom, from THe Arabian Knights count?  THe Arabian Knights were two fighters, two casters, a Rogue and a Donkey. 

 

And Yeah I am ancient as well. Watched most of these in first run.

[Lord Liaden]

4 hours ago, Sketchpad said:

 

There's also Mighty Man and Yukk.

 

I was really, really hoping everyone would forget to mention them. 💩

[Lord Liaden]

1 hour ago, Scott Ruggels said:

 I have a lot of Herculoid Episodes on bootleg DVDs I picked up in the depths of the Dealers room at San Diego Comic-con. Always preferred the Adventure to the humor, because the humor never could get me to laugh.  
 

SO does the little donkey Zazoom, from THe Arabian Knights count?  THe Arabian Knights were two fighters, two casters, a Rogue and a Donkey. 

 

And Yeah I am ancient as well. Watched most of these in first run.

 

I downloaded all the Herculoids episodes off of YouTube postings a few years ago. Certainly not the highest quality, but free has its appeal.

 

And Yes, the Arabian Knights! A little cheesy, and the setting was unusual for the genre, but the Knights were effectively superheroes. Zazoom was clearly a pet, just an exceptionally smart cute little donkey. Who was also the most powerful and destructive member of the group. But his berserk mode was a weapon of last resort, as it could be just as dangerous to the Knights as their enemies if they didn't get clear.

[Asperion]

 

Best member of the SuperFreinds team. 

[Lord Liaden]

A note about the Arabian Knights: It was unusual in the 1960s for obviously Middle Eastern characters to be portrayed by Western entertainment media as such positive protagonists, smart, brave, and heroic. Mind you, the cartoon was still full of cultural cliches, and the noble-born leader and his female cousin were really light-skinned compared to the other characters. Still, a definite step in the right direction.

[Rich McGee]

5 hours ago, Lord Liaden said:

Mind you, the cartoon was still full of cultural cliches, and the noble-born leader and his female cousin were really light-skinned compared to the other characters. Still, a definite step in the right direction.

True, although real world Middle Eastern skin tones do vary quite a lot and the two were, as you noted, fairly close relatives so reasonable for them to look similar - even if they are pretty darned light.

 

Still much better about representation than the Sinbad Jr. cartoon, which is decidedly whitewashed - but is also definitely a relic-powered superhero show, so his pet parrot Salty is germane to this this thread's topic.  Whether being a talking parrot (even one voiced by Mel Blanc) that can navigate a sailing ship counts as a superpower is up for debate, but I think I recall him using the magic strength belt once.    

[Scott Ruggels]

For those who are not old farts, this may explain what the hell we are talking about:  

 

[Rich McGee]

One of my favorite channels on youtube back when I used youtube.  Doc does nice work.

[Lord Liaden]

Space Ghost was the series that really kicked the Saturday morning cartoon supers trend into high gear. The success of that show prompted the other two of the Big Three TV networks to contract H-B and others to develop their own series.

 

Many younger viewers only know the character from his later satirical pseudo talk show, and haven't experienced the coolness of his original adventures.

[Rich McGee]

13 minutes ago, Lord Liaden said:

Space Ghost was the series that really kicked the Saturday morning cartoon supers trend into high gear. The success of that show prompted the other two of the Big Three TV networks to contract H-B and others to develop their own series.

 

Many younger viewers only know the character from his later satirical pseudo talk show, and haven't experienced the coolness of his original adventures.

A great deal of H-B's success with those shows (as well as many of the characters in them) can be credited to Alex Toth, who was hired by H-B after seeing his earlier work on Space Angel - where his art and plots almost managed to overcome the truly pathetic animation budget.  Given better resources to work with he produced wonders for H-B, including Space Ghost, Herculoids, Birdman, the Galaxy Trio and Dino Boy.  Safe to say that without him H-B would have been a very different company, and not for the better.

[Scott Ruggels]

Alex Toth may be the biggest detectable influence on my art style. Back in the day I would be lying on the carpet infront of the TV watching these with a small sketch bad, and a handful of pens and pencils. He was drawing right up to his end, and did designs for shows up until the 90's, though he slowed way down after the death of his wife, who started as the H-B Receptionist.

[Rich McGee]

The man was found dead at his drawing table.  "Right up to his end" has never been more literally true.  A dedicated artist and consummate professional.

 

As a big fan of the golden days of newspaper comic strips it's a pleasant daydream to imagine a slightly different world where Toth followed his initial dream and went into that field rather than comic books and then animation, and somehow managed to revitalize a rapidly-fading genre and create a new generation of artists following in his footsteps.  I find it very sad that the only action/adventure strip I know of that started within my lifetime is Goulart & Kane's Star Hawks, a deliberate effort to honor the days of old - and long-gone now itself.  There are many, many webcomics that are carrying on that tradition in the modern day but it's just not the same as daily strips in a newspaper.