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Description
The Freedom Force was a Saturday morning cartoon in 1978 that lasted one season and only had five episodes. The concept was a fun one. In the "Valley of Time" there are a lot of civilizations from ancient cultures to futuristic settings. Magic and technology existed side by side and a group of heroes from different times and places would solve whatever problems came up in the diverse communities. It was an idea filled with potential but they never did much with it.

The heroes were Isis (an animated version of the live-action character), Merlin the wizard, Sinbad the sailor, Hercules, and a giant armored being called Super Samurai. The character designs were cool (Filmation studios always had nice character designs but crude animation) and the selection of heroes was good. This was during a period when censors were strongly opposed to any kind of violence, which limited the action. Instead of using acrobatic punching and kicking, or swordplay, Sinbad was given something like water bending, which was odd. Hercules never punched anything. He just picked up heavy stuff. Isis and Merlin fared the best since they could just wave their hands and cause something to happen.

The group was intentionally culturally diverse, though that was a little clumsy. Super Samurai had a cool look but but had no parallel in Japanese lore. He was a youth named Toshio who could summon. his giant armored form at will. I wish they had done a little research and gone with a folkloric hero like Sun Wukong, or Yim Wing Chin, of Tametono, but you can't have everything.

Freedom Force was created by Lou Scheimer, Buzz Dixon, Darrell McNeil, Michael Reaves, Robert Kline and David Wise and I have not been able to find who currently owns the property rights.

Description
The Freedom Force was a Saturday morning cartoon in 1978 that lasted one season and only had five episodes. The concept was a fun one. In the "Valley of Time" there are a lot of civilizations from ancient cultures to futuristic settings. Magic and technology existed side by side and a group of heroes from different times and places would solve whatever problems came up in the diverse communities. It was an idea filled with potential but they never did much with it.

The heroes were Isis (an animated version of the live-action character), Merlin the wizard, Sinbad the sailor, Hercules, and a giant armored being called Super Samurai. The character designs were cool (Filmation studios always had nice character designs but crude animation) and the selection of heroes was good. This was during a period when censors were strongly opposed to any kind of violence, which limited the action. Instead of using acrobatic punching and kicking, or swordplay, Sinbad was given something like water bending, which was odd. Hercules never punched anything. He just picked up heavy stuff. Isis and Merlin fared the best since they could just wave their hands and cause something to happen.

The group was intentionally culturally diverse, though that was a little clumsy. Super Samurai had a cool look but but had no parallel in Japanese lore. He was a youth named Toshio who could summon. his giant armored form at will. I wish they had done a little research and gone with a folkloric hero like Sun Wukong, or Yim Wing Chin, of Tametono, but you can't have everything.

Freedom Force was created by Lou Scheimer, Buzz Dixon, Darrell McNeil, Michael Reaves, Robert Kline and David Wise and I have not been able to find who currently owns the property rights.