The Hunt for Aquaman

I wanted to take a minute to tell you why I feel this is the golden age for enjoying entertainment of the past. More specifically, I wanted to give you a personal example of it.


It was 1985 when I learned that Aquaman had his own cartoon in 1967. I remember feeling a wave of shock in my stomach. The feeling a collector gets when he misses out on a rare piece. I felt overwhelmingly irresponsible. I had no idea that my favorite character used to have his own cartoon. I had never seen it, never heard of it, had no knowledge of it's existence.

I found out because of this advertisement in a comic book:


As I said before, it was 1985. And all I knew at this point was that the cartoon existed, and that I would soon spend $24.95 of my lawn mowing money to own it. But what questions could I answer beyond that?

When did the cartoon air?
Was it in the same style as Super Friends?
How many episodes were there?
Were they being aired on local stations now?
Was the cartoon any good?

No. Idea.

This was 1985. What were my options? Let's run THAT down...

Ask my peers at school? (No.)
Ask my local library for more information? (No.)
Try to find fan magazines with more information? (Not likely)
Ask my Dad? (No!)

My first step was to call Errol's, a precursor to Blockbuster, and pre-order my Beta copy of the video. That's right... Beta. So I would run into a problem just three years later that I didn't foresee at the time.



Secondly, I had to find out if the cartoon was aired locally. I did this by getting out the local TV guide from the newspaper and going through every day, every hour, looking for all possible interpretations of the show. And at this point, I didn't even know the official title of the show was the Superman/Aquaman Adventure Hour.



Third, I saved up my money, waited, waited, waited, and waited for the release date, biked to Errols with my wallet and backpack, and finally bought the thing.



I loved the cartoon, of course. There are aspects of cartoons from the late sixties that are vastly preferable to cartoons from the early seventies. You can thank parents groups for that. But I'm not here to do a review of the cartoon at the moment. Pertinent to the story... my new beta tape had "8 Aquatic Adventures".

Just eight. And still I had no more solid information. I knew what the cartoon was like. I loved it. I could guess that the cartoon pre-dated the Super Friends. But I had no way of knowing if there were any more episodes.

Three years later, in 1988, I had to find a friend that had both a beta machine and a VHS and who could transfer the cartoons to the VHS format. As beta had died. But at least I had my cartoons in a tape that would play on my Grandmother's VCR.

It was about five years after that, 1993, when I found a guy at a comic book convention who knew anything about anything. I was shocked to learn that not only were there 36 episodes of the Aquaman show, but that the show also had a few 'guest shot' episodes of Justice League, Teen Titans, Green Lantern, Flash, Hawkman and the Atom. This all pre-dated the Super Friends.





This type of dealer isn't selling video that's been officially released by the companies that own the properties. This dealer is selling VHS copies of cartoon episodes that he had gotten from local TV stations and transferred the film to VHS. I paid the guy whatever he was asking and left with many of his cartoons on VHS tape.

Which would prove yet another problem several years later.

Having the 36 episodes was completely worth it. I love every single goofy moment of every single one.





In 2007, Warner Bros finally released the full series on DVD. Much more than "8 Aquatic Adventures". I now knew far more about the cartoon than I did in 1985, but more from learning bits and pieces along the way then being able to pull up information on the all-knowing internet. I bought the DVD without hesitation.

A couple of years later, the cartoon is available on iTunes for digital download. i bought that too.


So yeah, I have the cartoons, have seen them, and have had all my questions answered. It only took about fifteen years.

My buddy Steve just texted me with the name of a TV show he thought I would find interesting. Five minutes later, I knew all about the show without asking Steve a single question. I didn't need the TV guide, the library, a comic book convention, an illegal VHS dealer, four different formats, and fifteen years to find out.

Golden age.

Thanks,
DCD