The All-New Super Friends Round Up S2 Ep5C – “Super Friends vs Super Friends”

Season 2, Episode 5, Storyline C – “Super Friends vs Super Friends”

Original Airdate: October 8, 1977

Short Synopsis: “Somewhere in the vast Pacific Ocean, a naval exploration ship lowers a diving bell with two Navy scientists. But, little do they realize, they too are being studied.” – Narrator

Basically, there’s a whole underwater civilization of aquatic creatures who have never been discovered (*cough* Aquaman *cough*) and they like to collect specimens they find to fight each other for their amusement in a giant underwater arena. Here’s what they look like.

The Super Friends staff must have had entire teams of animators whose sole purpose was to try and come up with new ways to draw under water humanoids. These things are from “the long-forgotten city of Oceana, sister city to Atlantis.” I guess I’ll call them Oceanians. No, scratch that, I’m calling them Glubbity Glubs.

And then, of course, the Super Friends are captured one by one like flies to a flytrap.
I was going to explain how every single one of the Super Friends end up trapped by the Glubbity Glubs, but does it really matter? You can pretty much sum it up with: they did something stupid and then were paralyzed by an “invisible muscle control ray.”

Aquaman gets captured first (ineptly trying to help that diving bell), then ALL THE REST of them are taken in one fell swoop.

And, it took the Glubbity Glubs to finally say what we’re all thinking: “These surface dwellers are even more powerful than the other.” They mean Aquaman, in case you weren’t sure.

The Glubbity Glubs are a hard race to please.
When we’re shown the arena for the first time, a Glubbity Glub is fighting aaaaaa…Parrot Lobster?

The crowd shouts things like, “More action! More excitement! The monsters always win!”

Tyranus, the supreme ruler of the Glubbity Glubs, is worried about his precarious position as tyrant, “If I’m to remain in supreme power, they must be constantly entertained.”

He then announces to the crowd: “People of Oceana, your boredom is at an end! BEHOLD!”

And then they BOO. Y’all, it was awesome.

Then, Tyranus unveils the monster Aquaman is to fight, which looks like a Vulture-Crab-Turtle:

He then assures everyone, “Tomorrow’s games will thrill even the most bored among you!” I love that the biggest problems the Glubbity Glubs face is boredom.

Get it on, bang a gong.
The plan is to have all the Super Friend fight each other until one remains, then that one will fight Vulture-Crab-Turtle.

I knew I probably wouldn’t get to see the Super Friends actually fight each other to the death. I’m not that dumb. But, I was hoping, at least, maybe there could be some bickering. Like, Superman starts arguing about Batman always sitting in his chair, or Wonder Woman snapping and telling everyone she’s “up here,” I mean, that’s not too much to ask for, is it?

Yes, it is. Their plan is to fake a fight and then have one fake-standing at the end. This is necessary because of the muscle control rays – they are all helpless to them. Guess who volunteers to be the winner?

Foolproof plan right there.

They start out by swinging at each other from afar, kind of like that fight move “The Windmill.” Look how convincing and vicious it is:

Then, Wonder Woman lassos Batman and Robin together as I’m sure they requested.

And, um, this happens.

The image of Wonder Woman winking at Aquaman is going to haunt me the rest of my life.

And, finally, this.

Now that the one person even the Glubbity Glubs thought didn’t stand a chance has won the giant fake fight, he has to fight Vulture-Crab-Turtle.

WTF Screenshots
This is my favorite – a barrel full of pretend-dead super heroes at the Ocean Disposal. Brilliant.

Batman needs to get back to the gym.

Will Aquaman Beat the Monster? Do any of us care?
Aquaman, who was all, “I wanna win the fake fight, my specialty is fighting Vulture-Crab-Turtles! I wanna win, waaaaaahhhh!” finds it a little harder than he anticipated.

First, he gets stuck in a claw.

Then, the tank they’re in breaks, and way more water than it could have possibly held floods the arena, and the monster starts attacking everyone.

The Super Friends save everyone’s ass and the Glubbity Glubs learn their lesson.

So here’s the age-old question: who do you think would win an actual fight? I’m pretty sure it would come down to Superman and Wonder Woman. He’d probably be the final victor unless she had some kryptonite or fear gas up her sleeve. Wait, she doesn’t have sleeves. Superman, then. What do you think?

P.S. I’m posting Super Friends outtakes on the Cannibalistic Nerd Facebook page. So, if you need a mid-week Super Friends pick-me-up, that’s the place to get it.

If you would like to see these shenanigans for yourself, Season 2 is available on DVD.