The Greatest Adventure of All!

 

If fans of genre fiction were going to list the greatest adventure heroes of all time, Flash Gordon would be in the top ten of many lists and probably at least in the top twenty of most. So when Filmation produced a 90-minute animated film recounting Gordon's quest to save Earth from Ming the Merciless, giving it the title Flash Gordon: The Greatest Adventure of All is perfectly appropriate.

It was the success of Star Wars in 1977 that led to Filmation's trip to the planet Mongo. Flash Gordon was one of the major influences on Star Wars, after all, so was a logical choice for another Space Opera. Also, Lou Scheimer was a fan of the original comic strip and the movie serials starring Buster Crabbe. So Scheimer made sure the characters and story was treated with appropriate respect.

The movie was made in the late 1970s for NBC, but it didn't air until 1982. That's because NBC opted to go with a Saturday morning cartoon instead. So scenes from the movie were re-purposed. 

That cartoon ran for two seasons. After it was cancelled, the original movie was reconstructed and broadcast in 1982. 

And it was awesome. 

The story (written by Samuel Peeples--who wrote the pilot episode of Star Trek) follows the original story arc from Alex Raymond's comic strip, though some changes and streamlining is done. The time period is updated to 1939, with Flash (an agent for the State Department) dodging German bombs in Warsaw. 

A clue from a dying man brings him to the hidden laboratory of Dr. Zarkov. By now, he's been joined by girl reporter Dale Arden. The three end up on a spaceship, Travellng to the wandering planet of Mongo, which is currently on a collision course with Earth.

Approaching Mongo, they are shot down by fighters, then encounter monsters, then get captured by cavemen-like creatures, who target them for human sacrifice. Along the way, they meet Thun, king of the Lion Men.

Eventually, the also meet Ming and his beautiful but ruthless daughter Aura. Flash and Thun end up enslaved by Lizard Woman, who force their slaves to dig up radioactive ore until the slaves are crippled and blind.

While this is going on, Ming chooses Dale as his next wife and Zarkov is forced to work in Ming's laboratory. Zarkov also learns that Ming has cut a deal with Hitler and is supplying the Nazis with V-2 rockets.

To stop all this, Flash needs to incite a slave rebellion, convince various factions on Mongo to stop fighting each other and team up against Ming, then figure out a way to overthrow Ming before his marriage to Dale. Oh, and before Ming conquers Earth.

It's a great movie--imaginatively animated, well-written, aimed at adults in the sense that people get killed, and faithful to the classic source material. If its not the Greatest Adventure, it's still pretty darn great.