Defenders of the Earth Ep. 01 Escape from Mongo

Updated audio 6/08/2026!

Join host Patrick Cadigan as he covers the pilot episode “Escape from Mongo,” providing a structured breakdown of the story, characters, and themes while offering context about the show’s origins and production. Patrick walks through the episode’s plot and analyzes broader themes such as the blending of science fiction and mysticism, the modernization of classic pulp heroes for a younger 1980s audience, and the introduction of the heroes’ children as a narrative bridge. Alongside the recap, the discussion includes character overviews, production trivia, and reflections on what makes the series stand out within the landscape of 80s animated television. So flash forward (and back) again!

Links:
Escape from Mongo Resource (page)
Episode DVD Commentary (text)
🍎Freeform Episode DVD Commentary Notes (link) 

Transcript

Patrick Cadigan  0:15  
I have hit the record button. Welcome in. You're listening to Flash Forward: A Defenders of the Earth Retrospective. I'm your host Patrick Cadigan. You're going to join me as I revisit each episode of the series, breaking down the stories, characters, theme, and maybe digging just a little bit into the lore that gave this series its moment in 80s animated television. Whether you're a longtime fan who remembers watching its first run or discovering the show for the first time and wondering how you ever missed it to begin with. This is your chance to flash forward and back into a world of heroes, villains, and gloriously 80s retro action adventure. So, let's get started. 

Patrick Cadigan  0:52  
This is actually the second time that I am recording this discussion, because the first time, apparently, I hit the stop button, so I had my dry run, and now I'm coming back into this, but again, this is the first episode. I intend to follow the same format for each discussion as I go. We'll introduce some of the quote unquote metadata for the show, when you know the name, who it was written by, air date, who we're going to be seeing in the episodes, things like that. Then we're going to do a series breakdown. We're going to go through each one of the beats for the episode, and then we'll get into some of the analysis, key discussion, talking points, things like that. When it's available, I'll have trivia, and in some cases some of the background information that I was able to pull up there isn't as much around this animated series as some of the other ones out there, obviously, like, you know, like GI Joe or Transformers or something. However, I have to say that one of the reasons that I was interested in doing this was because I think that this is one of the better animated shows in the 1980s I came into it obviously because of Flash Gordon. I was a huge Flash Gordon fan from the 1970s movie or late 1970s early 80s with Sam J Jones, and then consequently also the Filmation animated series, so I was really into, really into those. So, when Defenders popped up, and it was Flash Gordon, I was like, "Oh yeah, this is super cool. I didn't know a whole lot about The Phantom. I have since learned more, obviously, about the character, because, of course, the long history that exists with him, and then, of course, Mandrake as well. But I knew nothing of Mandrake or Lothar. They were completely new to me, and even in the build up to the recording of this discussion and all of the background stuff that I've done, they're really like Mandrake was one of the more elusive characters for me. So interesting history, I've gotten to know a lot more about him, but I feel like that there was way more about The Phantom and Flash Gordon that are out there than both Mandrake and Lothar, but still very cool characters, and I am, I am looking forward to getting to know them more and more as time goes on. So, boom, here we go.

Patrick Cadigan  3:19  
Starting with the obviously the episode title, we have Escape from Mongo. Now this has an air date, september 8, 1986 which I figured out was on a Monday. So this aired first run on a Monday, ran through Friday, and then they just kept doing that for all 65 episodes. So, of course, this was in syndication because 65 episodes was what they needed in order to sell it to that market. So this episode was written by Team Dick Robbins and Bryce Mallick. As it turns out, Malik participated in a commentary track for the very first episode on the DVD that I picked up, so some of the information that he and others had shared, it was really interesting to listen to them, but starting with Dick Robbins, now he was a writer and a story editor, in some cases, as for his writing credits, he did the Smurfs and Super Boy, the Transformers, Gooby Doo Goes to Hollywood in 1979 and Godzilla, the old 1970s cartoon animated series. Malik, on the other hand, a little bit of a shorter resume here, he in the in the 80s, he did the Little Rascals, he did Transformers, and then as he started to transition into the 90s, he worked on Chippendale Rescue Rangers and was a story editor also for James Bond Jr, which I've. I never actually seen all right, and because, of course, this is the pilot episode. We are introduced to a whole slew of characters pretty much right away. We're introduced to Flash Gordon, Mandrake the Magician, Lothar The Phantom, but then we also meet this next generation, or effectively the children of our heroes. We've got Rick Gordon, who is Flash's son. We've got LJ, who is Lothar's son. We have Jada, the Phantom's daughter, and we have Kishin, who is the ward of Mandrake the Magician on the villain side, we're going to catch up with Ming the Merciless. We have Prince Crotan, who is introduced as Ming's son. We have Garrax, the leader of the ice robots, and some of the other characters that we meet were actually introduced to Dale Arden. However, in this case, in this, this, in this show, in the lore of this show, we never actually hear her name. She is referred to as Flash's wife and Rick's mother, but we never hear the name Dale Arden. Now, of course, she dies in this episode, which is unusual again for 80s animated television, but in this case she did, in fact, die, but her essence then moves on to be incorporated into an AI computer called Dynak X. However, I'm jumping ahead of myself here, because, of course, that's not actually going to show up until the next episode. We're also introduced to Kissa, who is Jedda's panther, and then we get Zuffy, a space alien, who my understanding from the production team, everybody was super excited about Zuffy. 

Patrick Cadigan  6:53  
Act one, we open to a dark and stormy night, where at first we observe a huge mansion at the base of a mountain, then catch a glimpse of a damaged rocket ship as it makes its way through the storm. Finally, crash lands near the entrance. The doors of the mansion swing open, and we see two men approach the wreckage. Lothar wants to investigate, but is stopped by Mandrake, who worries that his friend may injure himself. Mandrake waves his hand, and the cockpit entrance and canopy immediately give way.

Mandrake  7:27  
It's Flash Gordon. Let's get him into the house.

Patrick Cadigan  7:33  
The two men carry the unconscious Flash to the house. Later, the storm has dissipated, and inside the mansion, a convalescing Flash recounts the story of how both his son and his wife are prisoners of Ming the Merciless on Mongo, a planet dying from a lack of resources. Flash shares that he came to warn everyone that Ming's plan is to leave Mongo and invade Earth, but his ship was pursued by Ming's ice robots and shot down Mandrake's adopted son, Kshin, tells the heroes that he doesn't hear these types of stories in science class, and Lothar agrees, calling it more of a science fiction story that could never actually happen. All of a sudden, a duo of ice robots appear, blasting their way through the mansion's living room wall, the robot's leader, Garrax, tells everyone that he is there to take Flash back to Mongo, but an unflustered Mandrake, drinking his tea, points out that there is no Flash Gordon in the room to take back. An unamused Garrax points to the damaged rocket ship outside the mansion window, and again, with a wave of Mandrake's hands, we see the ship lift off and fly away completely fooled. Garracks and the ice robots immediately leave. Before you know it, Flash appears back on the couch and jumps to his feet, worried about his departing ship. Mandrake tells him not to worry, the ship is still there, that he just hypnotized the ice robots into believing that the ship had flown away. We catch sight of an approaching motorcycle, and its driver jumps from the bike and walks through the mansion's damaged wall. Lothar chastises his son, LJ, for being late, and LJ apologizes, recognizing that he obviously missed something. We transition to the misty mountains of Planet Mongo, and find Octon, Ming's sentient AI computer, telling him that Garrax and his ice robots have failed to capture Flash. Ming's son, Prince Crotan, chastises his father for sending stupid robots to try and apprehend Flash, Ming angrily silences his son and instructs Octon to have the ice robots return to base. Ming expects Flash to return to Mongo, as he has imprisoned both Flash's wife and son. Ming then instructs Octon to have both prisoners bought to him. We then see Flash's wife and son in an ice cell with the mother telling her son not to be afraid, his father will save them. As Garracks and the robotic ice guards approach, Rick's mother tells him to stay put, she has a plan. As she hides just out of view of the robots, Garrax takes the bait and instructs his sentinels to blast open the cell. Rick dives for cover, and when the bars have been blown away, his mother makes use of the distraction to battle laser rifle from one of the robots. Rick takes the opportunity to grab the gun and uses it to shoot out the remaining guards. However, Garrax has managed to grab a hold of Rick's mother, and she pleads with him to escape. Rick, however, protests that he cannot leave her behind. As the sentry guards begin to repair themselves, Rick vows to return to save his mother and leaves, still pursued by robotic guards. Escaping outside of the prison building, Rick attempts to hide at the base of a hill, and as he scans the area, we see furry hands pop up from a hole in the ground and pull Rick inside. Rick turns to find a small purple creature with antennae, who appears excited to see him. Rick attempts to figure out where the creature came from and is instantly able to discern the creature's coos for meanings and messages, the two bond over their mutual loss of family. From Mandrake's mansion on Earth, Kishin is telling Flash that he appears to be better as the two walk to the mansion's outer station. The door opens to reveal Flash's fully repaired rocket ship. Flash is obviously confused, claiming that it must be one of Mandrake's illusions. Lothar is quick to jump in with an elbow grease jibe, and making it clear he is the mechanical genius of the group, with a robust working knowledge of astro mechanics. Lothar jokes that Flash should take the ship for a test run, but Flash is in no laughing mood, and tells his friends that he is on his way back to Mongo to stop Ming before he invades the Earth.

Patrick Cadigan  12:07  
His friends are quick to join Flash on his mission, but not before Mandrake tells Kishin that he cannot come along as he has homework. Back on Mongo, Rick and his new friend are back inside Ming's base attempting to locate Rick's mother. Suddenly they're confronted by Ming's pec dragon, Mongore product placement, who wraps itself around the two with Zuffy, the space alien, seeming to throw a fit. This seems to have an effect on the dragon and lets the two go while making its way back to its master in the interrogation room, Ming continues to threaten Rick's mother with the use of the inquisitor. When she doesn't give him what he wants, Ming instructs Mongor to turn on the inquisitor. As energy engulfs the helpless woman, Rick looks on in horror, seemingly frozen as to what to do. Eventually, his mother succumbs to the machine's energy as her head drops and eyes close. 

Patrick Cadigan  13:09  
Act two. After several moments of watching his mother's torture, Rick finally chooses to confront Ming and demands to let his mother go. Ming has different plans and tells Rick it's too late. Rick begins to use his laser rifle to shoot at Ming and Mongor, but they manage to evade his blasts. Rick manages to approach his lifeless mother at the Inquisitor, but Ming immediately commands Mongor to attack once again. Rick vows to return as he flees from Mongor's pursuit. Ming seems prepared to follow, but the station's master alarm begins to blare. Ming realizes that he's under attack and plans to deal with this new challenge. Zuffy, the space alien, approaches the lifeless body of Rick's mother, notices a glowing crystal in her hand, and decides to take it with him at his control center, Ming asks Octon, "What is going on with the AI robot? Responding that there is only one ship on the attack, Ming immediately recognizes the ship of his archenemy and is pleased with his return, and vows that neither he or his family will leave Mongo alive. Prince Crotan, on the other hand, warns his father that the battle has not even started.

Speaker 1  14:27  
Octon ordered the robo ships to intercept and destroy Flash Gordon. He must not interfere with my plans to leave Mongo and establish new headquarters on Earth

Patrick Cadigan  14:41  
from his rocket ship, Flash and his two passengers are confronted with Ming's robo ships, and a lively battle ensues. At first, it appears the robo ships are no match for our heroes; however, Ming's forces have the advantage of numbers, as more and more robo ships just keep coming, man. Rig doesn't care for these odds, and sets up an illusion of four additional rocket ships. This throws Garrax completely off his game, as he goes after one of the illusion ships and ends up damaging several towers of his own base of operations. Ming is furious at this turn of events, and Prince Crotan can't help chiding his father for his overconfidence. Ming orders Octon to launch his new throne room, as he intends to invade the earth at once. With the robo ships taken care of, Flash and his friends land on the surface and make their way into the palace, just in the nick of time, as Rick and Zuffy, the space alien, are just about to get pummeled by a pair of ice robots. Lothar takes an exception to that and takes care of the hulking duo, Lickety Split, with father and son reunited. Flash is quick to find out the whereabouts of his wife, Rick. However, cannot bring himself to tell his father what has happened. An impatient Flash continues his way into the palace, while the others observe Ming taking off in his UFO throne room. As the group makes their way into the palace, they find a distraught Flash prostrated at the feet of his wife's body, carrying his wife in his arms. Flash vows to stop Ming at all costs, with the others joining in his resolve, while on his way to Earth, Ming articulates his plan to take over the planet, and the ease in which he will do so. In Flash's rocket ship on the way back to Earth, Mandrake and Lothar contemplate the challenges of finding Ming on Earth, with so many places to hide. Flash isn't worried, though; he's focused on finding his old foe. Suddenly, Zuffy, the space alien, appears in the cockpit to tell everyone he is there, seemingly able to understand English as a spoken language. The purple furry creature reaches behind him and pulls out the crystal he found, obviously from the same place Prince Adam finds his sword. Everyone wonders aloud, what the crystal is, and Rick remembers it from the Inquisitor machine. Back on planet Earth, Ming lands his throne room in an Arctic setting and proclaims the area as Ice Station Earth, commenting how the frigid temperatures will help to sustain their technology. Ming then orders Garrax to begin building a new base of operations, and Octon to find the school where Rick Gordon will attend, so that he will be able to find Flash Gordon. Ming then reveals a group of humans who have been encased in ice, thus making them susceptible to Ming's command. Back at Xanadu, the group collaborates on the whereabouts of Ming's new hideout, LJ and Rick are ready to jump in and help, but Lothar reminds LJ that he's too young and that he'll need to focus on helping Rick enroll in school the following day. As the two disappointed boys leave, Mandrake tells the remaining group that they need someone with super keen senses to help. When Flash wonders aloud how they would find someone like that. Mandrake already has an idea. The ghost who walks. We now find the heroes in a jungle setting looking for the skull cave. Lothar comments that he senses danger, but it's too late. The trio hit a trip wire and find themselves trapped. 

Patrick Cadigan  18:21  
Act three. A group of natives are escorting the three heroes to destination unknown.

Mandrake  18:28  
Any ideas to how destination.

Flash Gordon  18:30  
Beats me. I haven't seen a street sign yet.

Jedda  18:41  
Halt, the Bandar natives are my friends. Who are you, and what do you want?

Mandrake  18:46  
These gentlemen of Flash Gordon and Lothar, my friends, and I'm Mandrake. We're looking for the ghost who walks.

Jedda  18:53  
The man you are seeking is my father, The Phantom. 

Patrick Cadigan  18:56  
Next at the Skull Cave, The Phantom tells the group that he is willing to join them to help defeat Ming, but voices concern for his daughter, Jedda. Not to worry, though, Mandrake suggests enrolling her in school with the other children in Central City. Next, we're at the school with Rick and LJ, noticing Jedda talking with her jungle panther, Kisa, through the fence. Two men in suits with glasses and fedora hats show up to say they are friends with Flash, and that the kids need to come with them. However, Rick and LJ aren't buying it, as they really want to go to class. The two men then kidnap the boys against their will. When Rick strikes one of the men, an ice bolt erupts from the eyes, freezing a nearby water fountain, Jetta was drinking from the two boys, are then hauled off to a waiting vehicle, and Ett drives away. All the while, Ming is watching from his throne room in Ice Station Earth, and intends to spring his trap. Back at the school, Jetta communicates telepathically with Kisa and. Instructs her to follow the escaping vehicle. We see the vehicle drive up a mountain and enter an open gate. Meanwhile, the remaining group, including Jedda, are in a ship flying to find the boys, and Flash comments that he's never attempted to find anyone using telepathy. Jedda points out a structure below, and Mandrake informs the group that it's in an abandoned prison. Having landed at the base of the prison, the group wonders how they will gain entrance, but the phantoms already got a plan, calling on the power of 10 tigers, helping him vault over the prison wall and open the doors from inside. Within moments, though, the team is immediately captured as Ming confronts the group, he tells them that he plans to use the prison's old power system to electrocute them all to death. Not to worry, though, because Rick and LJ manage to break out of their cell, sabotage the prison's electrical system from the inside, and free the group, forcing Ming to retreat once more as the generators explode on board their ship. Rick presents the crystal given to him by Zuffy, the space alien. And upon further inspection and a little telepathy, Mandrake determines it houses the essence of Rick's mother. Rick then introduces the idea of using the crystal in a new super computer, he plans to build. Everyone thinks that that's a great idea, and Mandrake christens the team the Defenders of the Earth. The end. 

Patrick Cadigan  21:34  
All right, so like I mentioned before in this particular episode, Dale Arden Flash's wife, Rick's mother, dies, and this is, you know, you didn't typically see this in 80s cartoons, 80s animation, you know, because, of course, in those, those types, in that, in that medium, the stakes are usually pretty low, you know, even in GI Joe and transformers and things like that, you know, you had people running around with guns all the time and shooting each other and things like that, but nobody ever really got hurt, so that was kind of a big deal. It's also interesting now, given the fact that then they took basically her essence and then they transitioned her into an AI computer, and of course, now at the advent of where we are with AI. Granted, I know that they've been talking about this for years, and they've been building towards this for years, but I still think it's pretty super cool. So we have that.

Patrick Cadigan  22:35  
Core theme of this episode is the transition of heroism from these classic pulp icons, right? You've got Flash, Mandrake, Phantom, Lothar. These guys go back to easily to the 1930s I can remember some of the early Flash Gordon serials, and of course, not only Flash Gordon, but then, like Buck Rogers, I was a big Buck Rogers kid, played by the same actor, Buster Crab, and I do know that there was a Phantom cereal as well, although I haven't seen that all the way through. And then I just recently discovered that there was also a Mandrake serial, but again, I haven't managed to get all the way through those serials. For me, are kind of hit and miss. I can't lie, the Flash ones were, were the Flash Gordon serials, were pretty bad. They were definitely of their time, so to speak. Just, you know, bad acting, really goofy stories, you know.

Patrick Cadigan  23:36  
I'm not expecting, like, you know, super, you know, special effects or anything like that, but yeah, they.. it wasn't.. it wasn't one of the better ones. I will save throwing it out for me. Some of my favorite serials were Captain Moral, The Adventures of Captain Marvel, Crimson Ghost. I do remember the Batman and the Superman serials. The Batman serials were pretty terrible, and the Superman serials were very cool, the two Superman and then Superman versus Adam Man. So, but again, getting back to this again, we have these legacy characters owned by King's Feature Syndicate in the commentary for the show, one of the, one of the commentarians, I can't remember who it was that brought it up, it could have been Bill Hutton, the producer, but he talked about how the reason that they wanted to bring on the kids was one to obviously have that demographic, because that's the demographic that they were going for, of course, with 80s animated television, and then that was a trope at the time, they always had to include kids in these cartoons because that was their audience, but in this case also there was a tacit recognition that flat. Mandrake, Phantom, and Lothar were these much older properties, and they really didn't know if that was going to translate over for the kids of today, so they were like, well, let's introduce their kids, and that'll be the great thing. So that was what they did. Again, I will say that outside of the 80s trope to bring in kids in general, these kids are a lot way less annoying than some of the other ones that we have been introduced to. When I think of the kids from, like, the Mask series, I mean, just in general, anytime you would bring kids into my, the one that I hated the most was Penny from Inspector Gadget. I just.. it was really, really hard for me to watch that show. As fun as it was, it just.. I don't know, it was.. it wasn't a great trope. Oh, and then, of course, Wendy and Marvin in the original Super Friends, that was another one that that didn't work out really well. I don't think I minded the Wonder Twins quite as much, but they were still kind of annoying. So, but anyway, so this is again the modernization of these pulp heroes. It is this episode is building towards a blending of different genres, so it's taken sci-fi for Flash Gordon, the mysticism of Mandrake, and the jungle adventures of The Phantom, and then just boom, placing them into this high-tech 1980 setting, they are flying off in airplanes, and, or I'm sorry, not even airplanes, uh, spaceships, and you know, super, super helicopters, and you know, they're they're fighting with robots, because, of course, they couldn't shoot or damage real people, because at the time the sensors that was not allowed, so again one of the reasons why so many of those 80s animated shows had robots always around, but yeah, so modernizing these old icons, you know, if you will.

Patrick Cadigan  27:19  
So one of the other interesting pieces that I took away from this was the technological versus the mystical power, so you've got this dynamic that starts up between between Ming's advanced like mango technology, but then as you transition you've got these earthly powers, such as, you know, like Mandrake's hypnosis and the Phantoms power ring, the Ring of 10 Tigers, and this is basically setting up this conflict for all of these different characters, so just raw technology versus human spirit and what ancient wisdom. So, there you go. 

Patrick Cadigan  28:07  
All right. So, given that this is the first episode, why don't we do some quick character bios for the characters that we are introduced to. Of course, we're going to start with Flash Gordon. He's protagonist, the leader of the Defenders of the Earth, probably the more famous of the of the other three properties within the King's King's feature syndicate line, he's in this show, in this iteration, he's a famous space adventurer, former prisoner of Ming the Merciless, of course, and that's going to set up their rivalry, he has skills that include being an expert pilot, skilled fighter, and, of course, he is a natural leader. He starts out as we are introduced to him, he's a captive on Mongo, and he escapes with his son Rick to warn the Earth that Ming is coming. 

Patrick Cadigan  28:57  
So, of course, then we have Rick Gordon. This is Flash Gordon's teenage son. As he is introduced in this universe, he's a young scientist. He's an inventor, and he is eager to help his father, and he wants to be on the team. The skills that they set up with this kid is advanced technological knowledge and an inventive and an inventor, so yeah, he's going to come up with a lot of the stuff as we go, almost like a Wunderkind of kind, so kind of like Mandrake's powers, like if they're going to need something to come up out of nowhere to move the plot forward, Rick's going to be your guy. 

Patrick Cadigan  29:38  
Then we're introduced to The Phantom, who in this iteration is Kit Walker. He is also known background as the ghost who walks, a jungle hero with strength, superhuman strength. Now, if I remember correctly, the difference here is that the original it. Creation of The Phantom was a lot like Batman in the sense that he was just a regular guy, and he had all of these skills, like he could do, he was like a great acrobat, he could do all these things, but his claim to fame was essentially like he was a normal guy, but he was still a hero, however, for this show they had to kind of up the ante a little bit, so they give him a fairly nondescript power about pulling in from pulling in the strength or the power of quote unquote 10 tigers, and then that's going to give him various additional powers, superhuman powers later on, like running strength things like that, but again, the original iteration of The Phantom was just a normal guy. 

Patrick Cadigan  30:50  
We have Mandrake the Magician. He is a powerful magician and a master illusionist. His background, as he's introduced, he's a famous stage magician, but the magical powers that he produces, they are real. The skills that we know about up until this point are hypnotism, illusions, and they allude to various magical abilities, and again, those will kind of mix and match and chain change as the show moves on.

Patrick Cadigan  31:23  
Then we're introduced to Lothar, who historically was Mandrake's personal bodyguard, and so he is the loyal friend to Mandrake, but he's also a powerful warrior. He is a former prince and a very formidable fighter, the he is introduced with having superhuman strength and a really good hand to hand combatant. 

Patrick Cadigan  31:47  
Then we meet Jedda Walker, who is the Phantom's daughter. The plan is for her to follow in her father's footsteps, and then so thus she is skilled in combat and jungle survival. Her skills are again combat skills. Although we learn later on in the show that she actually has some telepathy, she is able to communicate with her pet tiger. 

Patrick Cadigan  32:14  
Then we meet LJ, in other words, Lothar Junior. He is Lothar's teenage son. He is the inheritor of his father's strength and his father's bravery. So, again, his skills he revolves around superhuman strength and super athletic abilities. 

Patrick Cadigan  32:33  
And then finally, we have in the defenders line of finally we get Kshin, he is Mandrake's adopted orphan, he is under Mandrake's care. They are not related, he's learning, but he is, he is aspiring to be a magician, the same as Mandrake. So, again, his skills, his powers, magician, and I would say that of all of the kids in this show, Kshin is the one who gets on my nerves the most. It's not terrible, but there's some funny moments with him in the second episode, which I've actually gotten some audio pieces to that just the way that they kind of utilize him sometimes. He's, he's definitely not my favorite. 

Patrick Cadigan  33:20  
On the villain side, we have Ming the Merciless, so he is the primary attack and antagonist here. He is the ruler of Mongo. He's tyrannical, and he has ambitions to conquer Earth. His skills are essentially being a strategic mastermind. He commands vast armies, and he has super advanced technology behind him as we are introduced to him, of course. He's plotting to invade the earth, and he is particularly going after Flash and Rick Gordon. 

Patrick Cadigan  33:51  
Some of the others are the ice robots. Now, these are the minions of Ming the Merciless. These are robotic soldiers sent by Ming to help with the invasion of the earth, you know, I mean, it's basic robot kind of stuff, cold based, or you know, like weaponry, like you know, shooting lasers and things like that, like there's nothing really memorable about these guys, quote unquote durable and powerful, and there's always a million of them. 

Patrick Cadigan  34:24  
One of the other characters that we meet is the main ice robot, which is Garracks, and he will pop up. He is one of the other recurring villains that we are going to see pop up in this series, and we are introduced to him here again, weaponry built in weaponry. He's a little bit smarter than the other robots, but then, of course, again, when the plot needs him to, well, you know, he's not really quite so smart.

Patrick Cadigan  34:56  
And so in this case, I think I'm going to end off with. Some of the episode trivia that I found, now again, this was pulled from one of the DVD collections that I had purchased around the Defenders of the Earth. In this particular episode, again, one of the first trivia notices that they talk about was that when, when the group puts their hands together and name themselves the Defenders of the Earth. The only hand that's missing in that particular scene is LJ, and again, the main reason that all these characters were pulled in together, Flash Gordon, Phantom, Mandrake, and Lothar, was because they all fell under the rights of the King's Future Syndicate intellectual property, so they got them all together, but this was also a joint venture with Marvel Productions, and we know that Stan Lee had a hand in writing the opening song, that those were the lyrics that he's written, and I have to say that it is vintage, vintage Stan Lee. During the commentary for this episode, let me pull up the notes that I got for that, because there were some - there are some interesting things that they mentioned. I am going to leave a link in the show notes to some of the commentary notes that I took, one of the things that the commentators had talked about, this again was one of the more unusual cartoons at the time, because when they were doing all the voice recording, all of the actors were in the room at the same time. Historically, for those who don't know, a lot of times the actors would record their dialog individually, and then bring it all together, cut it, slice it all together, and then release, but in this case all the actors were in the room at the same time. The other thing that I did not know about this particular episode, and then the next one. So, the first two episodes in this series, it was actually Toei Animation who did the animation for that, and for those of you know, the uninitiated, Toei is pretty famous for I became aware of Toei from the Transformers, so but it was just the first two episodes that Toei did for the show, and then they didn't do any more, as I had mentioned previously in the commentary track, they, they were not a fan of Zuffy the space alien, because he apparently took a lot of resources, there was like an internal debate or an internal challenge within the team to come up with this alien, and so they were saying that it took a lot of resources to get to the alien, then it took a lot of resources to get it right, and then it took even more resources in the actual animation, because, of course, this was all hand-drawn animation at the time, so again, not a super, not a super big fan of Zuffy, the space alien. One other thing that I thought was interesting in the original iteration, before the, as the show was being developed, The Phantom was going to be the one who was going to have a son, and then it was going to be Flash Gordon's daughter, but then in the pre-production, like building towards the series, they actually, they flip-flopped it, so Flash Gordon gets the son, The Phantom gets the daughter.

Patrick Cadigan  38:34  
One of the other things that I thought was kind of interesting was originally animation-wise Ming was supposed to be blue-skinned, and if I remember correctly, they had done some mock-ups and some drawings, and then that was the plan, but then when it came to the actual animation, they decided to switch it to green, because then that looked better. Interesting piece of actor news, the actor who plays Rick Gordon, and his name Lauren Lauren Lester, I think. Yeah, Lauren Lester. See, I'm better at this than I think I am. Lauren Lester is married to the daughter of the actor who voiced The Phantom, and I can definitely tell you that that is not a name that I have right away. I think that that's going to come in the next episode, where I do a little bit of background on the actors who do the voice acting, but for right now, the Lauren Lester, the actor who plays Rick, is married to the daughter of The Phantom Voice actor, and they actually met towards the end of the tapings, so it was the this show in particular that got those two together, so I thought that was kind of cool, vintage 80s. For animation, a child, several child psychologists were brought in to review the scripts and help advise the writers on the content for the children, because, of course, they didn't want to do anything that was too, that would be considered too detrimental in the commentary, they, they weren't 100% sure how much of the notes that they used from the child psychologist when they were actually, you know, like how much of it that they actually like took in and considered when they were doing the show, but they did bring in child psychologists. One other last thing that I thought was really interesting was, is that in this for this show, everything was recorded in order, so the actors, as they were talking about it, likened it very much to a radio show, so I thought that that was pretty interesting, but, like I said, I'm going to have a link to the notes that I took for the commentary, because there's a bit more in there of varying interest to different people. 

Patrick Cadigan  41:08  
But it is out there all right. So I then am going to bring this discussion to a close. You will, you can find me back here in two weeks' time, again. Initially, I'm going to say, I apologize, because this is the first discussion. I'm still kind of getting the formatting down. I'm usually pretty good with this. There's actually another podcast that I do, called The Post Secondary Transition Conversation, although that is very different, because it's education-based, so it's almost like I'm walking into a classroom and I'm telling people what it is that they need to do, whereas with this I'm like I'm pulling from here and there and all these different places, because there is, I said in the beginning that there isn't as much out there about this animated show, but still, I mean, there there's lots of information, especially when you break it down individually, from Flash to The Phantom to Mandrake, and you know, just stuff like that. There, there is a lot of stuff out there, so there's always things jumbling around in my mind. So bear with me. I definitely intend to get better. I have a pretty good format going, I think, but I am always open to thoughts, suggestions, feedback. You can email me at FlashForwardpod@icloud.com If it's nice, I'll actually read it out. But anyway, I'm going to go ahead and finish out, I thank you so much for joining me with your time, and I will talk with you soon.