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Having seen this cartoon recently on Cartoon network, I Laugh at how bad it was. It was typical Saturday mourning stuff with both flat animation and terrible voice acting.

I also saw Aquaman appeared on Smallville and the charater design looked really awful in live action form. It was a cartoon being adapted in the wrong visual medium. I really must say that the intelligence level of both DC Comics and it’s fans must be very low, for liking this awful stuff , same goes for Warner Brothers.
Rating: 1 / 5

Great gastropods! Aquafans everywhere are all a-tingle over this swell 2-DVD collection of 36 six-minute animated adventures starring the King of the Seven Seas, Aquaman (that’s “ACK-wa-man,” not “AH-kwa-man”). These charmingly corny programs, narrated by Too Close for Comfort’s Ted Knight, are dripping with nostalgia and bubbling over with fun! Sadly, the discs come in one of Warner’s universally despised el cheapo, super-skinny digipack cases. That means you can’t remove Disc 2 without first removing Disc 1. Sufferin’ starfish!–I loathe this type of case! On the plus side, the artwork printed on all sides of the cardboard is sensational. The picture quality of the cartoons themselves is also good, with vibrant colors that will make your eyeballs water with delight. As with most Filmation shows, the characters are drawn very simply with bold black outlines. The Sea King’s suit lacks the scales seen in the comics, and the whites of his eyes are incorrectly flesh colored. The exotic undersea backgrounds are nicely detailed. But–holy haddocks!–doesn’t that exact same school of fish appear in almost every episode?

As any comic book aficionado worth his saltwater knows, Aquaman has the power to communicate telepathically with sea creatures via a series of white rings that emanate from the center of his forehead. Oddly enough, the denizens of the deep always obey his commands. Wailin’ wolf fish!–I wish my dog was half that obedient! What’s more, the orange and green-clad marvel is able to keep his wavy blonde hair perfectly coifed at all times, despite the fact that he’s constantly swimming in the ocean. Slitherin’ seaweed!–his skin doesn’t even get wrinkly in the water! Tragically, Aquaman cannot survive on land for more than an hour…which, as you can imagine, is quite an inconvenience.

The Sea King’s ability to breathe in the ocean is shared by his excitable teenaged ally, the underwater boy wonder, Aqualad (a.k.a. “Tadpole”). Since he lacks the power to talk to fish, or to do anything else that’s particularly useful, Aqualad spends much of his time thinking up clever new interjections to blurt into his ring radio whenever there’s trouble. These exclamatory word-pairs typically consist of the name of a sea creature preceded by a verb, preferably beginning with the same letter of the alphabet, for example: jumpin’ jellyfish, leapin’ lobsters, bouncin’ blowfish, etc. Note that it is customary not to pronounce the `g’ at the end of the action word. Aqualad greatly enjoys repeating his alliterative exclamations with intolerable frequency. If the lad’s hapless pet walrus, Tusky, could speak to him by way of mental telepathy, the toothy mammal would undoubtedly ask the ebullient teenager to stop yelling “Leapin’ lampreys!” every other minute, and try barking for a change. And–mumblin’ mantas!–Tusky does bark quite a bit, as he has a penchant for getting into trouble and becomes panic-stricken at the drop of a seashell.

The amazing Aquaduo, together with their freakishly overgrown seahorses, Storm and Imp, monitor the seven seas from the Aquacave–an ultra high-tech underwater laboratory crowded with waterproof computers and giant maps. These extraordinary electronics allow Aquaman to keep tabs on his countless enemies, such as: the infamous Black Manta and his red-faced Manta Men; the green-skinned mermaid queen, Vassa; the sandstorm-conjuring Sea Sorcerer, keeper of the vile Book of Magic; Captain Sly, with his invisible plastic bag traps; the demonic Mephisto, with his deadly vibro-beam; Snork the Great, the untrustworthy undersea genie; the blue-faced Sea Scamp and his trio of bear-like Bulks; and the hideously deformed diabolical genius known only as The Brain…just to name a few. Jumpin’ jackfish!–the oceans are practically overflowing with bad guys!

Although the multi-talented A-man is sometimes called upon to solve problems in faraway places–like the time the golden-haired meddler traveled to Planet Q344 in a waterlogged spaceship to organize a peace conference between the Quatix and the Bimphars–he is primarily concerned with the protection of the shimmering city of Atlantis. Because the citizens of Atlantis breathe air, the underwater kingdom is shielded from the ocean by a massive glass dome. For some reason, most of Aquaman’s adversaries desperately want to smash said dome so the seawater will–sputtering spoonbills!–rush in and flood the city! True, Aquaman can hurl balls of compressed water, and spin like a propeller to create powerful waves, but the oceanic guardian relies heavily on his fishy friends to assist him in thwarting the sinister plans of the myriad villains that threaten Atlantis on a daily basis. Of course, a great deal of strategy is required in deciding which gilled critter to employ to successfully carry out each required task. Nevertheless, the vulnerable people of Atlantis ultimately owe their lives to the whales, sharks, dolphins, and octopi, who are always willing to lend a fin, a flipper, or a tentacle to do their water-breathing master’s bidding without hesitation or complaint.

The coveted Aquaman DVD set includes just one interesting extra: a 25-minute featurette entitled, “Sovereign of the Seas.” Unfortunately, this mini-documentary focuses on the history of the Aquaman character, and offers little to no information about the making of these uniquely entertaining Filmation shorts. Weapin’ weakfish!

I leave you with these words of wisdom from that pupilless clam-dweller, Oceanus, the sagacious Old Man of the Sea: “A two-legged fish can only be caught by a two-legged bait.” Buzzin’ barracuda!–that old man is smarter than The Brain!
Rating: 4 / 5