The 1966 science-fiction film 'Fantastic Voyage' had an audacious premise: a crew of scientists and a submarine are reduced to microscopic size, then injected into a man's bloodstream in order to perform vital brain surgery. (The patient is himself a scientist, whose vital knowledge is endangered by a blood clot in his brain.) The movie had several merits, but also had some distinct lapses in logic ... some of which were partially resolved by Isaac Asimov in his novelisation of the movie.
The 1968 TV series 'Fantastic Voyage', featuring extremely low-budget animation, was allegedly inspired by the film. This series was (to my knowledge) never aired on British television, but I saw several episodes in London in 1972 when Filmation Associates tried to sell the UK syndication rights to this series. For some reason, somebody connected with this animated series seemed to think that it was a direct sequel to the original film: I recall that the press kit included comments such as 'the crew continue their adventures in the scientist's body'. Not true! None of the film's characters made the transition to this series; the only common link is the premise of a miniaturised sub and its crew. In fact, none of the episodes which I viewed depicted the submarine inside a human body.
The crew consisted of Commander Kidd, smart plain-Jane scientist Erica Lane, and smirking bespectacled wiseguy Busby Birdwell. Allegedly, Birdwell had designed and built the submarine, but the character as depicted here never convinced me that he was smart enough (or serious enough) to achieve this. Impressively, it was usually female crew member Erica who came up with the best tactics and strategies. The fourth member of the crew was ... get this ... Guru. That was his name, not his title. Guru was a tall swarthy bearded guy in a turban, who acted like Mr Spock and made laconic comments. He also had some poorly-defined paranormal abilities. Whenever the crew needed some object to do the Indian Rope Trick, Guru would make a few mystic passes in midair and the gizmo would levitate.
The crew worked for some top-secret American organisation. Every episode portentously explained (with an echo effect) that the crew had only "TWELVE... HOURS..." to complete their mission, or else some hideous unexplained fate would occur. They would all pop back to normal size, I guess.
The missions they undertook were amazingly trivial. In one episode, Busby dressed up in a jester costume and Erica shrank him down to doll size (without authorisation to do this) so that he could entertain the kiddies at an orphanage. The fact that they were able to do this doesn't speak well for their employers' security system. I recall another episode in which the miniaturised submarine went airborne (like Supercar) and ran afoul of a squadron of monarch butterflies, which were gigantic in proportion to the mini-sub.
Every episode of this series was self-contained, with no cliffhangers. This show was more intelligent than a lot of other Saturday cartoons (which isn't saying much!), and I recall that I liked the stock music during the submarine sequences. I liked Asimov's novel better. He even wrote a sequel, titled 'Destination: Brain'.
The 1968 TV series 'Fantastic Voyage', featuring extremely low-budget animation, was allegedly inspired by the film. This series was (to my knowledge) never aired on British television, but I saw several episodes in London in 1972 when Filmation Associates tried to sell the UK syndication rights to this series. For some reason, somebody connected with this animated series seemed to think that it was a direct sequel to the original film: I recall that the press kit included comments such as 'the crew continue their adventures in the scientist's body'. Not true! None of the film's characters made the transition to this series; the only common link is the premise of a miniaturised sub and its crew. In fact, none of the episodes which I viewed depicted the submarine inside a human body.
The crew consisted of Commander Kidd, smart plain-Jane scientist Erica Lane, and smirking bespectacled wiseguy Busby Birdwell. Allegedly, Birdwell had designed and built the submarine, but the character as depicted here never convinced me that he was smart enough (or serious enough) to achieve this. Impressively, it was usually female crew member Erica who came up with the best tactics and strategies. The fourth member of the crew was ... get this ... Guru. That was his name, not his title. Guru was a tall swarthy bearded guy in a turban, who acted like Mr Spock and made laconic comments. He also had some poorly-defined paranormal abilities. Whenever the crew needed some object to do the Indian Rope Trick, Guru would make a few mystic passes in midair and the gizmo would levitate.
The crew worked for some top-secret American organisation. Every episode portentously explained (with an echo effect) that the crew had only "TWELVE... HOURS..." to complete their mission, or else some hideous unexplained fate would occur. They would all pop back to normal size, I guess.
The missions they undertook were amazingly trivial. In one episode, Busby dressed up in a jester costume and Erica shrank him down to doll size (without authorisation to do this) so that he could entertain the kiddies at an orphanage. The fact that they were able to do this doesn't speak well for their employers' security system. I recall another episode in which the miniaturised submarine went airborne (like Supercar) and ran afoul of a squadron of monarch butterflies, which were gigantic in proportion to the mini-sub.
Every episode of this series was self-contained, with no cliffhangers. This show was more intelligent than a lot of other Saturday cartoons (which isn't saying much!), and I recall that I liked the stock music during the submarine sequences. I liked Asimov's novel better. He even wrote a sequel, titled 'Destination: Brain'.