Too much of everything

It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.

This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

Flash Gordon, Dale Arden and Dr. Hans Zarkov travel to the planet Mongo to fight the evil emperor Ming the Merciless who is secretly giving military technology to Hitler.Despite Filmation reuse and overused of recycled cells (notably Ming laughing) this truly is one of Flash Gordon's greatest adventures. The setting and scenes ooze the imagination, with giant statues, palaces, space crafts and monsters. The 1980's live action movie borrows plenty from this Filmation film. Although shown in 22 December 1983 in the UK on ITV it was split up and used as the bases of the Saturday morning series Flash Gordon (1979).Written by Samuel A. Peeples, whose credits include the original Star Trek series, its packed with great action set ups and array of memorable characters including the voice talent of Melendy Britt as Aura (later she voiced She-ra) and Ted Cassidy's Chewbacca lion like Thun. It's only short coming is that Dale Arden is sorely underused, reduced to a damsel in distress. It's edgy has a great atmosphere and even delivers a twist ending that outdoes it's 1980's live action counterpart.

Flash Gordon began as a comic strip drawn by Alex Raymond. In the 1930s it was the inspiration for three much-loved movie serials starring Buster Crabbe, which George Lucas says were his inspiration for Star Wars. In the 1950s, there was a really bad live action TV version. In the 1970s, there was a camp live action film, most famous for its Queen soundtrack. "Frash Wawa, he saved every one of us..." Al Williamson drew some beautiful Flash Gordon comic books, before moving on to draw the Star Wars comic strip.The Flash Gordon comic strip is now all reprint. My favorite Flash Gordon stories are those written for the comic strip by Harry Harrison, of Stainless Steal Rat fame, and drawn by Dan Barry, reprinted in Comics Revue.This TV movie, also released as a Saturday morning cartoon, was written by Star Trek writer Sam Peeples, and more or less faithfully follows the early Alex Raymond comic strip adventures. The less polished, more repetitious, Saturday morning version is now out on DVD.

This was the feature version of the Flash Gordon animated series, from Filmation and NBC. It had actually been in production before the series version. NBC was so impressed with the footage that they commissioned the series, using footage from the feature for stock scenes.The feature was in production at the same time as the Dino De Laurentis version. In fact, according to Animation by Filmation, (by Michael Swanigan and Darrell McNeil, Blackbear Press, 1993), De Laurentis was also impressed by the footage, and invested money in it when the studio ran into budget problems.SPOILERS: The film begins in Warsaw, Poland, in 1939, as the Nazis are bombing it. Flash is working for the state department and comes across the name, Mongo. He escapes Poland and flies back to the US on a plane, which is also carrying Dale Arden, reporter. The plane is hit by a meteor and Flash and Dale bail out, when they are rescued by Dr. Hans Zarkov. Zarkov informs them that the meteor shower is a deliberate attack by Mongo, which they must stop. The trio rockets off into space, on their journey to Mongo.On Mongo, the group meets up with Emperor Ming the Merciless and his daughter Aura. They befriend Prince Thun, of the Lion Men, and make their escape. They form alliances with Prince Barin of Arboria and Vultan, King of the Hawkmen. Together, they launch an assault on Ming's palace and rescue Dale and Zarkov, as well as push Mongo away from Earth.Over the course of the movie, it is revealed that Ming is the source of the Nazi's greatest weapons, such as the V-2 rocket. This adds a whole new wrinkle to Ming's villainy and makes Mongo an even greater threat to the Earth. Flash is given a government connection and a background in the 1936 Olympics. This is a much better background than an NFL quarterback, as in the other movie.There are different voices in the film, with a few exceptions. Robert Ridgely is still Flash, Diane Pershing is Dale and Melendy Britt is Aura. Thun is played by Ted Cassidy (Lurch of the Addams Family) and Barin, Ming, and Zarkov have different voice actors. The performances are quite good, something Filmation was not noted for.I was blown away by this film when it was finally broadcast. It had all of the key episodes and finally provided the beginning of the story, which had been missing from the series. Unlike the De Laurentis film, it kept a serious tone and was faithful to Alex Raymond's wonderful strip. Unfortunately, it was never released on video, although several episodes of the series were. You can still find it from tape traders and, occasionally, on ebay. it's definitely worth seeing if you like the cartoon series or the Sam Jones version.

This animation was my first contact with magical world of Flash Gordon. I had never before even heard of him, although there was some similarities with one Micky Mouse story. This film was made with love and it shows: the animation is absolutely fabulous.