Saturday Morning Slam Dunks.

Once again,I'm interested in the musical numbers played on the show,usually during the basketball sequences. No idea who was actually singing,but I am aware the songs were produced by Don Kirshner,the man behind the Monkees and the Archies. I believe this was the first regular H-B voiceover job for Scatman Crothers,who played Meadowlark Lemon,and would later voice Hong Kong Phooey.

Crothers had earlier, in 1966, replaced the contractually unavaible Sammy Davis, Jr.'s Cheshire Cat (due to Sammy being with fellow Rat Packers Sinatra & Martin over on Reprise) in the Alice in Wonderland record starring Janet Waldo (speaking) and Doris Drew (singing) as Alice.

The original Harlem Globetrotters storylines usually had the team travelling to various exotic locations and playing cheating teams usually organized by mad scientists, crooks, and would-be world conquerors. The Globetrotters would find themselves outplayed and falling behind against the cheating opponents by a large point score at halftime...The Globies would regroup (with a pep talk from Granny and the team members and/or Dribbles the dog finding a weakness in the opponents) and beat their cheating opponents with their basketball skills fair and square to win the games...and bringing the bad guys to justice.

The Globetrotter players in the 1970 cartoons were Meadowlark Lemon the charismatic leader (Scatman Crothers), Curly Neal the bald cowardly fellow (Stu Gilliam), nice guy Geese Ausbie (Johnny Williams), slow talking Bobby Joe Mason (Richard Elkins), Gip Gipson the big burly guy (Eddie "Rochester "Anderson), and short excitable Pablo Robertson (Robert DoQui). Granny (Nancy Wible) was the coach and team bus driver and Dribbles the dog (Don Messick) was the sneaker and uniform wearing mascot.

As with the Scooby Doo and Josie and the Pussycats chase scenes, a clever song would be performed as the Globies begin their comeback in the second half of the games.

The "Super Globetrotters" recycled the super powers of "The Impossibles" with Nate Branch (Scatman Crothers...the real Meadowlark Lemon at the time had left the Harlem Globetrotters to start his short-lived own basketball stunt team "The Bucketeers") getting Fluid Man's water powers, Geese Ausbie (Johnny Williams) getting Multi-Man's powers, Curly Neal (Stu Gilliam) and Twiggy Saunders (Buster Jones) splitting Coil Man's powers as bouncing Super Sphere and springy Spaghetti Man respectively, and Sweet Lou Dunbar's (Adam Wade) Gizmo Man being the new super power guy in the group, taking a cue from Pockets from "The Perils of Penelope Pitstop" with amazing gadgets hidden on his person...in Sweet Lou's case, everything found inside his Afro hairstyle. Crime Globe (Frank Welker) summoned the Globies and gave them orders to battle the next gimmicky-themed villain in the story. Michael Rye (Green Lantern and Apache Chief in "Super Friends") was the narrator.

Crothers, Williams, and Gilliam were the only cast members from the original "Globetrotters" cartoons to return in "Super Globetrotters."

CBS aired a live action Saturday Morning variety series "The Harlem Globetrotters Popcorn Machine" in 1974 (not produced by Hanna-Barbera) starring the Globetrotters (Meadowlark, Curly, Geese, Sweet Lou, and new members Nate Brown, Tex Harrison, Theodis Brown, John Smith, and Marques Haynes), Rodney Allen Rippy (then the tv commercial spokeskid for Jack in the Box fast food restaurants), and Avery Schreiber as Mr. Evil plus guest stars in various comedy and musical sketches. The series was produced and co-written by Jack Burns who played the voice of paranoid neighbor Ralph in H-B's "Wait Till Your Father Gets Home" and who was teamed with Schreiber as a comedy team in the 1970s ("Huh? yeah. Huh? yeah.") and who also produced "The Muppets" and the 2 Hudson Brothers variety shows in the 1970s, "The Hudson Brothers Razzle Dazzle Show" on CBS and the syndicated "Bonkers" series.

The "Snow White and Harlem Globetrotters" special was broadcast in the mid 1980s (1985?) in syndication which ran for 45 minutes in a double bill with the 45-minute "Star Fairies" special which was based on a toy doll line for a 90 minute block (with commercials).

"Snow White and The Harlem Globetrotters" had the Globies playing "helpful dwarves" (incredibly tall dwarves) to Snow White and playing a round of basketball versus the Evil Queen's henchmen. The 1970s/1980s character designs were used in the special with Scatman Crothers playing Nate Branch's voice, Stu Gilliam playing Curly Neal's voice, Johnny Williams as Geese Ausbie, and Adam Wade as Sweet Lou Dunbar (without their Super Globetrotters powers) again.

My Trivia answer: Geese Ausbie and Curly Neal look to be the holdovers from the original Globetrotters cartoon show to return in "Super Globetrotters".

Meadowlark Lemon left the Globies to start his "Bucketeers" team. Bobby Joe, Pablo, and Gip were nowhere to be found in "Super Globetrotters" and I would have thought Hanna-Barbera might have re-used their character designs for "Super Globetrotters" if those players were still active members.

I'll like to think the reasons why Dribbles and Granny didn't appear in "Super Globetrotters" are because:

Dribbles is a multi-millionaire from marketing designer sport shoes for doggie paws.

Granny retired from basketball coaching and is teaming up with Granny Sweet from "Precious Pupp" as champion auto race drivers. Granny still owns a stake in the Globetrotters business and gets a dividend payment for every Globie victory (which is probably every exhibition game they play).

Never seen the original, and based on my previous posts people know why. The odd special i watched part of of youtube I'll probably go back and get it since we finally got answered that it's not with Warner.

But I have seen the second series and it's one of my favorites. This one was usually reserved for like 3 in the morning on friday nights long before Cartoon Cartoon Fridays was a thing. And I would usually stay up to watch it. A lot of the episodes are still vivid in the mind, and I'm quite excited for when my DVD set arrives to see the one I have no memories of ever seeing.

The concept is ridiculous, and that's exactly why I love it. It's the Harlem Globetrotters with super powers playing basketball against awesome bad guys. Including two monster themed teams. However I admit that Bullmoose episode still wracks my brain. That must have been one of those nuts days at Hanna Barbera's monster of week planning days. In fact this show inspired me when little to draw some of my own gimmicked up basketball teams.

This one is one that's just plain goofy and it's charm is that it just rolls with it. Can't wait for my set.