Underdog

There's no need to fear! Underdog is here! When

in this world the headlines read of those whose

hearts are filled with freedom rob and steal

from those who need to right this wrong with

blinding speed goes underdog underdog underdog

underdog speed of lightning or of thunder by

Hello and welcome to the 52nd episode of Tooncast

brought to you by the Geekcast Radio Network.

I'm your host, DFG, and Mike, and joining me

as usual is Kevin, Professor Boss K -Dog Thompson.

Hello, sir. Hello. How are you? I am doing pretty

good, actually. And today we're going to be talking

about underdog. And no, I'm not going to do the

un -un -un -un -un thing. Oh my god. Hey, you

know, if you string that along, it's like none.

So just for the counters out there, that's the

first time we've said underdog. Oh, we're counting?

No, I'm just kidding. 1, 7, 25, 45. Yeah, I can't

count. I knew you didn't know how to count. I

got no education when I was a kid. You were watching

too many damn cartoons. Damn right. What's been

going on with you, sir? Let's see, I'm actually

being a good son right now because my mom's in

Florida, still got another week out of, she's

been there for about a month and I actually am

redoing her entire bedroom and I tore up all

the carpet and got it down to the hardwood floors

and just kind of surprising her with a little

home makeover, I guess you could call it. Where's

Ty Pennington when you really need him? I know,

I don't need him. And then I've been starting

another big project over at VTVA. I've been trying

to screen cap all the G .I. Joe characters. And

so far I got about, I don't know, 50 of them

done. I got another 100 or so to go. You know,

this is really, really sad. When I was looking

up stuff on a certain website that I told you

about off air, which we're not going to talk

about on air, I was looking for the guy that

voiced Flint. I could not find it. I actually

have to go back to the episode 25 script if I

even still have it to even look it up. I cannot

remember for the life of me who voiced Flint.

And I actually just looked it up today and I

had it. The reason we don't have it on BTBA yet

is because we don't have that actor's picture

yet. Plus there's no real compares for it is

there? No, no. I can't remember his damn name.

And then I did, I think I mentioned last week

that I was doing a couple compares and I haven't

done that in a long time and I just put a Galvatron

and a Cobra Commander one up recently so that

was kind of fun. Oh cool, I'll have to look at

that. I did almost have a freaking conniption

fit though because I put the Cobra Commander

one up and after like the first couple days,

Charlie Adler was actually winning. And I have

nothing against Charlie Adler, but I have something

against anybody but Chris Lada winning. Yeah,

yeah. You know, it's actually funny, I don't

know who handles your all, we don't know who

handles behind the voice actors Facebook stuff.

It's actually all of us, but you can kind of

pick out If you read enough of our updates, you

can kind of pick out that there's certain people

that do more updates than others and that use

certain language over and over and over again.

Well, my point is I saw a post, I don't know

if it was the actual account or if it was the

fan page or what the hell it was, but I saw a

post about the Gorilla Grodd voice compare. Yeah.

Oh my god. I haven't seen that one yet. Oh my

god. I'm not even going to pull it up because

I don't want to ruin the bandwidth with this

recording. But Power's Booth is the only one

that I like as Gorilla Grodd from Justice League.

The old Gorilla Grodd from the Super Friends

show. It's not horrible, but oh no, I know what

it was. It's our favorite person to hate. That

that optimist prime fucking ripoff Neil Kaplan

voiced him in something. Oh voice gorilla groudon.

I listen that I was like, oh my god About seven

fucking brain cells. Yeah, we did have we did

have something interesting though with our Facebook

page I had mentioned last week that we were getting

more and more fans. We've actually had five voice

actors add behind the voice actors page as a

favorite or become a fan of it. Right, cool.

Including someone you talked to recently, Gary

Chalk. Cool, very cool. Yeah. That was pretty

cool. I gotta watch what I say now on all my

comments. Well, you know, it's one of those things

where, you know, Facebook, if you don't have

to go through their agents and you can just send

them like a fan message, like, You know, tell

them how much of a fan you are of their work

and then maybe at the end of the message request

an interview or something. You know, Facebook

and Twitter are pretty much the two big ones

where I've gotten pretty much all the interviews

that we've done outside of the Larry Kenny interview.

That was actually an email back and forth. It

was just kind of cool because we've already had

one voice actor become a member in the forums,

which our forums aren't real popular yet, but

it's kind of cool to have a couple that actually

fan it or favorited it, or however you want to

call it on Facebook. Yeah, no, I mean, one of

these things where I think a lot of the voice

actors, well I know Tara Strong does like status

updates, but I haven't seen a whole lot, like

I haven't seen Gary Chalk do a whole lot of status

updates as far as, what he's doing or even just

to give his opinion on something. He's more of,

you know, becoming friends with everybody or

fan -wanking a page or something like that. Which

is fine if that's the way he wants to use it,

fine. I mean, you know, if like everybody wished

him a happy birthday on his birthday. and he's

you know we sent out a wide thank you everybody

so i mean it's not you know i'm not trying to

speak ill of any voice actor whatsoever well

with the exception of that bastard neil caplan

but it's one of those things where you know they

have so many fans or they have so many friends

that's why a lot of voice actors or a lot of

famous people or producers or whatever cancel

their their personal accounts and start the fan

pages because that way they can keep their personal

account for people that they actually know. That's

one of the reasons why I kind of set up our fan

page for GeekCast Radio Network. Not really that

I don't, not that I don't want to be friends

with people, I really do, but I think, I don't

even know, I'd have to look it up, but I'm not

gonna look it up, I'm too lazy, it's Easter and

I don't care. I think I have like 130 -something

friends. And it's like, it's mostly mutual type

stuff through like Radio Free Cybertron or This

Week in Geek, or if people listen to the shows

and they find me on Facebook, which is fine.

I mean, if they want to find me, that's fine.

And I'm not saying don't add me as a friend on

Facebook. I'm just saying that's one of the reasons

why I think a lot of voice actors or celebrities

will create a fan page, is to kind of keep, you

know, it's kind of like, Celebrities and paparazzi

you have to keep them Outside the door right

I will say though that as far as my experience

though so far and just running into they're dealing

with You know anybody that's I guess what we'll

call celebrities. It seems to me like voice actors

are the coolest when it comes to Being part of

the fandom or or embracing the fandom and you

know granting interviews or talking and doing

that stuff. It's almost like, not that they're

nerds or geeks themselves, but they kind of are.

A lot of them. It just seems like they're more

open to their fans than celebrities in other

areas of the world, like sports or acting, like

live action actors or music or different stuff

like that. I did want to ask you one thing, kind

of off topic, just because I had seen it. I tried

to get myself killed over at another website

that I won't mention, but I saw a post about...

David Kaye not being involved in the next Transformers

cartoon. What's your opinion on that? Unfortunately,

you know, hey, it's it's Hasbro's deal with Discovery

and They're gonna cast or they're gonna have

Susan blue cast who she feels is right for the

role. I Think it's kind of sad that they're not

having You know the second, you know The second

guy in Transformers history to be with it the

longest Outside well outside of Sue blue who's

been there like overall over the last 25 years

the longest David Kay is next in line, and he's

the only one that ever switched He's the only

one that ever switched from Decepticon or Predacon

to Autobot or Maximal or whatever you want to

call it You know he's the only voice actor to

ever switch a role like that and I wish he would

be involved in it, but I just don't know what

direction they're going with this new cartoon,

Transformers Prime. I honestly think that it's

going to be a tie -in between Movie 2 and Movie

3, which I am completely not in support of. No.

Just no. This is I've got a couple other comments

to make but I don't understand 25 years after

the fact why nobody has decided to just pick

up after G1 stopped and try to make a cartoon

Where they stopped well alright or or or to take

the time that they skipped in between episodes

and the movie and try to make a cartoon based

on that storyline I mean but that's what I wanted

to say is that I have nothing against Gary Chalk

or David Kaye I think they've been fantastic

on on all the Transformers stuff but I'm kind

of actually in support of even though I know

he's upset that he's not involved with it I'm

kind of looking forward to see what they do and

to have another take on I'm assuming, you know,

some of the main characters like Prime or a Megatron

or whoever. Well, Colin is probably most likely

going to be Colin. Yeah. And I can't complain

if it's any of the G1 guys, but if it's not,

I'm kind of for a new take on it, I guess, is

what I'm saying. I mean, I like K and Chalk,

but I'm willing to give someone else a chance.

If it's going to be something completely separate,

like Transformers animated... Transformers animated

was a love story to G1 like you were saying a

second ago about the About going back and making

a cartoon series after G1 You kind of can't do

that because of the simple fact that after rebirth

if you don't count the Japan if you don't count

the Japanese continuity if You ended at rebirth

like it did in the US you didn't skip to Beast

Wars Beast Wars and Beast Machines tied in all

this stuff From g1 and then I don't even count

the unicorn trilogy because that's all Japan

crap And and and then you skip ahead to animated

animated was pretty much an updated version of

g1 It wasn't g1 specifically, but there's a lot

of g1 nods and elements inside that cartoon.

It is really a very well done cartoon So I think

they kind of already did that as far as Like

bringing, not really continuing from G1, but

bringing the sort of aesthetic back to it. As

far as this new cartoon, I'll wait until I see

some more of it, but I'm telling you, if it's

a movie 2 to movie 3 tie -in, I'm gonna absolutely

fucking hate it. I don't care if... If they force

Mr. Welker to wear a respirator to make his Megatron

sound better, I don't care. If it ties into the

films, I don't want it. I want something new

and different. If I can't have a Season 4 of

Animated, which we know is not going to happen,

I want something new, different, a fresh approach.

Not something to tie into these goddamn cash

cows of these fucking movies that honestly, really,

since I've watched them, since I've had the DVDs,

like the last, I don't know, while I, or into

the following I've had for about, I don't know,

six months or whatever, whatever, whatever the

hell the damn thing came on a DVD, I honestly

can't stand either one of them anymore. The movies

themselves, not the voice acting, as far as the

voice acting, that was fine. The movies themselves,

I don't like them anymore. Yeah, I still somewhat

like the second one. I don't know, I still think

it's cool to see them transform in a live action

style, but I agree there was so much that was

bad about them and that went wrong. Like I said,

I asked you if you got Joe as better than Transformers.

I don't know if you've heard me say this before

or any other shows. I don't think I've said it

on this show. Michael Wilson, who is a co -host

on Toycast and who is the third of the three

of us, me, Stephen, and him, do Beast Unleashed.

He sent me a direct message, oh God, on Twitter,

a long time, about a year and a half ago or something

or other. It was when I was still doing TFG -1.

It was right after the episode with Megatron

stole the the the lightning bug or whatever the

hell it was I don't remember what it was in the

in the cartoon episode sent me a message says

I Love using this quote, but I Remember this

so fondly because the message was Michael Bay

needs to stop raping my childhood like Starscream

make rapes metal bugs You know, it's one of these

things where I think there's only three Michael

Bay movies that I actually like. Outside of the

Transformers ones, there's only three that I

actually like. Bad Boys 1 and 2, and Armageddon.

Other than that, he needs to take his pompous

ass and go somewhere. He needs to step down,

let a true Transformers writer... Now see, that's

the problem with him. He'll bring, like he brought

in... or whatever the hell they're fucking about

an orky yeah yeah kirk's been an orky or well

god i can't insult orco like that but anyway

uh... he brought in these guys who were supposedly

you know the these huge transformers fans and

look what we fucking got yeah i mean seriously

and granted i'm not going to say that yeah it

should have been all g one or yet should have

been all you know fan winks or everything else

it shouldn't have been because obviously you

have to figure out you know real life you know

how how were these things gonna work in real

life I get that but if you're going to bring

writers in to write a story and they're and they're

the experts let them fucking write it don't you

know dip your fucking pen in a fucking quill

and try to rewrite half the shit yeah we've gone

off topic extremely underdog shut up too uh...

yeah uh... so myself what's been going on with

me uh... i just got uh... well by the by the

actually recording this easter eat easter night

or easter evening or whatever the hell you want

to fricking call it uh... but uh... i just got

uh... change your initial smash up It's okay,

I like it. It'll probably be a good button masher

when I'm pissed at some stuff, but I needed another

game because I've beaten Metal Gear Solid 2 like,

I don't know, 40 fucking times in the past one

and a half. I just play that game now just to

mess with the damn soldiers and, you know, shoot

them off ledges and watch them, you know, plummet

to their death and all that. I'm still doing

the Radio Free Cybertron guest hosting. As long

as they'll have me on, I'll be on that. Let's

see here. Still in preparation for Toycast 50.

We actually have already recorded the segments

for the winter announce and all that stuff. Just

have one segment more to go. That should be released

soon. Again, by the time this goes up, it would

have already been released. Hell, it'll probably

be on episode 60 by the time this one goes up,

but... Yeah, other than that, not much else is

going on with me. What else did I... I don't

think I've really gotten anything else. Hell,

I don't know. Alright, so... Yeah, underdog.

Take it away, let's do this. Oh, I got it, I

got it. Before we do that... I gotta throw one

thing out there to get way off topic one more

time. Oh, God. Have you seen anything about the

new Voltron or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoons

that are coming out? No. There's a new Voltron

and a new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles show coming

out. Oh, crap. I'll just throw that out there.

We'll get back to that in another episode when

I... Well, all right. Well, no. You might...

Well, not normally the turtles. I want to focus

on Voltron because I noticed a... a news story

over on TV shows on DVD .com that WEP and Media

Blasters and whoever else puts those sets together,

they are re -releasing Lion Force into two volumes.

So instead of five tins, you're going to have

two volumes. Well, I get that the tins are probably

not available anymore. I don't know if they're

out of print. or if they're just not available,

like, at regular retail, I know they're available

on Voltron .com. I'm happy with my tins. I don't

want a condensed version. You know, honestly,

way, way back in episode, oh, crap, which one?

Oh, God. Episode two when we did Animaniacs.

I always got two and three mixed up because it

was Animaniacs and Tiny Toons back to back. My

main complaint about the Animaniacs DVDs as they

got released they kept getting smaller and they

kept compacting them where you have a compact

case that has Two DVDs on each side one on top

of the other. I hate that. Yeah I'm not a big

fan either But these new shows are being put

out by one It's not it's Nickelodeon, but I don't

know which one of their channels. It is Nick

tunes probably but uh, they're putting out a

new a new Dragon Ball cartoon, a new Teenage

Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon, a new Voltron,

and I'm trying to think of the name of the Voltron.

It's Voltron colon, and then it's a word that

starts with a P, but I can't remember it right

now. Client force. No, it's freaking can't remember.

It's not Pandora, but it's something like that.

It's like Voltron, whatever. But I'm interested

to see. I guess it's going to start this fall.

So between that and the stuff that the hub's

doing, I'm actually excited for the first time

in a long time about this next year's season's

lineup of different cartoons. I mean, half of

them will suck. But if there's that many, there's

got to be something that's going to be cool.

Yeah. Alright, for today's history lesson we

are talking about Underdog 3. It's an American

animated television series that debuted October

3rd, way back in 1964 on the NBC network under

the primary sponsorship of General Mills and

continued in syndication until 1973. So that's

a pretty long run. Approximately 124 episodes

under dog for shoes shine boys here alter ego

appeared whenever love interest sweet poly purebred

I can't stand that name was being victimized

by such villains. I like this name as Simon bar

sinister or riffraff No, not the Heathcliff riffraff

under dog always speaks in rhymes except at one

time actually such as there's no need to fear

underdog is here five his voice was supplied

by the frequent guest on Hollywood Square's Wally

Cox probably best remembered as Mr. Peepers and

one more note in the history lesson like many

of the shows that we talked about in the Hannah

Barbera spotlight you notice that this one was

in the 60s which means that there was lots of

sub components to the show which we'll get into

later what do you remember about underdog Just

the whole Superman ripoff You know the whole

phone booth thing When I was one I probably should

say this for the actual show, but when I was

watching the episode today I was like two and

a half episodes of this thing cuz yeah But when

I was watching the episode and I looked at the

lowest lane wannabe That's what I'm gonna be

calling her for the rest of the show. I'm not

saying SPI pure bread. Yeah, whatever PPS or

PMS or whatever? I see you pee or whatever. I

don't know That would make this show a whole

different show Well, I cup but anyway When I

first saw a close -up of her I'm like hey wait

And I know you're gonna kill me for saying this,

but it's the first thing probably why I was like

wait Why is huckleberry hound not blue and dressed

in drag? I saw a profile shot of this character

of the side of her face and her big honking schnauzer

The fact that she wasn't blue she ran her face

reminded me just like huckleberry hound if he

was not blue and a little bit fatter I have no

comment on that. Oh, crap. Yeah, I honestly don't

remember that much else about it. I remember

less. I didn't watch the show as a kid. I know

the theme song. I remember that from when I was

a kid. And I remember what Underdog looks like

and that he has the U and that's nine and everything

that he did and everything like that. I couldn't

have told you a darn thing about the actual cartoon.

I couldn't have told you any of the other characters.

I couldn't have even told you the premise for

the show or what he was doing. So I don't really

remember that much about it except for the theme

song and his famous quotes and stuff like that.

I hate to interrupt you, but I know a lot of

people are going to kill me for saying this.

Underdog was pretty much the dog version of the

Ruby Spears, or not Ruby Spears, Max Fleish or

Superman cartoons. That's pretty much all it

was, was him shoe shining somebody, the Lois

Lane wannabe screaming, the villain taking her

away to his hideout, him going into the phone

booth, coming out, underdog, underdog, whatever,

that's 11. I think for me, if you go back to

this generation of cartoons, which I'll call

late 50s and then the whole decade of the 60s,

I kind of lump all those together because the

70s is all kinds of different. But these early

cartoons, Unfortunately, I think Underdog is

part of... What's the company behind this one?

I know General Mills is the sponsor. I don't

know who the actual production company is. I

haven't looked ahead in the script enough, I

guess. Whoever it was, and we'll get to it later,

but... I don't know if it's total television

or what it was, but whoever it was... I guess

I'm just not a big fan of their stuff in general.

And so I think Underdog suffers from the fact

that they weren't from one of the companies that

was the big name successful companies of the

time. They're not a Hanna -Barbera show. They're

not anything to do with Warner Brothers. They're

not anything to do with some of those other major

ones back in the day, which I'm drawing blanks

on right now. And I think my biggest The thing

is, I guess I'm just not a fan of the style and

the storytelling of whatever company did do this

show. But I'll save some of those thoughts for

when we get to the actual show. Well, I'm looking

at it down here because I script ahead. I don't

know who actually made it, but it says here that

Underdog also aired on ABC in Australia in February

18, 1966. In 1995, Biggers, Stover, Covington

and Harris with General Mills negotiated a sale

of the creations to Saturday Night Live producer

Lorne Michaels who later sold the rights to Golden

Books. Classic Media currently owns the underlying

rights to Underdog. I think there was a company

called Total Television or something that was

all around too like in the beginning before it

got sold all these other things. I'm just not

a fan of their stuff in general so I guess it's

But I don't know. I'll save some of those thoughts

for later. But we can get into the characters

and a couple of the voice actors. I do have some

comments to make about that. Obviously, Underdog

is our main character, 20. It was an anthropomorphic

superhero parody of Superman, like we mentioned,

and obviously other heroes with secret identities.

Even some like we've talked about in Hannah Barbera,

like Hong Kong Fooey or something like that,

I guess. The premise was that humble and lovable

Shoeshine Boy, a cartoon dog, was in truth the

superhero that we talked about before, Underdog

21. George S. Irving narrated and comedy actor

Wally Cox provided the voices of both Underdog

21 and Shoeshine Boy. And then when villains

threatened Shoeshine Boy, this is original here,

ducked into a telephone booth. where he transformed

into the caped and costumed hero destroying the

booth in the process when his superpowers were

activated and he most every time except for about

once i think he spoke in rhyme um like when poly's

in trouble i am not slow for it hip hip hip and

away i go or something stupid like that um uh

but you know he has his catchphrases um and he

has his little shtick that he does all the time

i As far as his voice actor, I'm not a fan. I

think it's cool when he does do the, there's

no need to fear, Underdog is here, like that's

cool, but that's his only good line as far as

I'm concerned, as far as voice acting goes. I

just do not care for Wally Cox at all. Yes, no,

I agree. And then of course, your lowest lane

takeoff. Was voiced by Norma McMillan sweet poly

purebred. She was a little better I got a little

in the episodes I watched it seemed like she

was kind of inconsistent to me There was times

when I liked her voice acting and other times

where I was very annoyed by it To me the best

voice acting in this show is the bad guys Yeah,

probably Which are both the main ones Simon Bar

-Sinister and riff -raff are the main two and

then of course you had some sidekicks and stuff

like that, but they're both voiced by Alan Swift

I'm not necessarily a huge Alan Swift fan, but

I like him doing these voices compared to the

other characters in this show at least. I think

it was the first time I've ever seen his name.

Yeah. And, you know, they're kind of, I don't

know, I like the bad guys in this show maybe

even better than the good guys. But, and the

other villains, you had the Electric Slippery

Eel, Batty Man, Tap Tap the Chiseler, Overcat,

and quite a few other things. And you had Simon

Bar -Sinister, his assistant named Cad Lackey,

who a lot of people on the internet were saying

that he looks like Bill Clinton. I don't know

if I buy that, but you can check it out if you

want to, I guess. But which characters out of...

if you take the main two good guys and the main

two bad guys and the sidekick, did you like any

of them? No. I just don't like... I don't know

what it is like. Well, when I was a kid I thought

this show was funny, like the underdog part of

it I thought was really funny because of the

whole Superman parody, but it's like, really?

Wow. Complete cheese! You might as well put fucking

Grape Ape in this show and have him be King Kong,

because that's pretty much what they did almost

every episode with the lowest length alike. I

like the fact that I went to watch this in preparation

for for this recording and I had to sit through

I think at least 15 minutes worth of animation

15 minutes worth of cartoons before I ever even

saw underdog Like he was MIA like they they showed

a whole underdog clip and something we'll get

into when we get in the regular show. They showed

a whole underdog clip which did not feature underdog

at all at this point. Part one of the storyline.

And then they went ahead and showed one of the

components and one of the components and one

of the components or whatever. I had to freaking

go look up and find the second part of this before

I ever even saw underdog in the cartoon. I don't

know. I don't know what they were doing but I

guess if I had to pick a favorite character it's

Simon Varsinster. And if I had to pick a least

favorite character it would be all the others

Like I said, I just I don't remember this much

as a kid because even as a kid this show just

it really didn't interest me Yeah, you know I

can I completely agree It's not really so much

as a kid. I think one of the reasons why a Lot

of this show appealed to people was because it

was the Superman ripoff. Mm -hmm It was like

a bad version of Danger Mouse. God no. You did

not just compare Underdog to fucking Danger Mouse.

Danger Mouse kick ass. I know, but they're similar

in as far as like ideas, like the premise kind

of I guess, but Danger Mouse is like a thousand

times better than Underdog. Yeah. And this is

one of those, like sometimes when they make movies

off of cartoons, like usually I'm... Like, oh,

skeptical, whatever, like this might not be good,

but I'm still, you know, inside kind of excited,

like, oh, that's kind of cool. When I saw that

they were doing a movie of this, there was not

one ounce of me that was excited at all. I was

like, you've got to be freaking kidding me. And

Brody didn't help the situation either. I don't

mind him doing voices at all, but... Oh, God.

Jesus Christ, Jason Lee, come on, have Kevin

Smith throw you another cock bone or something.

Actually, I just changed my mind. My favorite

character in Underdog was the narrator. Because

I actually liked his voice. Well, let's move

on to the only other segment that we're actually

going to talk about. I'm going to talk about

all of them. I'm not talking about them. Only

one that really mattered to me and only one that

I really really enjoyed and I just now realized

who Why I enjoyed this was Tennessee tuxedo and

the walrus Chumlee It was Tennessee tuxedo and

his tails. I believe was the name of the cartoon

or the segment here and the uncomfortable agent

86 Don Adams voiced Tennessee tuxedo in the exact

same voice by the way I'm not saying this bad,

he hasn't got a clue. Right, right, right. Well,

if you look at Maxwell Smart, Tennessee Tuxedo,

and Inspector Gadget, they're all the same voice.

Oh yeah. Why would you have John Adams, Agent

86, the biggest bumbler in television, and I

say that with love, I really do, because that

was part of Max's, you know, whole shtick. was

that he was this bumbling detective or whatever

or control agent or whatever the hell it was

I don't remember so the Tennessee Tuxedo role

was his voice as well it's a little bit different

than obviously the Get Smart role but when he

would get to Gadget which we've already covered

Gadget so this is kind of like we're coming to

you from the future When he would get to gadget.

It's just like wow. It's an animated Maxwell

smart. Yeah It was just awesome Yeah, he's one

of those guys. There's certain guys that You

know there's there really there's two types of

Besides the crappy ones. There's two types of

good voice actors Your good voice actor if you

can like change your voice and do all kinds of

different things and nobody knows it's you and

you're just like do all kinds of crazy stuff

And then you're a good voice actor if you just

have a kick -ass voice. And you're fine doing

your same voice like Don Adams is. I mean, you're

kind of like Chris Lada in a way. He didn't do

a lot of variations of his voice. See, I've never

actually heard. I'm not starting to interrupt

you. I've never actually heard his real voice,

so I would never be able to tell you. Yeah. I

mean, he changes it up more than Don Adams, but

he's kind of like one of those people that just

mastered one type of voice that was so cool that

you could do it in multiple things. Right. I

mean, obviously, you have people like Frank Walker

and a ton other that can change their voice so

much, and it's just insane. But I have to give

credit to those guys that just have such a kick

-ass voice that they could just use it over and

over again, because some people use their same

voice over and over again, and they don't have

a cool voice, which kind of bugs me. But basically,

underdog. They switched the format of underdog

a lot throughout its run over kind of that whole

decade and usually there was four parts in the

show unlike some of the Hanna Barbera which usually

had three different segments. Usually underdog

had four parts with underdog either being the

first one or the first and last one and then

a couple other ones being sandwiched in tweens

and at one point they switched it. My problem

is that underdog was Unlike the Hanna -Barbera

ones, the Hanna -Barbera ones were short segments

that had a beginning, middle, and end within

that seven, eight, nine, ten minutes, whatever

it was. Underdog didn't do that. Underdog would

take its five to ten minutes and it would give

you the first of like two, three, or four parts

of one story, which in my mind doesn't work in

this type of format. And the reason I'm saying

that is if you have a standalone show like a

GI Joe or a Transformers You can do it to be

continued or a cliffhanger or a whatever a two

three part episode and and it's fine but if you're

gonna show one part of a Story, and then you're

gonna go and show three completely different

cartoons in your half hour And then come back

like the next day or the next week and tell the

second part of that To me it just doesn't work

as well Like when I was watching this for preparation,

I watched what would have been a full episode

back in the day So I got one segment of underdog

and then I got one segment of something else

one segment something else And I I'm like where

the hell is the rest of my story? Not that there

is much story in underdog, but I don't know.

I'm just not a big fan of the format They were

doing it's just maybe maybe it worked Maybe people

wanted to walk, you know Tune in the next time

to see the second part and then tune in the next

time to see the third part But that just doesn't

seem to make a lot of sense to me. Right me if

I'm wrong, didn't... I could have sworn they

usually did the cliffhangers on the final part

of the Underdog show. Like the cliffhanger episodes,

I could have sworn those were at the very end.

They would start out with an original story at

the beginning for Underdog. And then they would

go through the segments of Tennessee and whoever

else. I don't remember the other segments. I

don't really care about the other segments and

I'm not going to talk about the other segments.

And then the last cartoon will be an underdog

cliffhanger, which would leave you with the next

day or the next week or whatever. I could be

wrong. The one I watched showed underdog the

first part of a story. Then it showed two other

segments. and then it showed the second part

of the first, you know, it showed the first one

at the beginning, it showed the second part at

the end, but it wasn't just a two -parter, it

was like a four -parter. So then you would have

had to watch another episode and saw the third

part at the beginning and then the fourth part

at the end. By that time it's so broken up, I

don't want to watch four different parts spread

throughout. either two episodes or three episodes

or whatever. So I'm just not a big fan of it.

I will mention the other ones. We're not going

to talk about a lot of them, but the ones I have

no recollection of are a show called The Hunter,

a show called The World of Commander McBrague,

and Klondike Cat. King Leonardo in a Short Subjects

was sometimes in the middle. That's a little

more popular. And then the two that I actually

saw episodes of today was Go Go Gophers and Tutor

Turtle. And I just have to say something real

quick about each one. Tutor Turtle was okay,

I guess, but I couldn't figure out what the hell

the point of it was. I watched the whole show

and there was no plot to me. I was just lost

during the whole thing. I mean, the actual turtle

is kind of cool, but it is pretty bad. Go Go

Gophers I have to talk about because not only

is it extremely dated, but it is appalling. It

is borderline racist. They are two gophers dressed

up like Native Americans with bucktooth, obviously,

and not talking very well. And the scene I saw,

there's a Joker guy who is supposed to represent,

I guess, General Custer. and it's like Custer's

last stand with these two gophers on the top

of the hill dressed like Indians and they're

throwing snowballs at each other. So basically

these two gophers are our Native American, country

-fied, redneck versions of Larry the Cable Guy.

It was disgusting watching the... The US Army

and the Native Americans and the way that they

treated... That's not something to make fun of

in a cartoon to me. Maybe that's the history

teacher in me coming out, but... I mean, the

voices were alright in it, but good lord, if

that show was tried to air today, someone would

be fired. Yeah, somebody would be put in jail.

But I think all of these segments have something

similar, which is they're all bad. Except for

Tennessee Tuxedo. I like Tennessee Tuxedo and

Chumlee. I especially like Chumlee. But almost

all of these segments, including Underdog, the

main segment, are just bad. The company that

was doing all this stuff didn't know how to tell

a story. And I'll leave it at that. Where the

hell are we? Do we even go into the behind the

scenes? Because I don't even remember. We've

gone so far off topic on this. Not really, but

I mean... Where are we? We're just starting behind

the scenes right now. Oh god. So that was the

show, that was the voice actors and the segments.

Okay. Now we'll do a little behind the scenes.

Alright. When he is not underdog, he is incognito,

a shoe shine boy. Like Superman, when trouble

calls, he hardly dresses in a phone booth. which

would explicitly explode upon his conversion.

In order to release his powers, he must take

an underdog super energy pill. Oh, God. Just

give me a second. Way ahead of his time. No,

no, no, just give me a second here. I have something

about this later. They're trying to say that

it's okay to take heroin speed Whatever in pill

form you gotta read the next line. Oh crap. Oh

Yeah, but yeah, no the underdog energy vitamin

pill that that's bullshit encouraging kids to

take their vitamins That's bullshit That's bullshit.

I call bullshit on that cuz all right look you

have to wait till what I tell you later No, wait

no wait cuz you have a little shoeshine boy over

here who's a little wimpy kid or a little wimpy

whatever And then when all of a sudden somebody,

you know, a little Lois Lane wannabe screams

for help, or somebody else screams for help,

he takes out his damn PCP pill, pops it, hell,

all right, forget PCP, heroin, or crack cocaine,

steroids. He takes his fucking steroid pill,

gets these miniature giant fucking muscles, the

phone booth fucking explodes, oh god. God damn

it. Um, the only thing I liked about that whole

scene was the sound effect of the phone booth

exploding. I thought that was a good sound effect.

Yeah. Yeah. Crap. Moving right along. Fucking

druggy. He keeps one of these pills inside his

special ring he wears all times. Before taking

one, he would often utter the words, the secret

compartment in my ring I fill with an underdog

energy vitamin pill. Several episodes show Underdog

losing the ring and being powerless since he

must take another pill as his superpowers begin

to fail. Without my super energy pill I grow

weaker and weaker and weaker still. Wait, wait,

wait, wait, wait. This happened in 1964, correct?

Uh, yeah. I need to go back and look and see

when the Looney Tunes cartoon Super Rabbit was

made. Same premise. Yeah. The exact same fucking

premise. When the little scientist made these

super carrots for bugs, he held them in like

a little cigar holder. Oh jeez. Yeah? Oh god.

Underdog has shown to have the power of flight,

super strength, and invulnerability to conventional

weapons. It never talks about his super hearing

that he can somehow always hear this chick whenever

she says something. The number and scope of his

superpowers are inconsistent from episode to

episode, being subject not only to the conventions

of superhero comics, but also to the conventions

of humorous cartoons. In one episode, he easily

moved planets, safely budding against them with

his rear end. In another episode, his super -energy

pill diluted billions of times when added to

a city's water system, was capable of giving

normal humans who drank the water enough strength

easily to bend thick steel bars. And then, of

course, he also had things like extra vision.

I like this one, super breath. What the hell

is that? Well, super breath is pretty much the

super breath thing. The extra vision and super

breath are pretty much taken straight from Superman,

because Superman's super breath could either

be cold. But he also had atomic breath. Right.

So maybe he'd gone nuclear? Oh, it does say he

has ultrasonic hearing, of course. And a great

calculating brain, I guess, has the superpower.

Anyway. He is not the goddamn Batman. Moving

right along. I don't know the writer, so I'm

not going to say anything about him. I don't

either. So the actual show, oh god. In 1959,

handling the General Mills account as an account

executive with the Dancer Fitzgerald Sample Advertising

Agency in New York, W. Watts Biggers teamed with

Chet, I almost said Chef Stoker. Chet Stouffer,

Tradewell D. Covington, and artist Joe Harris

in creation of television cartoon shows to sell

to breakfast cereals for General Mills. The shows

introduced such characters like King Leonardo,

Tennessee Tuxedo, and Underdog. Beggars and Stouffer

contributed both scripts and songs to the series.

When Underdog became a success, Beggars and his

partners left Dancer Fitzgerald Sample to form

their own company, Total Television. With the

animation produced at gamma studios. Oh god.

That's why no no no no Just look at that word

gamma. Yeah Hulk smash In my in Mexico God now

I crack on on some of the Canadian animators,

but Mexican animation, what would that be Meximation?

Oh god Here's a surprise, though. Read the next

line. At the end of the decade, total television

folded when General Mills dropped out as a primary

sponsor in 1969 but continued to retain the rights

to the series until the mid -90s. There's a surprise.

They folded. Well, it's not actually a surprise,

but... The syndicated version of The Underdog

Show consists of 62 half -hour episodes. Supporting

the segments differ from the show's original

network run. The first 26 syndicated episodes

feature Tennessee Tuxedo as a supporting segment.

Tennessee Tuxedo originally aired as a separate

show and also his own syndicated adaptation.

Thereafter, for most of the balance of the package,

the middle segments include Go Go Gophers, and

Quondike Cat for three consecutive half hours.

And Tennessee Tuxedo in the fourth. Commander

McBrague is featured in the majority of episodes

replaced by three segments of the Singalong family

and shows number one, two, three, number 28,

29. What the hell? Yeah. Two, three, 28, 29.

Yeah. I lost count there. The final two syndicated

underdog half -hours feature one -shot cartoons,

originally part of the unsold pilot for a projected

1966 series and champion cauliflower cable and

game on Gene Hattry, with Commander Bragg appearing

in show number 61, Global Gophers in 62. Do we

really care about this? No. No. Like we said

before, most stories were multi -parters, but

there were a couple times where they had stand

-alones. The first four episodes were stand -alone.

But most of the times they were multi -parties,

which I just don't like how they did it in this

show. And like you had said before, it aired

on ABC in Australia and set it with the Golden

Books and Classic Media now owning them. But

yeah, the show's just terrible. It's you know,

is it is it's only saving grace for me and I

didn't even know I forgot that Tennessee had

his own show separate from underdog Yeah dog

and most of us should have just gotten research

on Tennessee's show Underdog steam songs better

but It is now time for the music segment The

theme song. The show was mostly remembered for

the theme song. The title song, Underdog, which

was written by Chester Stover, and Watts, Biggers,

Treadwell, Covington, and Joseph Harris. The

lyrics begin. Take it away. When criminals in

this world appear and break the laws that they

should fear and frighten all who see or hear,

the cry goes up both far and near for Underdog.

Sorry. That's my best version of that. You liked

it. It's actually better than the original. This

is another reference to this album we've talked

about it one other time but a cover of the theme

song performed by Butthole Surfers is included

on the 95 tribute album Saturday Morning Cartoon's

Greatest Hits which we talked about in one of

the Hannah Barbera shows. I don't remember which

one. And then there's other versions. The extended

acapella version was done by The Blanks on TV

show Scrubs. And there's some other crap. The

series music was done by Watts Beggars. Going

into the legacy segment here. Oh, I did have

something I wanted to point out real quick. I

forgot to mention during the show. But uh your

friend sweet poly purebred Apparently that character

was based on Marilyn Monroe Which seems like

it was more like Lois Lane, but apparently the

writers were basing that on Marilyn Monroe and

You'll like this one an attempt was made in the

early 90s to re -release underdog in syndication

But because of the drug culture at the time all

references to the secret energy pill were removed

Without them, the cartoons did not make sense

and were quickly pulled. This is a little ironic

since the original reason the pills were added

was to encourage children to take their vitamins.

I'm psychic. And in Japan, the show was called

Ultra Puppy. The U still worked. Since there

was a U on a shirt, they could still call him

Ultra Puppy. So, going into the legacy segment.

Underdog has appeared in one little golden book,

Underdog and the Disappearing Ice Cream. Carlton

Comics or Charlton Comics produced a comic book

that ran 10 issues from July 7, 1970 to January

1972. Gold Key Comics produced a comic book that

ran 23 issues from March of 75 to February of

79. More spotlight comics Harvey comics and who

gives a crap DVD releases here we go on July

24th 2007 classic media released underdog on

DVD in region one in a three volume collection

Following a previous three volume set released

in the late 1990s each volume features six diddle

diddle II Digitally remastered episodes each

featuring two underdog segments along with additional

cartoons from the total TV library That's a sucky

library It is expected that other releases will

follow in the future lovely not talking about

the next one we have to you can Film adaptation

In 2005, Variety reported that a live -action

underdog motion picture was in development by

Spyglass Entertainment, scripted by Joe Piscatella

and Craig A. Williams, and announced the story

introduces a demomited dupe, some stupid company,

to Shine, who gets superpowers after a lab accident

where he is adopted by a 12 -year -old boy The

two formed a bond around this shared knowledge

of Shushan is really underdog. Actor Peter Dinklage,

oh wow, that's a horrible last name to have,

was cast to play Simon Bar -Sinister while Alex

Newburger, ugh, I don't want a Newburger, I don't

want an old burger either, was cast to play underdog's

human companion. Jack Unger, the movie started

filming in Providence, Rhode Island in March

2006 and was released on August 3rd, 2007. MPA

film board at PG -13. The film was described

and distributed by Walt Disney Pictures. Shoeshine

Underdog voiced by Jason Lee was played by Lemon

Beagle named Leo sporting a red sweater and a

blue cape. As much as I like Jason Lee, this

was not a movie he should have done. And I don't

care about the radio thing. Me neither, I don't

even care about the show. Anyways, so... My final

thoughts. I don't really care about the show.

The show is total television is total failure.

You know, it's... I wouldn't say that you shouldn't

go on YouTube or something and check out an episode

of Tennessee Tuxedo just to see Tennessee Tuxedo

and Shumlee. They're kind of cool. They're much

more in the vein of a Hannah Barbera cartoon

than all the other Total TV stuff. But I wouldn't

buy anything that Total TV made. And I would

not watch much of it either unless I had to for

the show. You know you know the sad part about

all this this entire episode I Know my mom grew

up watching and loving underdog because she was

ten years old in 1964 Yeah, so that whole from

mid 60s to late late 60s. I know she watched

this so Hopefully she doesn't listen to this

episode This is just I like a lot of classic

stuff than this. I just can't Yeah, I can't get

behind this one anymore either. Sorry. Alright,

so thank you for joining. Two thumbs down on

this one. Yeah, two stinky toes down. Thank you

for joining us here on Tooncast. There are several

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I hope you enjoyed this episode of Tooncast.

I wish you'll join us next time. We'll be reminiscing

on the Pound Puppies. Ah, cooler. For now, I

am TFG1Mike with... Optimus Solo, and we said

underdog 765 times this episode. No, we didn't.

Shut up. I know. Until next time. Tennessee Tuxedo

CCC Tennessee Tuxedo He will be Parachuting for

your pleasure Sailing seas in search of treasure

Anything so he can measure up to men That's Tennessee

Tuxedo A small penguin Who tried but can't succeed

Although he may fail As he fights for fame and

glory Still he tries in each new story tale Join

along with me We'll try each day through to learn

something new to better you and me. Come on and

see, see, see, Tennessee Tuxedo. See, see, see,

Tennessee Tuxedo. Though he may fail, as he fights

for fame and glory, still he tries in each new

story. Fail! That's Tennessee Tuxedo and it's

fail!