The Impossibles (TV series)


The Impossibles was a series of American animated cartoons produced by Hanna-Barbera in 1966 broadcast by CBS. The series of shorts appeared as part of Frankenstein Jr. and The Impossibles.

Setup

Posing as a trio of young rock 'n roll musicians, The Impossibles were actually crime fighters, with super powers, dedicated to battling evil super-villains of all shapes and sizes. When performing for their adoring fans, the lads would play their mod, futuristic-looking guitars atop an equally futuristic bandstand that could convert into a car, or a jet, a speedboat, or even a submarine. Their standard catch cry when called into action was "Rally ho!"
Their humorous dialogue was typically peppered with puns. As with many Hanna-Barbera characters, the Impossibles were topical and inspired by the times, in this case resembling the rock 'n roll groups of the mid-Sixties.

Characters

The Impossibles

Each member of The Impossibles had a specific and visual superpower:
Each episode usually began with the villain pulling off an improbable caper while The Impossibles were busy performing across town. The team is called into action by their chief "Big D". After a series of funny super powered forays, the Impossibles capture the villain and return to finish their concert.

Villains

The Impossibles faced many bizarre villains. All villains were defeated in a timely manner and justice was always served.
The following villains have appeared more than once:
The following villains have only appeared once:
Some villains were made to serve a useful purpose and even went straight after their capture:
An ad for the Saturday morning cartoon lineup in comic books of the time referred to "the Bubbler", "Bratfink", and "The Sponge".
The Impossibles episodes were written by Michael Maltese, who is known mostly for his work with director Chuck Jones.

Episodes

Comic books

A single issue of a Frankenstein Jr. and the Impossibles comic was released by Gold Key as a tie-in to the TV series, and the contents were reprinted in The Impossibles Annual in 1968. "The Impossibles" comic story was titled "The Impossibles vs. The Mirror-Man". A new text-based story, specially written for the annual was "The Impossibles Cure a Doctor", with the villainous Herr Doktor Adolf von Tischklautz. Big D is mistakenly called "Big B" in this story.
In 2016, the Impossibles appeared as part of the cast of the Future Quest comic book, where the origin of their powers is explored; having been exposed to a special radiation, as part of an experiment by F.E.A.R., they gained their powers and became agents for Big D who's a woman named Deva Sumadi. They are also joined by a fourth member, a girl called Esme Santos who has control over magnetic fields, who nicknamed herself Cobalt Blue. Together, they fight against an alien being called Omnikron, who absorbs everything and everyone in its path.

Adaptations

For the 1979 series The Super Globetrotters, the Impossibles' super powers were reassigned, entirely intact, to three members of the Globetrotters team. Coil Man was redesigned and renamed Spaghetti Man. Fluid Man was renamed Liquid Man. Multi Man was unchanged.
The Super Globetrotter costumes of Fluid Man/Liquid Man and of Multi Man remained the same as their Impossible counterparts, except the color palettes were changed to match the Globetrotters' uniforms. The transformation sequences and many of the signature "moves" from the 1966 series were re-drawn, frame by frame, to feature the superhero incarnations of the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team instead of the guitar-toting Impossibles.