'The Super Powers Team: Galactic Guardians' (1985-86) "was a graduation for the 'SuperFriends' so it makes sense you graduate away from the 'SuperFriends' name and into 'Galactic Guardians,'" writer Mark Waid explained. Rich Fogel added, "They've been doing 'SuperFriends' for a while and I think DC particularly felt that they like to bring it more in line with what was going on in the comic books." DC Comics publisher Paul Levitz made known, "The evolution was really driven by the way we were working with Hanna at the time. The name 'Super Powers' was viewed by Hanna to be more age appropriate and the Saturday morning business at that point was becoming more and more closely linked to the toys world."
The African American character Cyborg, Mark Waid believed, "was unique among the ethnic characters that we've seen previously in 'SuperFriends' reincarnations, like 'Apache Chief' or 'Samurai', in that he wasn't just a knock off of established DC characters. He was a character in his own right and created as a character first and the color of the skin was secondary." Rich Fogel pointed out, "Because he is in the comic books, he has a much richer back story than some of the characters that were created specifically for the TV show."
Mark Waid maintained, "The beauty of using the entire half hour for an episode (or 22 minutes commercial free) is that it gives you a chance to create genuine cliff-hanger within the story, real problem, and real character dynamic, and it becomes more with how the character deal with the problem than just simply, 'Oh no, there's a falling meteor! We've got to catch it', the end, see you next week."
Paul Levitz observed, "As you begin to have a 2 or 3 acts story, you can take people through emotional arc of some sort or another, a physical journey or just have more plot twists along the way." DC Comics editor Dan Didio remarked, "Once you go into the longer story you have a better chance just to take one or two characters and really explore them. When you are in the shorter segments, 11 minutes, everybody has a purpose. It becomes a tool because that's all they can do in a short period of time."
In May 2007, Neal Bailey spoke to comics writer Danny Fingeroth. He made the observation, "In so-called real life, people are often forced by circumstances to compromise their ideals and ethics. What we admire about heroes, fictional and real, is that they seem able to rise above the petty concerns of the rest of us humans and do the right thing. What makes such stories the most compelling is when we get to go through the process of decision with the hero so we realize just what the character gives up by making the choices he or she does.
"The reasons the movies always go to Peter Parker/'Spider-Man' and Clark Kent/'Superman' is because these myths work and are known and loved by people the world over … I think having stories about characters that age and change in real time is a great thing. I think there's an audience for it. But it will never happen with big-dollar franchise characters. Too many people depend on them financially. And, really, it's how the audience wants to see their characters. The audience for the 'Spider-Man' movies hasn't read 25,000 superhero stories. They're not jaded with the archetypes."
In an interview in August 2011, voice actor Jack Angel recounted, "One of the things that has happened when other cartoon characters have been brought back is that younger guys with crisper voices have been hired. Just recently, I was asked to reprise a couple of the 'SuperFriends' characters I did 20 or 30 years ago and the assumption was I would sound much older than I did when the show was on originally. I wanted to do animation. Voice-overs because I was really good at it. During all that time as a DJ I often did commercials and narrations. The visual is ultimately more powerful than the sound. The cartoon character is the star and the voice just goes along with the picture. In the final analysis, nobody cares who did the voice."
Of getting into the voice-overs for animation business, "My agent sent me to Hanna-Barbera to audition. I got 3 roles. I had to do 3 voices. All had to sound different. And Samurai spoke some Japanese so one of the cartoonists (who was Japanese) always came to the recording session to ensure I spoke the words correctly … Instead of trying to do pidgin English or a Japanese accent, (director) Wally (Burr) suggested that I merely speak without contracting any words. Instead of 'aren't' my character would say 'are not', which seemed to give the dialog a foreign feel to it. Sometimes some of these characters spoke like Tonto on 'The Lone Ranger', 'Me go find sheriff.' It was no big deal to speak that way … We didn't know it then, but those days (the 'SuperFriends' years) would turn out to be some of the 'good ol’ days.'"
Of getting into the voice-overs for animation business, "My agent sent me to Hanna-Barbera to audition. I got 3 roles. I had to do 3 voices. All had to sound different. And Samurai spoke some Japanese so one of the cartoonists (who was Japanese) always came to the recording session to ensure I spoke the words correctly … Instead of trying to do pidgin English or a Japanese accent, (director) Wally (Burr) suggested that I merely speak without contracting any words. Instead of 'aren't' my character would say 'are not', which seemed to give the dialog a foreign feel to it. Sometimes some of these characters spoke like Tonto on 'The Lone Ranger', 'Me go find sheriff.' It was no big deal to speak that way … We didn't know it then, but those days (the 'SuperFriends' years) would turn out to be some of the 'good ol’ days.'"
