DC's Beloved SUPER FRIENDS Cartoon Lives Again in the Comics (The Style Is Perfect)

Warning: Spoilers for Batman/Superman: World's Finest #27

Summary Batman and Superman of the Super Friends return to comics after over 40 years in Batman / Superman: World's Finest #27.

The heroes, along with Bat-Mite, journey to the Second Dimension and transform into cartoon versions of themselves.

The issue includes nostalgic references to iconic superhero animated shows like Super Friends.

Super Friends Batman and Superman are smashing out of the TV screen and back into comics for the first time in over 40 years! Super Friends is a 1973 Hanna-Barbera Saturday-morning cartoon based on the Justice League, with 93 episodes spanning 12 years, and a 47 issue DC-TV comic-book run. Now, two of the Super Friends return briefly to print.

In Batman / Superman: World's Finest #27 by Mark Waid, Dan Mora, and Travis Mercer, Bat-Mite takes Earth's greatest hero (and Superman) on a dimension-hopping journey, including to the Second Dimension: a world of flat cartoons. There, Batman, Superman, and Bat-Mite are transformed into versions of themselves that take clear stylistic inspiration from the original Super Friends cartoon.

The fifth dimensional imps, like Mxyzptlk and Bat-Mite, are often super-fans of heroes like Batman, but some imps are fans of villains. The villainous imps have joined their counterparts and are wreaking havoc in service of finding the strongest hero. When Parasite and Paras-Mite steal the third-dimensionality from Batman and Superman, they're thrust into a world that looks familiar.

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Super Friends is considered a part of the Bronze Age of DC, so this post-Crisis duo won't recall the iconic costumes they're suddenly wearing in the Second Dimension. The blue-and-gray Bat-suit and Superman's red trunks are similar to the styles in World's Finest, but while Bat-Mite figures out how to re-inflate the heroes, Batman and Superman are briefly their '70s Saturday-morning cartoon selves. Meanwhile, at the Hall of Justice back in the Third Dimension, Mxyzptlk is helping Robin and Jimmy Olsen with the onslaught of mite-ridden villains.

To see the World's Finest heroes in cartoon color is a happy return to retro aesthetics.

In an issue rife with iconic references, these flattened Friends are a reminder of more brightly-colored days. Though several images from the classic cartoon are still popular in the form of humorous frames, fans haven't seen Batman and Superman quite like this in a while. Super Friends is a playground of intellectual property. Crossovers aired with the Universal Monsters and Scooby-Doo, and one episode had Mxyzptlk transport the heroes to the Land of Oz. To see the World's Finest heroes in cartoon color is a happy return to retro aesthetics.

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This issue features several clever callbacks, opening with the title sequence for Batman: The Animated Series, a brief glimpse of Sleestaks from Land of the Lost in the Second Dimension, and another allusion to Super Friends: the full articulation of Jimmy's name. As so often happens in Super Friends, James Bartholomew Olsen may need to be rescued by Superman (and Batman, too!). All this is to say that these references indicate that DC knows how much fans love its animated properties, and it's only a matter of time before readers see yet another Super Friends nod in the pages of DC Comics.

Batman / Superman: World's Finest #27 is available now from DC Comics.

BATMAN / SUPERMAN: WORLD'S FINEST #27 (2024) Writer: Mark Waid

Artist: Dan Mora, Travis Mercer

Colorist: Tamra Bonvillain

Letterer: Steve Wands

Cover Artist: Dan Mora, Tamra Bonvillain