The New Teen Titans "Just Say No!" (partially lost Hanna-Barbera anti-drug animated PSA; 1983)

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Revision as of 23:25, 29 October 2018 by MissDannyO (talk | contribs) (Added some more information and an interesting fact.)
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Titans.jpg

Screencap from the available footage.

Status: Partially Lost

In 1983, the animation studio Hanna-Barbera was developing a pitch for an animated series of the popular DC Comics title The New Teen Titans. While this series was rejected by NBC and never went anywhere as they wanted to compete with shows like The Smurfs, Hanna-Barbera was also enlisted to utilize the Teen Titans for an anti-drug PSA in that same year[1], co-produced by DC Comics and the Keebler Company. DC would also market anti-drug awareness comics featuring these characters.

The complete commercial, written by Marv Wolfman, is approximately 60 seconds long and seems to feature a young basketball player being offered drugs by another student. Before he can accept the drugs, the Teen Titans all arrive (Cyborg winking at the camera complete with gleam) and explain to the group of children to just say no to drugs. There were also shortened versions of the PSA produced for other commercial air-time spots, in 30-second and 20-second variations.

Even though the commercial aired, the only existing footage that can currently be found of the PSA is about 18 seconds of muted animation depicted in a promotional video for anti-drug campaigns, screened by DC Comics' Marketing department in 1984. It is unknown if the full footage or audio has survived anywhere,  or who may have provided the voices of the Titans for the ad. (However, it's been suspected Ernie Hudson, who voiced Cyborg in The Super Powers Team below, voiced Cyborg here; if not, then it could've been the character's future voice actor Bumper Robinson, as he was just starting out voice acting around this time.)

This ad was notable for also featuring "The Protector", a character who had been created to replace Robin in the anti-drug comics due to licensing issues (while the Titans were licensed to Keebler for the anti-drug PSA and comics, Robin had been licensed to Nabisco for a line of superhero-themed cookies). It is said, though, that this did drum up interest in the character Cyborg, who would appear in the final season of the cartoon SuperfriendsThe Super Powers Team: Galactic Guardians.

A note of interest is that the footage of Cyborg winking at us would be looped for the video to futureウェーブ (wave)ॐ's "ずっとずっとをlast."[2]

Reference