Tooned In: Plastic Man – The Weed (1979)
By No One Can Beat Megabucks on 27 February 2025
A 10 on the CGC Grading Scale…
But first, TODAY IN METV TOONS NEWS…
Wednesday afternoon I was reminded that the Super Powers Team also tackled the death of Superman, along with Batman’s origin. Another banger of an episode, and why didn’t this have at least 2-3 more seasons? Adam West is really good in this one too. Only downside is, it means we’re at or near the end of the SPT run, and next afternoon we have to go back to 1973 and deal with those damn kids and their dog again.
Which leads me to ask…inevitably, I am going to have to finish the story, and I’ve done at least one episode per season…except THAT one. To make this as less painful as possible…which Wendy and Marvin episode do you think I should review? I have this feeling it’ll be either one of the guest star episodes…probably Flash or Green Arrow, and you’ll see why in a bit. Either that, or the one with Superman’s origin, or maybe the one with “The Raven,” because it’s an actual intergalactic supervillain? Or you may have something totally different in mind.
Small detail I noticed : the MeTV Toons’ logo’s animation has the same zooming cloud shape as the Firefly Funhouse intro. You see this on one of the Superfriends commercials. Could the Wonder Twins be the next to join the Wyatt Sicks? They DID get brainwashed by the Rock and Roll Space Bandits, after all.
Now, after all that…today I’m going to take a break from the Superfriends/Super Powers franchise, in favor of…another cartoon starring another DC Comics hero. I speculated on this one when MeTV Toons was running Ruby-Spears Heathcliff cartoons from 1980, and the channel did not disappoint when overhauling things in February.
So, Plastic Man…for those who don’t know, here’s the 101: Formerly “Eel” O’Brian, mobster, he’s betrayed by his fellow gangsters and left to die. A kindly monk takes him in and nurses him back to health…only Eel finds that acid getting into his wounds has given him the ability to stretch any part of his body (DON’T SAY IT, BLACK VULCAN!), and flex himself into any form he can think of. Given a second shot at life, he uses these powers to become a superhero.
Inevitably, Plastic Man made it to other media as well, starting with a cameo on Super Friends where he arrives, rescues a mouse from the inside of a computer, and leaves. Yes, that’s it. Which is why I said the other heroes’ cameos may look better to you. This good deed apparently didn’t give P.M. (as S.M., er, Superman called him) enough cred to become a permanent member of the Superfriends roster by the time the guest hero shorts and Challenge became things…so we didn’t see him in animation again for 6 years. Enter Ruby-Spears, basically Hanna-Barbera, except not. (their namesakes were the ones responsible for creating a little H-B character named Scooby-Doo, though) Their studio gave Plas his real big break on the Saturday Morning schedule, with 1979’s Plastic Man Comedy-Adventure Show. There, Plastic Man’s heroics could be enjoyed alongside various other characters’ adventures. The closest to reruns matching this original format was the syndicated package of the same name from the mid-80s, which “enhanced” things by introducing a live-action Plas to host it all.
Now, we’ve met Plas himself…doesn’t he have a sidekick, or is he part of some super team? Well, kind of. Instead of Woozy Winks from the comics, there’s two members of Team Plastic: Penny, a blonde southern girl madly in love with Plas, who barely returns the sentiment, instead having eyes for the female Chief that gives him their assignments. (Fun fact: both women are played by Melendy “She-Ra” Britt, so you pretty much get an Adora with a southern accent, while the Chief has the actual She-Ra voice) Penny eventually DOES bag Plastic Man, as next season they’re married and have…Baby Plas. But that’s another Scrappy for another day.
Then there’s Hula-Hula, and I probably don’t need to tell you this from the name alone, but he is a heavy-set Polynesian in a Hawaiian flower shirt. He talks like Lou Costello and is known for his bad luck, whereby disasters and pratfalls come right at him, and often Plas and Penny by proxy. Funny story: I tried to make an updated Hula-Hula, which amounted to having him be a stoic tribal warrior who could curse and jinx people. This was around the same time I was obsessed with that one Hanna-Barbera Tom and Jerry episode with Supercape, and wanted to make 2000s-appropriate versions of his rogues such as Hi-C the Robber Baritone, the Mustache, and the Bowler. I really, really needed a better hobby then.
(Note : That I was obsessed with one episode of H-B Tom and Jerry still puts it ahead of H-B Popeye. Otherwise, if you see Jerry wearing a bow tie, run away. Far, far away.)
As seen in the subject, we’re starting at the very beginning with THE WEED. And if you used to watch VH1’s I Love The ‘80s, this to them was what every Plastic Man episode was like. Besides it being the first episode, I wonder why they chose to talk about the one where the villain is “The Weed”?
And growing up with the syndicated reruns that had a different intro, I remember being bowled over when I saw the original that, unlike Superfriends, mentions DC Comics specifically. Speaking of Superfriends, the narrator of the Plastic Man intro is Michael “Oh no, my ring doesn’t work on anything yellow!” Rye, who you will also recognize as narrating the arcade Dragon’s Lair attract mode, and later as Igthorn, the duke you don’t nickname after poop, on Gummi Bears.
The titular Weed, who is like the love child of Oscar the Grouch and Evilseed (from He-Man) in a trenchcoat, stalks the botany department and breaks open a safe containing what looks like a refreshing orange beverage. Orange soda, by the way, was the only one that to me tasted just as good regular or diet. He meets his henchmen, who you know are henchmen because one looks like Snidely Whiplash and the other is the bald dumb muscle type you see everywhere…
Now that he has the mysterious liquid, the evil plant man brags to his hired help that he’ll soon be “the richest Weed in the world!” Rejected Randy Marsh Slogan for Tegridy Farms, #4690.
On the side of good, Plastic Man flies his jet to be filled up at a gas station, something something topical joke. Penny announces that she got them two tickets to the rock concert, which Plas swipes and fantasizes about using to take the Chief out, just as she calls. But all she has on her mind is The Weed. Well, she looks like she could use some help lightening up. I said LIGHTENING not LIGHTING. Anyway, the liquid he stole is actually a super plant growth formula…I should have known, when plants are involved on these shows, it’s usually that. If The Weed has his way, says the Chief, he’ll use the formula and, you guessed it, destroy the world (OF COURSE!). Luckily, she has information that The Weed and his henchmen are presently hiding out on the SS Some Punny Name I Didn’t Catch. Plas and the gang board the ship, but not before reminding us that “The Weed is very dangerous!” Just say no, then, kids!
Noticing Plas, the Weed’s thugs flatten him by rolling barrels at him. Somewhere in Brooklyn, some gorilla forms a plan that’ll finally allow him the sweet, sweet love of that Pauline lady. Hula-Hula tries to help but trips on a skateboard and sends them both overboard. Plas rescues Hula but is faced with a shark, whom he dispatches by becoming a plastic bow and shooting him off like an arrow. He returns just as his friends believe he was lost for good, and elastic puns ensue. A relieved Penny tries for kisses, but Plas can’t have that for now because “The Weed is still on board!” But instead, he satisfies someone else’s munchies by disguising as a roast chicken to get into the villains’ room. Chasing ensues, and The Weed starts using his formula, blocking Plas off with a giant grape, then mutating nearby seaweed to stop the gang in the water:
Plas, Penny, and Hula are just having chronic problems today.
Hula-Hula again moans about his bad luck, but Penny realizes that The Weed is using the formula to help his escape. Luckily, Plas overheard the villains plan on going to Peru, and in The Weed’s hideout in the country, we see him performing a Frankenstein experiment…
CM Punk in the Ruby-Spears Universe CONFIRMED!
…and our heroes join him, still bemoaning finding no Weed. Fear not Plas, it’s still early, 4:19 in fact. I’d say you still have a minute. But Hula remembers he has contacts in Peru and happens to meet an old friend, with the Michael Bell Special (obviously Bell, but doing a foreign accent…this will happen a lot on Voltron too…) From him, they find where The Weed’s hideout is, and Plastic Man does a “one-armed pole vault” to get in, as The Weed prepares to destroy Lima as an example of what he could do, and to help him is his Plant Monster, a weed blob with arms. It grabs the Plasticjet, and Plas turns into a pair of shears (I’ve reviewed two different Michael Bell characters using the same strategy against evil plants!):
Plastic Man borrows from Booty Man…
It doesn’t work, however, and Plastic Man gets bounced away into the scene we see in the intro where he’s a ball and gets caught in mud. As Penny manages to free the jet, Plas is still being stalked by the monster, but it turns away as he’s by a waterfall washing the mud off…
Have you got it at home?
Plas and the gang go to Lima to warn them of the coming of the Weed’s monster, which Plas sees no problem in because, “I’m a superhero, they have to believe me!” Of course, they don’t. More moaning ensues about the heroes not being able to get their hands on The Weed. Hula-Hula would even “give a year’s supply of pineapples” in exchange. At this point, I’m wondering…double entendre joking aside, WAS this a hidden drug addiction episode? It starts simple enough, then Plastic Man and the gang waste time and travel — presumably money while doing so — pursuing their needs, and now here we are with one of the heroes ready to trade their material possessions to finally get The Weed. This might be the best veiled euphemism for drugs since that Raccoons episode where Bert is addicted to buying potato chips to win a bicycle, leading to one scene where he comes down the stairs looking, well, literally stoned as he pours chips instead of cereal in his breakfast bowl.
Ahem. Back to what the writers hopefully intended, Plas comes up with an idea to stage a surrender to bring The Weed out of hiding. Next scene features a news report about the plant monster wreaking havoc, even on “the American superhero, Plastic Man.” The Weed himself sees this on TV as he’s getting trimmed, er, groomed:
Enjoying some cuttin’ and struttin’…
So he decides to go and see for himself, it’s then that we also learn that his henchmen are Batman ’66 Henchman Naming Committee Named…Pete and Moss. Of course they find it’s all a ruse shot in a TV studio by our heroes. PG fighting happens, which the nature of Plastic Man makes less noticeable. After dispatching Pete and Moss, Plas remarks that he must “pull myself together before I find The Weed.” Don’t you pull yourself together AFTER finding The Weed? A chase ensues at a construction site, and that gorilla from earlier gets more and more ideas. Plas springs up the girders, also seen in the intro, and eventually messes with the elevator and sends The Weed into a cement mixer.
You may say The Weed is now….stoned.
But the Plant Monster is still coming. It takes the Chief calling and saying Plas may be washed up to start the mental gymnastics process that reminds the gang what happened when Plas was taking his shower. Realizing the monster’s weakness was water, Penny and Hula use a Plastic Man Hose to wet the giant plant and defeat it. The villains are taken away, and Plas trolls Hula about his salad being alive, leading him to ask if cheeseburgers attack people. Everyone laughs, the end.
The end credits flash the same four images from the show on a loop. But this time, the original Ruby-Spears logo is kept in.
It’s more typical 70s and 80s super heroics, but since it’s Plastic Man it isn’t as pacifistic nor polished as much of the Superfriends. It’s Plas humor in a safe, Saturday Morning body.
BONUS: you won’t see this on the reruns, but Plastic Man had his own series of PSAs too. Those other guys had safety and health tips all covered, so what would ol’ Eel advise kids about? Why, Consumer Tips of course!