Defenders of the Earth
Defenders of the Earth is an animated television series featuring characters from three comic strips distributed by King Features Syndicate — Flash Gordon, The Phantom, and Mandrake the Magician — battling the villain Ming the Merciless in the year 2015. Supporting characters include their children Rick Gordon, Jedda Walker (daughter of The Phantom), Kshin (adopted son of Mandrake), Mandrake's assistant Lothar, and Lothar's son L.J. The show lasted for 65 episodes; there was also a short-lived comic book series published by "Star Comics" (an imprint of Marvel Comics).
Cast
- The 27th Phantom - Peter Mark Richman
- Mandrake the Magician - Peter Renaday
- Lothar - Buster Jones
- Flash Gordon - Lou Richards
- Ming the Merciless - William Callaway
- Kshin - Adam Carl
- Rick Gordon - Loren Lester
- Jedda Walker - Sarah Partridge
- Prince Kro-Tan - Hal Rayle
Other media
In addition to the four-issue Marvel Comics miniseries, there have been books including The Creation of Monitor, A House Divided, The Sun-Stealers and Computer Checkmate.
A line of action figures produced by Galoob included Flash Gordon, Mandrake, Lothar, the Phantom, Ming and Garax.
A PC video game was also made. It featured the various heroes from the series on a quest to defeat Ming.
As a marketing ploy, the Sunday strips of Flash Gordon, The Phantom and Mandrake the Magician all mentioned the Defenders of the Earth on the strip of September 28, 1986. This is the only appearance of the Phantom and Mandrake in the Flash Gordon newspaper strip, as well as the only appearance of Flash Gordon in the Phantom and Mandrake newspaper strips. Since the Defenders of the Earth storyline was out of continuity for all three newspaper strips, this sequence was shown as an alternate reality.