"Samson & Goliath" (1967)TV series

Directors:

Joseph Barbera
William Hanna

Writers:

Tony Benedict (writer)
Walter Black (writer)

Genre:

Animation

Plot:

A boy and his dog are endowed with awesome powers to fight evil.

Plot Keywords:

Character Name In Title

Cast

Tim Matheson	...	Samson (voice) (as Tim Matthieson)
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
John Stephenson	...	Additional Voices (voice)

Also Known As:

Young Samson & Goliath (USA) (new title)

Runtime:

USA:30 min (20 episodes)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Mono

Company:

Hanna-Barbera Productions

Second only to Hanna-Barbera's other classic, Space Ghost!

Next to the original 60s Space Ghost series, Samson & Goliath was my all-time favorite Hanna-Barbera cartoon.

Most episodes began with Samson & Goliath riding around on Samson's motorscooter where the pair would be summoned by some kindly scientist or military official to oversee some sort of project which typically proved too great a temptation for the criminal element. Namely some evil terrorist controlling a syndicate or some type of super-monster.

That's when Samson & Goliath went into action. Samson would yell "I need Samson power," then smash his magic bracelets together "explosively transforming" himself into a more biblical (and far more powerful) version of himself. For added muscle, Samson would smash his bracelets together sending waves of energy toward Goliath's general direction explosively transforming the dog into a massive lion. In lion form, Goliath was really fearsome looking, could leap astounding distances and fire energy beams from his eyes.

I remember a rare instance where Samson yelled "I'll need SUPER Samson power!" He gave both bracelets a twist, then he literally blew up with even more bulging muscles. Tim Matheson (Space Ghost's Jayce and Jonny Quest), who voiced Samson, provided excellent vocals as his voice was appropriately amplified when Samson was in super-form. As was Goliath's lion roar which could be used to shatter objects or cause cave-ins. The show was pure escapism and I loved every second of it.

Highly recommended classic Hanna-Barbera series!