The Super Globetrotters



The Super Globetrotters is a 1979 spinoff of The Harlem Globetrotters, produced by Hanna Barbera for NBC. It ran for 13 episodes. It's five semi-real-life basketball entertainers who gain super powers. Ludicrous super powers. Nate Branch turns into water, Curly Neal retracts his limbs into his body and becomes a basketball, Twiggy Sanders can use his body as a rope, Sweet Lou Dunbar stores gadgets in his immense afro, and Geese Ausbie can duplicate himself. They fight villains, mostly by challenging them to basketball games.

Some of the powers and costumes were taken directly from Hanna-Barbera's The Impossibles.

The whole show is parodied in a Futurama movie.

Tropes used by the series:

 * Animated Adaptation
 * Animated Tattoo: This was the power of Tattoo Man.
 * Archived Army: In one episode the Time Lord assemebled "the greatest criminals in history" into a gang.
 * Brought to You By The Letter S: F is for Fluid Man
 * Celebrity Toons
 * Egomaniac Hunter: Bwana Bob
 * Film Felons: Movie Man, whose gang consisted of a master of disguise, a special effects man, a sound effects expert and a stuntwoman.
 * Five Man Band
 * Funny Afro: Sweet Lou Dunbar has one.
 * Hairy Hammerspace: Gizmo Man
 * Hunting the Most Dangerous Game: "The Super Globetrotters vs. Bwana Bob"
 * Mes a Crowd: Multi Man
 * Transformation Sequence
 * What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart Anyway: One of the Villains of the Week was "Bull Moose" who evidently had all the powers of Teddy Roosevelt. Except for the whole Memetic Badass thing.