Sport Billy

"Sport Billy" was a 1979 animated television cartoon made by Filmation Associates, initially for broadcast in Germany. In 1982, Filmation carried the show over to the United States for syndication, and as a summer replacement in NBC's Saturday morning children's programming. [Lenburg, Jeff, "Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons", Second Edition, 1999.] It was the last first-run series produced by Filmation Associates to air on NBC.

Sport Billy was originally a European comic character and had already had presence in Europe and some parts of Latin America. As a European character, his main sport was soccer, and this was reflected in the intro sequence of the Filmation program.

The series consisted of 26 episodes split into two seasons. It was also shown in the UK, Italy, Australia, Greece, Spain, Yugoslavia, Turkey, Mexico and some other countries.

ynopsis

The story revolves around a young boy named Sport Billy who is from the planet Olympus (a twin of our Earth which is on the other side of the Sun) which is populated by athletic god-like beings. Billy himself has a magic size-changing gym bag - the Omni-Sac(k) - which produces various tools as he needs them. He travels to Earth on a mission to promote teamwork and sportsmanship. Described by the show's theme song as a "hero from another planet", Billy battles the evil Queen Vanda and her gnome-like henchman, Snipe. Vanda's mission is to destroy all sports in the galaxy since fairness disgusts her.

Billy is assisted by two faithful companions, a girl named Lilly and a talking dog named Willy. The trio travel around in a time traveling spaceship, which resembles a giant wind-up clock, complete with a ringing bell, and mounted on two rocket engines. Each episode the trio travel through time to save a different Earth sport from Queen Vanda's grasp.

Sport Billy was voiced by Lane Scheimer, son of producer Lou Scheimer. Lilly and Queen Vanda was voiced by Joyce Bulifant and Willy was voiced by Frank Welker.

Episode List

eason 1

#Joust in Time
#Trouble in Tokyo
#Mexican Holiday
#Return to Olympus
#Chinese Puzzle
#Teamwork
#Bad Weather Blues
#A Voice in the Wilderness
#Wheel of Fortune
#Hyde and Seek
#Power of the Omnisac
#A Race in Space
#Trial by Fire
#The Great Texas Hole in One
#Arabian Knights and Days
#Mixed Doubles

eason 2

#Viking for a Day
#Monster from the Loch
#Mystery of the Russian Cave
#Rah! Rah! Billy!
#Peril in Peru
#Athenian Adventure
#Pure Luck
#Taj Mahal Mystery
#Australian Adventure
#A Tale of Two Billys

Public Service Announcements

In addition to this series, there were also ten 30 second public service announcements produced by Michael Sporn Animation for syndicated TV during the general period the series aired. These spots also taught the value of fair play and sportsmanship, but without the plot of the series. [Michael Sporn Animation filmography http://www.michaelspornanimation.com/filmography.html]

References

External links

* [http://www.bcdb.com/cartoons/Filmation_Associates/S-Z/Sport_Billy/ Episode outline]
*imdb title|id=0131598|title=Sport Billy