Before creating the 80s juggernaut that was He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, Filmation created a similar cartoon, Blackstar, in 1981, and you can watch the first episode in the latest Everything Action Theater. The series follows astronaut John Blackstar (George DiCenzo), who travels through a black hole into an ancient alien universe and ends up on the Plant Sagar. He teams up with the Trobbits, the shape-changing Klone (Patrick Pinney), the “dragon-horse” Warlock, and Mara the Enchantress (Linda Gary) to battle the evil Overlord (Alan Oppenheimer), who constantly attacks the planet in his attempts to conquer it. Blackstar comes into possession of the Starsword, one half of the powerful Powerstar, which gives him superhuman senses, strength, endurance, reflexes, speed, agility, and almost unlimited invulnerability. Overlord controls the other half, the Powersword. The show lasted for 13 episodes and had a line of action figures, though they started coming out when He-Man was debuting and were mostly overlooked. The series also really hasn’t gotten a proper physical media release. You can watch the first episode, “City of the Ancient One,” below via The Cartoon Vault on YouTube.
