Forgotten 90's Cartoons: WILDC.A.T.S

  There was a time in the early 90's when comic book cartoons were huge. Batman The Animated series and the X-men cartoon premiered in 1992 to critical and commercial success, spurning  out long running toy lines and countless other merchandise. Of course by 1994 other cartoons were hoping to match that success. Marvel dropped 3 new cartoons on various networks and CBS aired WILDC.A.T.S.

  Based on the Jim Lee comic of the same name that launched in 1992, published by newly founded Image Comics. "WILDC.A.T.S: COVERT ACTION TEAMS" was a success upon release like most of the early Image titles. Later in the series run comic great Alan Moore (WATCHMEN) would take on writing duties.

 The choice to turn this series into a cartoon is most likely due to the fact that the designs in the X-men cartoon were based on Jim Lee's designs and CBS was hoping to cash in on his popularity. The tone and story telling in the episodes were clearly trying to copy the style of The X-men series. It aired alongside "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" and "Skeleton Warriors" as part of the CBS' Action block.

From top clockwise. Maul, Grifter, Warblade, Spartan, Zealot, Voodoo. 

Void and Marlowe.

  The cartoon retained the same team of characters from the comics. There was Spartan the cyborg leader, Maul the purple/green dude that got bigger and less intelligent the more angrier he got (Sound familiar?), Void the android, Voodoo the telekinetic that had her stripper back story stripped away, Grifter the gunman, Zealot  the samurai, the cartoon's rookie character Warblade with the ability to change his hands into different kinds of blades and Jacob Marlowe who was an imp in the comics is now just a regular human.

  Everyone on the team besides Marlowe were descendants of an ancient alien race called the Kherubim. the Kherubim have been in a centuries long war with the evil aliens the Daemonites. The Daemonites where lead by the evil Lord Helspont whose diabolical plan was to use his army to take over the world, OF COURSE!.

  The cartoon only lasted one season with a total of 13 episodes. Most episodes focused on one character to establish personality's and back story while, continuing the season long arc. The writing was not as good as say Batman The Animated Series or the X-men 90's cartoon but it was still a decent show in my opinion.

Grifter Action Figure

  Like most cartoons it had a toy line. The toy line was produced by Playmates Toys, who were already having a huge success with there Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles line. The WILDC.A.T.S set included all of the main characters and some of the side characters. Every figure came packed with a trading card if you were lucky you might find one of the cards signed by Jim lee. I was never that lucky though I frantically searched. There were several vehicles and even jumbo figures. The design of the figures were very different from the normal Playmates design as most of Playmates' figures were done in the squatting Pose of the TMNT figures, these instead were done in in a more realistic style and made at a 6 inch scale, not yet an industry standard as most figures of the 90's were a 5 inch scale.

  Though the cartoon did not last this was always a personal favorite of mine and I remember always being excited to wake up Saturday mornings to watch this show. It may not be great but it was fun, if you like 90's cartoons, superheroes, or both give this show a try. As for me I'm still dreaming of owning the Jumbo sized Grifter, that my parents said was too expensive, yes $10 used to be high price for an action figure.

Any way "WILDC.A.T.S HO!"... wrong series.