Posted By Dan Greenfield on Jun 25, 2025 | 8 comments

A BIRTHDAY TRIBUTE to one of comic art’s most influential illustrators…

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Toth self-portrait

By CHRIS FRANKLIN

Alex Toth (June 25, 1928 – May 27, 2006) was many things: illustrator, cartoonist, animation designer, noted vocal curmudgeon, and artistic genius. Perhaps the foremost master of the economy of line in sequential illustration, Toth seemed tailor-made to work in the burgeoning realm of television animation in the 1960s. TV animation budgets were limited, so designs had to be simplified so they could be more easily and affordably replicated.

Toth’s early concept art for The Herculoids. Many images in this post gleaned from Heritage Auctions.

Toth’s ability to break down characters into simple shapes and lines was second to none. He designed characters, illustrated storyboards, and created concept and presentation pieces for some of the most fondly remembered animated TV shows of the ’60s and ’70s, including The Herculoids, The Fantastic Four (1967), Birdman, Sealab 2020, and more, primarily produced by Hanna-Barbera.

Toth’s final design for Space Ghost was meant to mimic Batman… and in turned inspired Bruce Timm’s take on the Caped Crusader for Batman: The Animated Series.

Perhaps best known in animation for his creation of the visuals for Space Ghost and his many artistic contributions to the long running Super Friends, Toth had even more great designs and animation concepts that never made it past TV executive boardrooms. They ranged from kids’ adventure fare, to both original and pre-existing superheroes, and even one of comic strips’ longest running features. To celebrate the date of his birth, let’s take a look at 13 Toth animation presentations and designs that, for one reason or another, never made it to series. Most of these are featured or discussed in the excellent books Genius Animated: The Cartoon Art of Alex Toth by Dean Mullaney and Bruce Canwell, and Alex Toth: By Design by Toth himself and Darrel McNeil.

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Magic Man. One of several aborted superhero series from the 1970s, Magic Man was a revival of a ’60s pitch named Merlin the Magician and seems to focus on a police officer who becomes a mystical hero, while his black house cat becomes a panther. He also drives around in a snazzy vintage car.

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Here Come The Clowns/The Clown Family. Toth and Hanna-Barbera go to the circus… or tried to, anyway. The name of this one seemed to change, but the setting obviously remained. The design of the female character here reminds me of a young Cindy Williams (American Graffiti, Laverne & Shirley). Two years later HB would return to the circus setting with Devlin, inspired by motorcycle stunt rider and ’70s icon Evel Knievel. Unfortunately, in today’s pop culture landscape, “The Clown Family” would probably be created as a horror series. Yeesh.

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Dune Patrol. Unfortunately, not based on DC’s DOOM Patrol, this was the DUNE Patrol, about police officers in a desert area of the US. Mild adventure series like this were big in the ’70s, since parent groups had forced networks to cut back on TV violence and neutered most of the superhero cartoons.

Later versions of this presentation piece show another artist (possibly comic veteran Dan Spiegle) have altered Toth’s designs, but it was all for naught.

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Ghost Girl. Toth used his wife Guyla as the model for this female crimefighter who was a TV newswoman by day. The visual reminds one of Black Canary, whom Toth drew as part of the Justice Society of America in All-Star Comics in the late 1940s, and in a few solo outings in Adventure Comics in the 1972, just three years prior to this piece.

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Jekyll and Hyde. One of the most intriguing of Toth’s never-produced concepts, this proposed 1967 series was obviously based on Robert Louis Stevenson’s famous novel, which of course had been adapted into several feature films by this point. One wonders if Hyde would have still been villainous, or somehow controlled into being a pseudo-super hero? The Hyde design reminds me a bit of Toth’s later take on Gorilla Grodd from Challenge of the Super Friends.

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Hero Brigade aka K Project. This 1981 concept seems to be slightly ahead of the curve in Reagan-era America that saw a spike in military-themed heroes in animation, like G.I. Joe, Rambo and M.A.S.K. An interesting mix of a more modern “space marine”-like aesthetic we’d see later in the decade in the film Aliens, mixed with a ’40s/’50s sci-fi costume design flair.

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Revenge of the Golden Sphinx. One of Toth’s most breathtaking presentations, based around an adventure theme that was about to break big in 1981 with the release of Raiders of the Lost Ark. That same year, Toth quipped about the translation from presentation to potential production” “No way could/would later production art look anywhere like what I’d set down… Glitzy faker sells!”

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Space Avenger. Space Avenger…or is it Rocket Hunter? Or Lancer Jet? Or Rocket King? Toth seemingly worked up this concept art of a father/son space-faring duo with an alien monkey (often prevalent in Toth/HB projects) and a wolf first, and worried about the names later. No idea what the show would be like, but the art is, of course, very striking.

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Annie’s Awesome Foursome. One of Toth’s later projects was an aborted animated series based on Harold Gray’s Little Orphan Annie comic strip. In this 1992 presentation, Annie, Sandy and Daddy Warbucks were heavily updated and given new friends and foes.

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Gang from G.A.L.A.X.Y. An early iteration of the Galaxy Trio, before network CBS sent down the edict to make more superheroes, not only to ride the coat tails of the Batmania craze, but also to compete with ABC’s Fantastic Four… which Toth also did design work for!

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Dial H For Heroes. In 1981, Hanna-Barbera was developing a Saturday morning animated series based on the recently revived “Dial H For Hero” feature running in DC’s Adventure Comics title.

The show would have featured the leads of that revival, Vicki Grant and Chris King, and no doubt plenty of new superheroes for Toth to design each episode.

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Lost in Space. Unlike most of the shows Toth did designs for on this list, this one actually made it into production and on air, or at least the pilot did. Lost in Space was an HB-produced animated revival/reinterpretation of the 1965-67 live-action TV series about the Space Family Robinson.

Despite keeping the Robinson family name, the characters are all new, save for the Robot (renamed Robon) and the trouble-making Dr. Smith, voiced by original actor Jonathan Harris. Toth captures them both, but the Robot design is incredibly simplified in the aired pilot. The show wasn’t picked up, but the pilot ran as part of the anthology series The ABC Saturday Superstar Movie in the fall of 1973.

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Challenge of the Super Friends. Another one that made it to air, albeit in a heavily altered form! Early on in the development of the 1978 season of the Super Friends (referred to initially as “Battle of the Super Heroes”), the series was to introduce Captain Marvel (Shazam!), and a bevy of his villains. As depicted in Toth’s moody presentation piece, Captain Marvel’s arch foe Dr. Sivana would lead the League of Evil.

The team consisted of fellow Marvel Family foes Mister Atom, King Kull, and Beautia Sivana, as well as Batman enemies Joker, Penguin and Poison Ivy (a Catwoman design was also created by Toth). They also included four Flash foes, Heat Wave, Abra Kadabra, Captain Cold and Gorilla Grodd. Sinestro and Cheetah joined from Green Lantern’s and Wonder Woman’s comic series.

Unfortunately, HB learned while they had live-action rights to the Marvels, Filmation now had animated rights, even though they had produced a live-action Shazam! series just a few years prior! The Big Red Cheese and his foes were scrapped, and a good chunk of the Gotham Rogues were off the table too, due to Filmation producing The New Adventures of Batman for a rival network. The League of Evil became the Legion of Doom, under the leadership of Lex Luthor, and had an influx of other comics ne’er-do-wells. Thirteen of the most sinister villains of all time took on the Justice League of America in Challenge of the Super Friends, perhaps the most beloved season of the long-running series.

A year later, Captain Marvel and Sivana would appear in the two HB-produced live-action Legends of the Super Heroes specials, which are based loosely on the Challenge series. Bringing things full circle, Toth did promotional art for the project, used in the “actors wanted” ad that appeared in the industry magazine Variety.

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MORE

— ALEX TOTH’s Enduringly Entertaining and Influential ZORRO. Click here.

— PAUL KUPPERBERG: My 13 Favorite FOUR COLOR COMICS Drawn by ALEX TOTH. Click here.

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13th Dimension contributor Chris Franklin is a graphic designer, illustrator, writer, and podcaster, who co-hosts and produces several shows on the Fire and Water Podcast Network, including JLUCast. Check out his illustrative and design work at chrisfranklincreative.com.