The Lone Ranger is an American animated television series that ran 26 episodes Saturday mornings on CBS from September 10, 1966, to September 6, 1969.^[1] The series was produced by Herb Klynn and Jules Engel of Format Films, Hollywood, and designed and made at the Halas and Batchelor Cartoon Film studios in London, England & Artransa Park Film Studios in Australia.^[2]

In 1980, Filmation produced another Lone Ranger cartoon series.

Overview

The adventures in this Lone Ranger series were similar in tone and nature to CBS' prime-time Weird Western, The Wild Wild West, in that some of the plots were bizarre and had elements of science fiction and steampunk technology included in the story.^[3] One of the Lone Ranger's archenemies in the animated series was a dwarf named Tiny Tom and his giant henchman named Goliath; an analogue to The Wild Wild West's Dr. Miguelito Loveless and his giant companion Voltaire. Other supervillain-style foes in the series included the Fly, the Frog People, the Black Widow, the Queen Bee, the Iron Giant, Mephisto, Mr. Happy, Mr. Midas, the Rainmaker and Shandarr the Puppetmaster.^[4]

Cast

• Michael Rye — Lone Ranger
• Shepard Menken — Tonto
• Dick Beals — Tiny Tom
• Agnes Moorehead — The Black Widow
• Hans Conried — Mephisto
• Paul Winchell — The Rainmaker

Production

The Lone Ranger's voice was provided by Michael Rye {r.n. John Michael Riorden Billsbury}, and Shepard Menken provided that of Tonto. The narrator in the opening titles was Marvin Miller, whose narration ran:

When the factories first began to send their pall of smoke over the cities, and farmlands of the East offered only the barest living, Americans turned their faces toward the West. They poured into the new territory by the thousands--fording the mighty rivers, climbing the mountains, fighting Indians and outlaws--praying...toiling...dying.

It was a hard land, a hostile land. Only the strong survived...a new American breed--the pioneer.
In this forge upon this anvil was hammered out a man who became a legend...a daring and resourceful man who hated thievery and oppression.
His face masked...his true name unknown...with his faithful Indian companion at his side, he thundered across the West on his great white stallion, appearing out of nowhere to strike down injustice and outlawry...and then, vanishing as mysteriously as he came.
His sign: a silver bullet.

His name: The Lone Ranger!!!

Other guest voices were provided by Paul Winchell, Agnes Moorehead, and Hans Conried.

The animation was limited. But the backgrounds had a dark style, with blocks of color elided from the line, which visually set the show apart from many other cartoon TV series of the time. The distinct atmospheric music was composed by Vic Schoen, who also provided the powerful arrangement of Gioachino Rossini's William Tell Overture for the show's memorable opening sequence. Along with the Halas and Batchelor animators, the background department, led by Tom Bailey, Ted Petengel and designer Chris Miles, were responsible for setting the graphic style. The drawings were produced by chinagraph pencil on cell. Colored papers were cut or torn under or against the lines of the background, producing a dramatic and rich textural effect.

List of episodes

Home media

The 1960s animated cartoon TV series version of The Lone Ranger was not available on home media as of the middle of January 2017. This was partially explainable as a result of confusion over the ownership of the copyright to it. However, Universal Television, which had been partially responsible for the show's production in the sense of having commissioned Format Films and Halas and Batchelor Animation to work on it with the permission of Jack Wrather Productions, then owners of the Lone Ranger copyright, could be said to have a legitimate copyright-ownership claim.^{[citation needed]}