Q*bert

Saturday Supercade was an hour-long block of cartoons that played on Saturday mornings beginning in 1983. It included several segments that were each based on a different video game that was popular at the time. For the first season, Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr., Frogger, Pitfall, and Q*bert filled the hour. In the second season, new segments Space Ace and Kangaroo replaced Frogger and Pitfall.

Q*bert, along with his friends Q*ball, Q*val, Q*mongus and girlfriend Q*tee, attended Q*Burg High School, where they had to contend with the resident bullies Coilee, Viper, Ugg and Wrongway–the same baddies Q*bert squared off against in the video game. In a setting predominated by cube-shaped architecture, their world was replete with the cultural tropes of 1950’s America, including drive-ins, malt shops, hotrods and leather jackets.

Coilee Snake and his gang took pleasure in harassing their colorful, tube-nosed classmates, but Q*bert was no pushover. In addition to being brave, popular and an all around good guy, Q*bert had the benefit of a retaliation he called “slippy dew” that was not available in his video game. He occasionally loaded and fired black ball projectiles from his nose that splattered into an oily patch for his opponent to slip on. Luckily for Q*bert and his friends, karma had a way of turning the tables on Coilee and his pals. Although a constant source of trouble, their schemes had a tendency to backfire.

Q*bert ran for two seasons totaling 19 episodes.