Jana of the Jungle

      Jana of the Jungle was, in my opinion, one of the rare cases of Saturday Morning injustice. Most of the better shows, like Filmation’s Tarzan and Flash Gordon series, as well as jana’s companion series Godzilla, not ot mention Land of the Lost, did well with veiwers. Jana was an accomplished adventure series, featuring a female tarzan. These stories were set in the Brazilian rainforest of Soputh America, seemingly HB’s favorite continent, as so many of the Johnny Quest stories took place there. Jana was abandoned in the Amazon Jungle when her father’s boat, the Amazon Queen crashed (it was never revealed what became of her missing father; she spent the series searching for him). She was rasied by Montaro, the last survivor of an ancient warrior tribe of Indians. Her friends included Teeko, a small yapok, or water possum, her white jaguar Ghost, whom she rescued form a poacher’s trap as a cub, and Ben Cooper, a wildlife biologist. Some stories had an environmental theme, and featured poachers, land developers or treasure-seekers invading the Amazon. Others were very much of the “lost race” genre common to ERB and 30s pulps novels, and featured hidden civilization deep in the jungle vastness, including Indian cities of gold, a lost Mayan colony, a fierce tribe of blond women warriors, who gave the Amazon river its mane, and a tribe of giant beast-men.  Jana first aired in 1978, as half of the adventure themed The Godzilla Power Hour. The first half starred Toho movie productions famous monster, in new adventures where he saved the wolrd repeatedly from various mutant menaces. About mid-season, the show expanded into the ninety minute Godzilla Super 90  as original Johnny Quest episodes were added. Godzilla survived the season, and new episodes were aired the following one, but Jana did not. Later, Godzilla was paired in an hour long show with the Super Globe Trotters, and for the following season with Honk reruns of Kong Phooey and Dynomutt. None of these combinations went as well with the Godzilla series as either the Jana episodes or the JQ reruns. It is not entirely clear why Jana herself flopped.   It may have been because adventure shows like this one were mored aimed toward boys, and boys could not identify well with a female protagonists. Girls simply may not have been interested. Thus, the show missed both its audiences. I have written a fanfcic on Jana of the Jungle, which you can find below.
VALE OF LOST MEN