Defenders of the Earth

Defenders of the Earth is a 1986 American animated television series that aired in first-run syndication. Produced by Marvel Productions and King Features Entertainment, the series imagined the heroes of three King Features Syndicate comic strips (The Phantom, Flash Gordon, and Mandrake the Magician) joining together to form a superhero team. They are joined in their adventures by other characters from their respective strips, including Mandrake's assistant Lothar, Lothar's son LJ, Flash's son Rick, the Phantom's daughter Jedda, and Mandrake's adopted son Kshin. Set in the year 2015, the heroes spend much of their time foiling the various plans of Ming the Merciless to conquer the Earth.

"The Root of Evil" (Season 1, Episode 6)
Ming kidnaps a scientist who has accidentally created a formula that turns people into plants. He also kidnaps the scientist's daughter, and brainwashes her into leading Mandrake (who also knows the source of the formula's ingredients) into a trap.

"The Lost Jewels of Tibet" (Season 1, Episode 13)
Mandrake and Lothar team up with the beautiful Atascadero in search of three mystical jewels. The jewels contain alien life forms that hypnotize the three heroes into helping them.

"Like Father, Like Daughter" (Season 1, Episode 22)
A ship crash lands at the Defenders' base with Kastra, Ming's daughter, on board. Kastra brings a recording of a conversation between Ming and Dr. Janus that speaks of a mind neutralizer and Grand Junction. While the Defenders head to Grand Junction, Dr. Janus demonstrates the Mind Neutralizer, a device that makes people slaves to Ming, at City Hall. The Defenders arrive to find all the people under Ming's control and are taken captive by Kastra and the mind neutralized police force. Kastra accuses Flash of murdering her husband and the Defenders are taken away by the mind neutralized police. Rick, after looking at Kastra's crash landing, realizes that she wasn't shot down and gathers the other members of the younger generation to head for Grand Junction. Dr. Janus connects the Neutralizer to the city's power grid, which allows him to neutralize a larger group of people at the city's stadium. Rick and Company are shot down approaching the city; Jedda is able to evade capture while Rick, L.J., and Kshin are taken to Ming, who has them sent to the stadium along with other citizens to be neutralized. Jedda reaches her father and the other Defenders, but they are spotted by the neutralized citizens of the town. As they flee they encounter Rick, L.J. and Kshin, who are neutralized and command them to stop. Mandrake hypnotizes them to sleep and takes them back to their ship. Flash goes with Kastra to rescue her husband (and his friend) while Mandrake tricks Dr. Janus into handing him the data on the Mind Neutralizer. Understanding how the machine works they are able to reverse the effects and turn Rick, L.J. and Kshin back to normal. Dr. Janus has hooked the Neutralizer to enough power to send its beam to Ming's space station, where Ming sends the Neutralizer's beam over the earth. As he does this Defenders get to the junction for the Neutralizer on the space station and put the reverse effect in. The Neutralizer first turns the Earth's population into Ming's slave and then undoes the mind control.

"Ming's Household Helpers" (Season 1, Episode 27)
The Household Helper robots are the hottest thing on the market. Rick and L.J. go to the store to get one as do many other people. The robot cleans up the Defenders' base with ease and to the elder generation's liking. But Jedda feels something strange about the robot. Rick breaks the robot down (despite the Robot's warnings to not alter circuits) and discovers a long range transmitter; once he does the robot fires a hypnobeam at Rick making him into a slave of Ming. L.J. climbs up on one light, reflects the beam back onto the robot, and destroys the robot by doing so. Rick comes out of his hypnotic state once he does. The elder generation goes to Ming's base to destroy the factory producing the robots; Flash, Mandrake and Lothar are caught and the Phantom appears to be destroyed. The younger generation works on developing a countermeasure to Ming's hypnobeam. Ming sends out the signal to the robots; the robots fire their hypnobeams at the owners and turn them into Ming's slave. The younger Defenders send the countersignal which causes the robots to self-destruct and frees people from the hypnobeam.

"The Necklace of Oros" (Season 1, Episode 56)
An evil alien mentally influences Jedda Walker into choosing the Necklace of Oros from the family treasure room as her birthday present. Later, Mandrake hypnotizes Jedda and learns about both the history of the evil alien and his possible plans for the necklace.