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Originally conceived by creator Bruce Timm as a serious animated superhero series a la Timm's Batman, Freakazoid! was transformed into a wild and crazy lampoon of the "masked crusader" genre at the behest of its executive producer, Steven Spielberg). The hero of the piece was teenaged computer nerd Dexter Douglas, who as a result of a humongous Internet crash was sucked into his PC and transformed into the super-powered Freakazoid! Though his strength and skills were awesome, Freakazoid! was a bit on the stupid side--but even so, he was evenly matched with the rather cloddish villains he came across, such as The Lobe, Cave Guy and the Cobra Queen. Whenever his powers failed him, Freakazoid was able to keep the bad guys at bay by confusing them with a tirade of incomprehensible computer jargon. Dexter/Freakazoid's pal at the police department was the insecure Sgt. Mike Cosgrove (voice supplied by Ed Asner), while the girl of his dreams was Steph, who possessed an ear-shattering scream. Like many another cartoon series seen on the WB network in the 1990s, Freakazoid! entered on two levels, with plenty of fast action and silly slapstick for the youngsters, and an abundance of sly satire and "inside" jokes for the older viewers. Story editor Paul Rugg took special pride in the fact that the series was totally unpredictable: "There is no format. Each show you never know what direction you take. . .[I]t's basically about being silly. . ." Debuting as a Saturday morning series September 9, 1995, the 24-episode Freakazoid ended its intial run as part of the WB's Monday-Friday schedule on November 29, 1996.