Established in the "star year" 3732, the Space Academy, located on an asteroid, brought together the best of young minds, including several with special skills and abilities, to explore the mysteries of space.
Commander Isaac Gampu was the head of the academy. His many years of space exploration exposed him to conditions that immensely slowed his aging process; though appearing to be in his sixties or seventies, his true age was well over 300 years old, giving him a unique perspective on history and some ideal qualifications as a teacher. He oversaw the activities of three student exploratory teams, the Red, Blue and Gold Teams.
Chris Gentry and Laura Gentry were the captain and co-captain, respectively, of the academy's Blue Team. The siblings had highly developed telekinetic and other psychic powers. Laura was attracted to Matt Prentiss, the occasionally-seen leader of the Red Team.
Paul Jerome, a highly intelligent transferee from the Red Team, was raised on an Earth colony. He was number four in the Blue Team's chain of command.
Tee Gar Soom, number five in Blue Team's chain of command, had superhuman physical strength and continued the martial arts traditions of his Asian ancestors. He augmented these abilities with newer disciplines, some of which originated on other planets. His major was medicine, and was often called on to treat other students who were sick.
Loki was a young orphan discovered in the first episode on the dying world of Zalon. A playful prankster, Loki could teleport and could see well beyond the visible spectrum normally accessible by Earth humans. His frequent catchphrase was "Camelopardus!"
As with much of children's television in the 1970s, lessons and morals were taught in each episode. These included wide-ranging concepts, such as that the superpowers possessed by some academy students were not a cure-all for problems, and that even the old and wise could make mistakes. As the students encountered members of extraterrestrial races, even mutated descendants of Earth colonists in space, they came to further develop their wisdom and understanding of diversity throughout the universe. The spaceships commonly seen in the series were called "Seekers" and were used much like a spacebound van or bus. The Seeker's nose was a re-used prop from the earlier Filmation series Ark II. One term of jargon unique to the program was "ORACO", used when orders were acknowledged by academy personnel.
Episodes
Home media
BCI Eclipse LLC , released Space Academy: The Complete Series as a 4-disc Region 1DVD box set on January 16, 2007. The collection presented episodes uncut, remastered and in order of their original airdates, and included special features about the making of the show. Savor Ediciones, S.A. released Space Academy: La Serie Completa as a 3-disc Region 2 DVDbox set on October 28, 2009. Unlike the BCI set, this release only contains the episodes, no bonus features. Being a Region 2 release for Spain, the soundtrack is the dubbed Spanish version. Unfortunately, the original English soundtrack was not included, even as a secondary option. The discs are encoded in the PAL video format, which is the same format as the currently-existing masters, so there is a small amount of additional picture area not present on the NTSC conversions released by BCI Eclipse.
Spin-off
In 1978, a spin-off of Space Academy, Jason of Star Command, debuted. Initially a serialized segment of Tarzan and the Super 7, it starred Craig Littler and James Doohan, with Sid Haig as the villain. Star Command was described as a special section of the Space Academy; the show used the same sets, costumes and special effects as the parent program.
Merchandise
In 1977, a set of four eight-and-a-half inch action figures based on Space Academy characters. The dolls in this set included Issac , , and . Also available for the figures were special "", sold separately.
