Marine Boy was one of the first color anime to be shown in a dubbed form in the U.S., and later in Australia and the United Kingdom.
It was sold outside Japan via K. Fujita Associates Inc., with Warner Bros.-Seven Arts Television handling worldwide distribution of the English-language version.
The series is set in the future, when humankind has explored the world's oceans, establishing great facilities for undersea ranching (episode 4, 17, 22), mineral and oil exploitation (ep.
In this era there is an ocean-based government agency: The Ocean Patrol, whose mission includes protecting all in the sea from danger (episode 4).
The military branch of the OP includes researchers and scientists who are constantly developing their defensive and offensive arsenal (ep.
However, there are non-military branches of the Ocean Patrol which conduct some of the aforementioned ranching, research, oil drilling and so on.
Patrol boats may be heavily armed, most commonly with small "rocket torpedoes," but optional weaponry is sometimes mounted.
The crew of the P-1 includes Bolton and Piper (a double act, reminiscent of Laurel and Hardy) and often the Ocean Patrol member Marine Boy.
He has a great affinity with sea life, most particularly with a white dolphin he calls Splasher who Marine Boy occasionally seems able to communicate with quite clearly (ep.
It is perhaps because of his skills along with his avid insistence to get involved with trouble that his father, along with Professor Fumble, invented for him the red wetsuit which protects and equips Marine Boy, allowing for him to use his talents to perform dangerous duty.
The boots have hyper-powered propeller packs built into the heels which are so efficient they can enable Marine Boy to move huge boulders (ep.
Marine Boy also has a friend in Neptina, a young bare-chested mermaid who was always kept decent by her long flowing hair.
Neptina wears a magic pearl around her neck, which could be used for various purposes including creating an envelope of protection and deterring dangerous animals (episode 1, 2, 17), as well as working as a crystal ball to see events (ep.
The episodes featured young Dolphin Prince, his mermaid friend Neptuna and Dr. Mariner, with stories entitled "Secret Of The Red Vortex", "Call Of The Sea" and "Attack Of The Sea-Star People".
To complicate matters, not all Japanese networks were interested in buying expensive color film series which were considered vehicles for selling commercial airtime, especially programs aimed primarily at children.
Fuji, however, declined to buy into the project, happy as they were with the ratings they were achieving with their current Thursday night black and white anime series Harris' Whirlwind.
Undeterred, Terebi Doga found external sponsorship from the Matsushita Electric Industrial Company (later to be known as Panasonic), and sold their new version of Dolphin Prince to rival TBS Network.
Marine Kid was a ratings disaster for TBS, slotted as it was directly in opposition to the ever-popular Harris' Whirlwind, which was still airing on Fuji TV at 7:00 pm.
Jaffe expressed interest in re-packaging the existing series and expanding it with newly animated episodes for the English-speaking market, with two provisions.
First, the series needed to run for 78 episodes to ensure the program had substantial shelf-life and value for money for stations buying it.
As per the terms of the agreement, Marine Boy was first run as a syndicated program throughout the U.S. and in international markets from late 1967 onwards.
The Japanese version of the series was eventually sold to Fuji TV and aired on Mondays at 6 pm between 31 January 1969 and 22 September 1969, with only the first 36 episodes broadcast.