Having aired in an era before the internet integrated itself deeply into our culture, and due to not being the greatest success, it’s difficult to find promotional material for The Legend of Zelda TV series 30 years after it beamed its way into the hearts of young Nintendo fans.
The people of YouTube rarely disappoint when I’m in pursuit of something as obscure as this, however, and thanks to user Dave Flynn, I can present you with — of all things — a Taiwanese commercial of the show.
The commercial starts just as the series’ intro sequence does: The title screen flashes before Princess Zelda explains to Link the importance of the Triforce of Wisdom, and asks for his help protecting the land of Hyrule from Ganon. It then plays a scene from “Kiss ‘N Tell,” in which a maiden is seemingly under threat from a Gleeok and Link and Zelda arrive to save her.
According to the description, this ad is from a VHS tape of the Super Mario Bros. Super Show. The Legend of Zelda TV series aired as a part of the Mario show once a week (you’ll see at the very end of the commercial that it advertises the Zelda cartoon as set to air “This Friday!”).
The Gleeok fight is one of my favorite scenes in the series and is definitely the one I would have chosen for a trailer of this type.
If you can’t get enough of Link’s amazing catchphrase, Zelda Densetsu has uploaded the TV series’ intro in different languages, so you can hear “Excuuuse me, princess!” in French, Spanish, and German (there are also full episodes in these languages in this playlist). It turns out that the French version of the cartoon has a different title card to match its “Princesse Zelda” title!
