The animated series Spawn – based on Todd McFarlane’s antihero of the same name – premiered on this day in 1997 on the HBO cable network. The first season of the adult-oriented television show was for years HBO Home Video’s top-selling original programming video of all time, with combined sales of more than 1 million units.

Todd McFarlane’s Spawn centers on a government assassin who is betrayed and murdered by his employer, then resurrected as a Hellspawn. Spawn is forced to act as the reluctant leader of Hell’s army after making a proverbial “deal with the devil” in order to protect his family.

Keith David plays the voice of Spawn in the TV series, which also stars the character’s creator Todd McFarlane as the host of the show, Richard Dysart as Cogliostro, Dominique Jennings as Wanda Blake, Michael Nicolosi as Clown, and Ming-Na Wen as Jade, along with James Keane, Michael McShane, John Rafter Lee, Victor Love, Kath Soucie, Denise Poirier, Ruben Santiago-Hudson, Charlie Adler, John Hostetter, Ronny Cox, Alex Fernandez, Brendan O’Brien, John DeMita and Tony Amendola.