The Heroes (Persian: پهلوانان, romanized: Pahlevānān, meaning The Champions)^{[lower-alpha 1]} is an Iranian animated television series written and directed by Siavash Zarrinabadi and produced by Alireza Golpayegani from Harekat-e Kelidi Company and Saba Animation Center.^[1][2] This series is also dubbed in Arabic and Turkish.^[3] The first season aired in March 2008 on IRIB TV2 and the last season aired in April 2022 on IRIB TV1. This series was rebroadcast many times by IRIB Pooya & Nahal. The series focuses on fight of Pourya-ye Vali's students against Eskandar Khan and admonishes of Pourya-ye Vali in 13th century.

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Pahlavan Pourya-ye Vali, a blacksmith and master of Pahlevan Haydar Khorasani's Zoorkhaneh,^{[lower-alpha 2]} with the ingenuity and cooperation of his students: Pahlavan Yavar, who is like Pouria in blacksmithing, Pahlavan Safi, who was formerly one of the ruling armies of Balkh, has now engaged in felt-making and Pahlavan Mofrad, who was Ayyar, has now set up a barber shop in the city square, fights against the trickery of Eskandar Khan, the greedy and ambitious Darughachi of the city. The lazy and stingy king of city is also present in the series. The story of this collection takes place in the city of Khwarazm, one of the cities of Greater Khorasan, in the 13th century. Each episode has a separate story that ends in the same episode.

• Ali Hemat Momivand as Eskandar
• Bijan Ali Mohammadi as Pourya-ye Vali(Season 1,2,3,4)
• Amir Mohammad Samsami as Yavar
• Zafar Geraei as Mofrad(Season 1,2,3,4)
• Hamidreza Ashtianipour as Safi and Pourya-ye Vali(Season 5)
• Shahrouz Malekarayi as Teymour(Season 1,2,3,4)
• Touraj Nasr as Tooti and Toghrol
• Saeid Sheikh Zadeh as Mofrad(Season 5)
• Shahrad Banki as Teymour(Season 5)
• Mina Ghiaspour as Golrokh
• Hossein Khodadad Beygi
• Valiollah Momeni as Gholam(Season 1,2)
• Siamak Atlasi as Khajeh
• Akbar Manani
• Zhila Ashkan
• Shayesteh Tajbakhsh
• Hadi Jalili
• Amir Manouchehri
• Ali Asghar Rezaeinik
• Naser Khishtandar
• Maryam Nouri Derakhshan
• Mojtaba Fathollahi
• Hasan Kakhi

Alireza Golpayegani described the production of the first season as follows:

The pre-production of this collection lasted 7 months and its production as a group lasted about 2 years. Many people collaborated in the production of this collection. The basis of these stories was laid by Mr. Zarrinabadi in 2004, and the project started in 2005 and ended in 2007. Each episode lasted approximately two months and 10 days, and we produced a total of 13 to 14 minutes per month.^[4]

Siavash Zarrinabadi stated the reason for choosing to make the series 2D:

At first, we had a lot of discussions about choosing the technique of working with our friends in the production team, and finally, from various construction methods such as computer 3D, cut-out and single-frame dolls, the two-dimensional method was chosen. In my opinion, despite the problems of using this method, especially in Iran, such as the large number of production team members and the need for a large workspace compared to the three-dimensional method, which requires fewer people and smaller space, the two-dimensional method and its special graphics are more in line with the storytelling style, characters and historical atmosphere of this collection.^[5]