ReFrederator Blog

Paramount’s Little Lulu cartoons were produced in Times Square in New York City. Lulu, and a new series of miscellaneous cartoons, called NOVELTOONS (a play on the word “novelties”), joined the POPEYE on the Paramount short subject release schedule in 1943.

This was part of a new begining for Paramount’s cartoon studio - formerly the Max Fleischer studio - now dubbed FAMOUS STUDIOS (after Paramount’s Famous Music and Famous Players subsidiary businesses). Paramount moved the operation back up to New York City from Miami - and demanded a fresh start. Only Popeye remained a holdover from the last regime - and now those cartoons would be produced in color.

Paramount bought the rights to Little Lulu, a popular Saturday Evening Post panel cartoon, an created a very funny, very appealing series around her. Audiences loved the cartoons and animators loved the character. Feminists still consider her (along with Wonder Woman) [Read more…]

Comic Strip Week comes to a close with “A Scout with Gout,” a 1947Little Lulu cartoon from Paramount/Famous cartoon. ‘Marge’ (as in ‘Marge’s Little Lulu”) referred to Marjorie Henderson Bell, the cartoonist who introduced the tiny terror in the Saturday Evening Post, back in the thirties. But most baby boomers remember Lulu for just about everything else she did outside that original venue — comic books, animated cartoons… even her stint as spokesperson for Kleenex tissues.

I always thought Little Lulu was just about the most underrated classic cartoon series from animation’s golden era. These things had wonderful production values, and were, on the whole, among the funniest films Famous ever turned out.

Don’t you just love Lulu’s pop in “A Scout with Gout?” A really zesty, full blooded personality —look at his body language describing the great outdoors. No doubt a lot of this extra punch is due to the fact [Read more…]

Comic Strip Week rocks on with today’s item, a 1936 RKO/Van Beuren cartoon based on Fontaine Fox’s “Toonerville Folks.” By the time this film was released, the eccentric Toonerville gang was a national institution, having already entertained readers for almost thirty years (and they would go on for another twenty!) Everybody knew all about the Toonerville Trolley, the Skipper, Powerful Katrinka and the Terrible Tempered Mr. Bang, so the animators didn’t waste a lot of time on introductions in “Trolley Ahoy, ” the second of three Toonerville cartoons.

Burt Gillett, a seasoned Disney guy, worked on all the Toonerville films, and didn’t try too hard to get the exact look of the original comic while directing this one. In the funny pages the action was scribbled down by Fox in a crazy, squiggly style, usually framed from a high vantage point, as if we were perched on a telephone pole. Here, [Read more…]

Today’s classic is “The Bulleteers”, one of the 17 Superman cartoons Paramount released in the early 1940’s. All of these toons are nothing short of terrific, but “Bulleteers” has always been a favorite, my vote for the absolute best of the series. The plot concerns a trio of thugs who terrorize Metropolis piloting a miraculous vehicle that has more functions than a Swiss Army knife. They smash their plane/car/torpedo into public buildings, demand ridiculous ransoms, and wear snazzy costumes with pointy helmets and diaphanous sleeves. These guys are just begging for a comeuppance from you know who!

The animation is lush, the production design is gorgeous, but it’s the story telling technique that’s truly amazing here. Director Dave Fleischer doesn’t waste a frame, presenting every detail of a very lean narrative in the most dynamic fashion imaginable. Gothic shadows, subjective angles and a fabulous montage of “tracking shots” are just a few of [Read more…]

SUPERMAN!

Perhaps the greatest innovation of the Fleischer Studio: a cartoon that tells a dramatic story. A science fiction story.

Whereas cartoons were previously the domain of funny animals, fairy tales and parodies, the SUPERMAN cartoons pioneered a new genre for animated films.

The series was unequaled for decades, and has inspired today’s generation of superhero animators, live action directors and auteur Japanese animators.

[Read more…]

For successful transfer from funny papers to movie screen, Popeye certainly takes the cake… or spinach quiche if you prefer. In 1929 Elzie Segar introduced the squinty sailor in his pre-existing comic strip “Thimble Theatre.” and Bam!  — an instant hit. Just four years later the character became a major movie star overnight, thanks to the wonderful cartoons produced by Max Fleischer and directed by his brother Dave.

The Fleischers never tried to imitate the long curlicue narratives of the Popeye’s newsprint existence, but the animators borrowed a lot from the original, including Segar’s flavorful cast of characters (Wimpy, Poopdeck Pappy, the Jeep, the Goons, et al. )

Today’s Comic Strip Week installment is a classic from 1936, “Popeye with Little Swee’ Pea”, the first onscreen appearance of the tough little baby, Swee’ Pea. In the funnies, Swee’ Pea was Popeye’s adopted son, but the animated versions were always a little vague about the kid’s [Read more…]

You might notice at the bottom of many of our ReFrederator blog posts the signature of Dave Kirwan, and you might also be wondering who said Dave Kirwan is.

Meet Dave, the lead programmer of the hit ReFrederator podcasts.

We first met Dave almost a decade ago as a Duluth, Minnesota based winner of a storyboard contest I was running at Hanna-Barbera Cartoons. The next year he came by in person touring his almost-winner-son –16 year old Alex Kirwan (many of you know Alex as a talented cartoonist in his own right, and the art director of My Life as a Teenage Robot; Alex was too young to win, by the way, or it would have been a landslide)– around the studio. At the time, in addition to his skills as an award winning illustrator Dave co-owned an advertising agency and syndicated his strip “Martian Comicals.”

And of course, he’s a stone fan and complete expert on [Read more…]

Hot Damn! We’re off on week two of the world’s first daily classic cartoon podcast! For the next few days ReFrederator will be throwing the spotlight on films based on popular comic strips.

We kick things off with a real curio from 1936, “Happy Days,” a one shot pilot for a proposed series based on funny paper favorite “Reg’lar Fellas.” Well, it WAS a favorite back in the twenties and thirties — kind of a comic strip version of “Our Gang,” only without the ethnic diversity (most of the characters had last names like Duffy, Riley and Flynn.)

The Ub Iwerks studio produced this first film incarnation of the strip, carefully adapting their distinctive house style to reflect some of creator Gene Byrnes’ own look and technique. Byrnes drew his cast of characters (Jimmie Dugan, Pudd’nhead, Pinhead, Bullseye the Dog, et al) in a sort of pleasant correspondence school manner that is [Read more…]

From Gizmodo:

If we could have a crush on a podcast, we would be totally crushing out right now all over the recently launched ReFrederator, which puts out a classic cartoon every single day. Some of them star the likes of Bugs Bunny, Mighty Mouse, Daffy Duck, Betty Boop, Porky Pig, Donald Duck and Felix the Cat—ah, the beauty of things returning to the public domain—and others feature fairy tales and musicals.

Each week of cartoons will have a theme, and this first week’s is Mother Goose. If ReFrederator takes requests, we here at Gizmodo are selfishly hoping for a best of Fritz Freleng week sometime soon!

Thanks Gizmodo.

Next week is COMIC STRIP WEEK on
ReFrederator, the daily vintage cartoon podcast.
Your best Retrotainment value!

Thanks to you, ReFrederator was #1 on iTunes three days after Monday’s launch, and we’re now comfortably settled in the Top 5. Here’s what’s up for the coming week.

MONDAY (Apr 24): “Happy Days” starring Reg’lar Fellas.

TUESDAY (Apr 25): “Little Swee’ Pea” starring Popeye and Sweet Pea.
Very old. Very funny. Very black and white.

WEDENSDAY (Apr 26): “The Bulleteers” starring Superman.
We put the ’super’ in superfluous.

THURSDAY (Apr 27): “Trolley Ahoy”
starring Skipper, Mr. Bang, and the Powerful Katrinka.

FRIDAY (Apr 28): “Scout with Gout” starring Little Lulu.

One week from Monday. Bad first impressions.
It’s Celebrity Imitation Week.