newcritics - Latest Comments in Popeye: The Optimus Prime of Early Animation

Re: Popeye: The Optimus Prime of Early Animation

Athanasios — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 22:00:23 -0000

Nice!

Re: Popeye: The Optimus Prime of Early Animation

Kalinikos — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 18:33:31 -0000

Sorry :(

Re: Popeye: The Optimus Prime of Early Animation

Thrasyvoulos — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 23:16:36 -0000

Nice!

Re: Popeye: The Optimus Prime of Early Animation

David Halsted — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 12:31:33 -0000

Funny what kids focus on.

Your daughter may enjoy the Out of the Inkwell cartoons, too.

Re: Popeye: The Optimus Prime of Early Animation

Dan Leo — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 18:29:10 -0000

Dig it, Viscount. Even me and my fellow snotnosed nine-year-old punk friends knew that Brutus was bogus.

Re: Popeye: The Optimus Prime of Early Animation

Viscount LaCarte — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 13:59:03 -0000

Oh, boy, I am so looking forward to this.

You and me both, Dan. Those cartoons are amazing and hilarious. Much better than the new ones they made in the (I think) 50s were Bluto became Brutus

Re: Popeye: The Optimus Prime of Early Animation

Dan Leo — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 12:31:35 -0000

Oh, boy, I am so looking forward to this.
I'm old enough to have watched these on afternoon after-school TV (Sally Starr's cowgirl show in Philly), and I loved this stuff. Now I just need a Curly-era Three Stooges box set.

Re: Popeye: The Optimus Prime of Early Animation

The Shamus — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 10:08:29 -0000

Kevin: Thanks for the info on the backgrounds. To OutOfContext: The Sinbad color short is in this box set, as well. Another reason it's a keeper.

Re: Popeye: The Optimus Prime of Early Animation

OutOfContext — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 08:55:56 -0000

I heard that about the backdrops too, Kevin, and it's easy to believe, although hard to understand technically.
The early Popeye's have no peer in my book and I was excited to see they were coming out on DVD. When Popeye stopped muttering, he lost his character.
I agree about the Depression era black and white, but I do remember a couple of early color cartoons (one with a Sinbad theme) that were pretty fantastic as well.
I also enjoyed (as did my kids) Altman's Popeye and it puzzles me why it is usually marked among his worst. It was done very much in the spirit of the early Popeyes.

Re: Popeye: The Optimus Prime of Early Animation

Kevin Wolf — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 08:34:13 -0000

I'd heard that this set was coming out. I look forward to seeing them.

And thanks for mentioning Segar, whose original Thimble Theater and Popeye strips are works of genius. Fantagraphics has begun publishing >a href="http://www.amazon.com/Popeye-Vol-I-Yam-What/dp/1560977795/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-4044537-8731106?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1185798494&sr=1-1">the complete Popeye and I encourage fans to read them.

BTW, it's my understanding that the backgrounds in these Fleischer cartoons often were, in fact, "real" three dimensional settings. They were rotated on a turntable to create the illusion of movement while the animation cels - depicting, say, Popeye walking - were propped up before the background on glass.