Superman - Heroic Animation That Still Astonishes Today
By bohus
In the early 40s, Superman was a big hit in the comics and on the radio. Paramount held the rights to bring the Man of Steel to the silver screen, but they knew it would be expensive and difficult to depict Superman's amazing abilities in live action. They turned instead to Fleischer Studios, the animation studio run by brothers Max & Dave Fleischer and home of Betty Boop and Popeye. The Fleischers were slowing production of Betty Boop cartoons, thanks to the Hayes Code (an early form of movie content censorship) which demanded that the
Fleischers cool down what they viewed as Boop's salacious antics. Superman could be another hit for their studio, a technical showcase for amazing new animation effects work, and of course the chance to work in dazzling full Technicolor.
The Fleischers feared that a Superman cartoon might be TOO significant a challenge to bring to life. It wasn't impossible, of course, but the difficulty also stemmed from having a studio staff much more accustomed to drawing funny bouncy animal characters. Hoping to spook Paramount, the Fleischers budgeted the first Superman cartoon at an unheard of $100,000 - many times greater thant the cost of any theatrical short. Surprisingly Paramount didn't flinch. They so wanted to cash in on the Superman craze that they negotiated the Fleischers down to $50,000 for the pilot film, and $30,000 per monthly episode (nearly $450,000 in today's money, and twice what it cost to make a Popeye cartoon).
The Fleischers feared that a Superman cartoon might be TOO significant a challenge to bring to life. It wasn't impossible, of course, but the difficulty also stemmed from having a studio staff much more accustomed to drawing funny bouncy animal characters. Hoping to spook Paramount, the Fleischers budgeted the first Superman cartoon at an unheard of $100,000 - many times greater thant the cost of any theatrical short. Surprisingly Paramount didn't flinch. They so wanted to cash in on the Superman craze that they negotiated the Fleischers down to $50,000 for the pilot film, and $30,000 per monthly episode (nearly $450,000 in today's money, and twice what it cost to make a Popeye cartoon).
Not only are these classic 17 cartoons a breakthrough in animation, but they also gave birth to a number of traits that became permanent trademarks of the Man of Steel. The "Faster than a speeding bullet..." pre-amble came from the cartoon (made even more famous by its use in the TV series a decade later), as well as the rousing opening music that was later adopted by the radio series. Most significantly, it is in the cartoon that Superman went from leaping to flying. In the comics, Superman did a lot of jumping around (hence the line "able to leap tall buildings in
Even though I wish that there were better quality prints of Superman to share, that shouldn't stop any of you who haven't experienced these cartoons yet
links:
Fleischer Superman - The Mad Scientist
Fleischer Superman - The Magnetic Telescope
Fleischer Superman - Terror On The Midway