Commentary 16 Jan 2008 08:56 am
Rambling about Cheats
- Jerry Beck has a new toybox of a book called The Hanna Barbera Treasury. I haven’t read the book, but I have picked it up and looked at it. It’s a pop-up, pull-out, unfold and play-with-something-on-every-page kinda book. It’s unfortunate, because I think Jerry probably has a lot to say about this company and their history, but the book is designed to be a fun cartoon book. It’s designed to sell to consumers and not to tell anything truly informative about H&B.
However, because of the review Mike Barrier posted last week and a couple of follow up letters the subject of Hanna Barbera’s value has been raised. Since the review was posted and the letters and comments on other blogs appeared, I’ve thought a lot about the subject.
Let me tell you my history here. I remember when Ruff and Reddy first appeared. I was a kid watching the Howdy Doody Show. They’d gathered their “peanut gallery†at the end of their program to announce that a great new cartoon was going to premiere next Saturday at 10:30 AM, following their program, and they showed a short clip.
The next weekend, I was ready for Ruff and Reddy. Howdy and Buffalo Bob reminded us to watch it. The excitement built to a high.
I watched. I don’t remember much about it; the show didn’t make an impression. I remember a lot of the Howdy Doody shows; not much about Ruff and Reddy. I remember liking the opening credits with the two characters in frames. I remember it was, of course, in B&W as all TV was back then. That’s about it. A lot of long shots cut to close ups. I remember that. I was 10. Disney’s Sleeping Beauty was still two years away.
A couple of years later Huckleberry Hound premiered in syndicated form on local channel 11. It was ok; I liked the design style. However, I recognized that there wasn’t a lot happening and that the backgrounds didn’t have a lot on them. I did like the sponge painting technique; I’d never seen anything like it.
There were a lot of news stories about adults watching Huckleberry Hound (with its other featured cartoons – Yogi Bear and Snagglepuss.) I was maybe 12, but I got the reference to Yogi Berra, and I got the parody of Bert Lahr’s voice. He was the Cowardly Lion; how could I miss it? This show was also in B&W, though color TV was just starting to enter our world.
Yeah, I watched the show daily. I watched more after Yogi Bear got his own show, and I enjoyed the Quick Draw McGraw segments. But there were all those wild west backgrounds with only tiny buttes on the straight lined horizons. Maybe a cactus appeared on the bicycle pans, and I got to recognize what a bicycle pan was (without knowing the term). Essentially I was picking up some animation cheats without doing more than watching.
The Flintstones got a lot of attention when they first appeared on ABC. After all, this was the first animated sitcom. It looked a lot like The Honeymooners, but I liked that. It also reminded me of the Fleischer shorts I’d seen about the cavemen living in a somewhat modern world. There was also that Tex Avery cartoon that was similar; I’d seen it on TV by then. I enjoyed those early Flintstones. It was entertaining when they had their baby, Pebbles. Somehow, though, the show lost it for me about that time. I didn’t watch after Bam Bam entered. By then the great inking was not looking so great. I don’t think I saw The Flintstones in color until the 1970′s.
I watched The Jetsons for a small time; I liked TopCat for the first season (all those voices culled from the Phil Silvers “Bilko†show.)
I opted out once Jonny (ugh) Quest entered, and I never went back to H&B.
Looking back on it all, I see how limited the animation was, but I knew that back then and imitated it in my own 12 year old’s animation. I tried doing the limited animation as H&B developed it, but I’d also tried it as Ward Kimball did it in Toot Whistle Plunk & Boom and those other Disney Tomorrowland shows he did. Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol was also a much bigger influence than H&B.
The backgrounds were interesting, but I was much more interested in the design style I’d seen in 101 Dalmatians or Sleeping Beauty. I’d bought some B&W lobby cards from Sword In The Stone, and I tried my hand at imitating the backgrounds – in colors I’d choose. These were much more enjoyable than anything I’d seen in H&B cartoons.
So, where am I going with all this? Looking back now on all that limited animation history, I have to say that I learned the tricks – probably many of them before I learned the right way to do it. I also got to realize that H&B truly flattened out the animation in ways that UPA and Kimball’s limited animation didn’t do.
For a short time H&B and Ruby Spears farmed animation to New York animators. I picked up a lot of work and was able to animate and assist about 200 feet a week. They liked my stuff, and I made a lot of money in a short amount of time. Weeks later my shows would be on TV, and I couldn’t identify ANY of the scenes I did. It was all so forgettable. It was about making quick money, and I hated it. I quit and started my own company.
I had to unlearn the H&B method to get it out of my system, and I think that the world of animation also had to unlearn it. Unfortunately, I don’t think it ever came undone. All those bad habits that were designed by brilliant guys working for Hanna Barbera are too strong.
_Then, John Kricfalusi with Ren & Stimpy introduced newer ways of cheating – ways that worked for that show. Everyone who graduated from Cal Arts started imitating that.
_Now with the influence of Flash, tv animation is doomed to move east or west, bob up and down, and rarely toward or away from the screen. There is no such thing as perspective. Big actions happen off screen or pop from one pose to another (some justify this as an imitation of Tex Avery’s work – it’s not.) If a car crashes, do it off screen. Just shake the background with the audio crash. There are a hundred much more subtle cheats I could point out. You see them everywhere: in anything on tv, in Persepolis, in The Triplettes of Belleville, in newer Disney features. Everywhere.
Today, there’s a lot of sloppy cheating and very little animation to see. It all did really start with Hanna Barbera when they modernized animation to become a big assembly line. Michael Barrier is right in his review. I’m not a fan of Hanna and Barbera’s work – not even on the Tom and Jerry cartoons. (As a matter of fact, I suspect they helped Rudy Ising get the boot from MGM after taking his characters from that first T&J cartoon, Puss Gets The Boot.) But I’m not talking about their MGM work, here. I’m just interested in the factory they built on Cahuenga Blvd and the bad habits they offered the future.
In a way it’s brought us back to the days of silent animation. Col. Heeza Liar probably used more drawings than your average Huck Hound cartoon. I’m not sure the stories were any better either.
Is it time to invent Mickey Mouse again?
on 16 Jan 2008 at 11:12 am 1.Thad Komorowski said …
(As a matter of fact, I suspect they helped Rudy Ising get the boot from MGM after taking his characters from that first T&J cartoon, Puss Gets The Boot.)
Hi Mike.
Maybe Hanna and Barbera did have some clout in getting Ising booted out of MGM, but as unoriginal as Tom and Jerry are, they were indeed their own characters, and they were the defacto directors of “Puss Gets the Boot”, not Ising. Friz Freleng definitely remembers this as true as he was also uncredited for the color cartoons he directed at MGM.
on 16 Jan 2008 at 12:13 pm 2.Dave Levy said …
This is an interesting post, Michael. In a way we are talking about the long term effects of TV animation on the entire industry. There are even long term negative effects from the golden age of theatrical cartoons. This is where animation, and the stories it chose to tell, went from the early silent trick film to full blown technicolor kids films. Sure, these played for general audiences, but so did Casablanca. Today, nobody sits down a five year old with a dvd babysitter of Casablanca, but they will do that with the Loony Tunes Golden Collection. So, there’s a lot of legacy of blame to spread around.
TV gets a bum rush in this equation. We shoudn’t forget that besides Bakshi’s attempts, there has been very little innovation in animated features in America since Fantasia. I’m talking about experimental storytelling. Challenging storytelling. Not a better depiction of fur or hair in a Pixar film. So, it can be argued that on TV we saw the real new develoments. Think South Park, The Simpsons, Beavis and Butthead, Rocky and Bullwinkle, etc. Each of these introduced new visions and storytelling to animation in ways that are only rivaled by independent short animated films.
Yes, there’s tons of junk in TV animation. But, there’s cream hiding among it. How lucky we are to have the best, most inspiring aspects of golden age animation, TV animation, indy short films, as well as foreign films to inspire us in 2008. That’s how I see it.
on 16 Jan 2008 at 12:51 pm 3.Michael said …
Dave, I point out, in the next to the last paragraph, that I’m only talking about the TV Hanna-Barbera (and my comments about MGM were a low-rent side trip), and we’ere talking about the inventors of the animation-production-belt. I’m not blaming TV, though obviously the budgets were part of the culprit. However, I do point out that excellent limited animation was done for TV – see Disney Tomorrowland shows or Magoo’s Christmas Carol. Even Charlie Brown was better. These all were done at the same time as or predate HB’s work.
If you’re looking for important (as in changing) animation, you shouldn’t have jumped past UPA in shorts or Yellow Submarine in features. Rooty Toot Toot and Telltale Heart tell their stories in wholly new ways for the time. (Doesn’t Rooty Toot Toot predate Roshomon?)
on 16 Jan 2008 at 1:13 pm 4.Dave Levy said …
Excellent examples of great TV stuff there. Good point!
And, again, great post!
on 16 Jan 2008 at 1:17 pm 5.Dave Levy said …
and UPA and Yellow Sub, and the rest too.. all truly the gold standard for what is possible.
on 16 Jan 2008 at 1:34 pm 6.Thad Komorowski said …
“Rooty Toot Toot” is a masterpiece. Hubley is one of the few directors from the Golden Age whose work had a ‘point of view’ (though it wasn’t necessarily one I always like). Too often in animation is POV lacking and artists don’t reach beyond the level of entertainers.
on 16 Jan 2008 at 2:08 pm 7.Jerry Beck said …
I’m glad The Hanna Barbera Treasury has spurred such interesting discussions. My only goal with the book was to recall the original appeal of the Hanna Barbera characters through images, mostly from the period when the cartoons were made. The book was meant to be a gift book, an art book and a lot of fun. I think we succeeded.
on 16 Jan 2008 at 7:05 pm 8.Emmett Goodman said …
Mr. Sporn, just for the record, TOP CAT was on for only one season. So saying you liked the first season TOP CAT kind of means you liked the whole series. I apologize if I am putting words in your mouth.
I get the impression that the Hanna Barbera book is mostly fully of memorabilia images. I know it has a couple of good ink drawings in it, but is there a fair amount of original artwork and stuff. I am not interested in memorabilia, but I would love a visually detailed book with artwork from the early Hanna Barbera period.
Limited animation is now treated as a last resort for some animators. I know I see it as a last resort, but only because I am still a student with little time on his hands. But that also gives the need to compensate with more creativity in the content, design, backgrounds, etc. Most of the Hanna Barbera stuff from 1957 to about 1965 had all this. I grew up looking at HB’s stuff from the 1980′s. They blew so many chances to re-invigorate themeselves creatively, and their work lost a timeless quality.
on 16 Jan 2008 at 9:22 pm 9.Michael J. Ruocco said …
I saw the book at my local Barnes & Noble the other day. I flipped through it & there’s a lot of toy pictures & stuff in it, but there’s a fair supply of drawings and such there too.
Besides The Flintsones & Top Cat, I never really cared for Hanna-Barbera cartoons. Flintstones & Top Cat had some pretty good artwork & designs in it & were entertaining, but everything else to me was a complete bore. I guess as a kid I enjoyed it more, but I grew out of it as I got older.
I know HB cartoons had extremely low budgets, but they’re really “assembly line cartoons”: shelled-out, mass-produced TV fodder. The early ones (Huckleberry Hound to Top Cat) were great, but they gradually went downhill from there. They had good intentions, but they did really blow they’re chances. So much potential.
I know I might sound too negative here, but I’m just speaking from my heart. Sure, animation hasn’t really had too many inspiring moments since the Golden Age, but I agree with Dave: there are a few diamonds in the rough out there, but nobody really has stretched the creative boundaries. It’s like a rubberband, you get to an apex at one short moment & then it pulls back before it can go any farther.
on 16 Jan 2008 at 10:16 pm 10.Michael said …
I’ll have to do a little research, but I believe TopCat came back for more (much later) after its initial season. The first season had inked lines, the remainder were xeroxed.
on 17 Jan 2008 at 2:03 am 11.Eddie Fitzgerald said …
I agree with much of what you’re saying here. I can’t stand Hanna Barbera cartoons! I love the things about it that John K discussed on his blog — some good people worked there, no doubt about it — and the toys and Golden Books were great, but the cartoons themselves were unwatchable.
I thought the best parts of the HB cartoons were the intros. Was Joe responsible for those? The singers were bursting with energy and enthusiasm, and were incredibly professional. The visuals on the best examples fit the music perfectly. If only the rest of the show had been half as good.
I haven’t seen Jerry’s book but he has pretty good taste and probably managed to find the fun stuff.
on 18 Jan 2008 at 9:01 pm 12.Tom Sito said …
NIce post Mike. Sorry I came in so late, I’ve been nursing a cold. Yeah, I always wondered when there would be a good book on how the relationship between Bill and Joe really worked. All their publications were always kept on the surface about such things. I was surprised to learn that despite being lifelong partners, they rarely socialized together. Bill and his wife were over Joe’s house for dinner only twice in their lifetimes. All the time I worked there, I never saw them together for more than a quick conference, but I wasn’t privy to the higher echelons then .
Whatever the truth to the system to their partnership, one of the most successful in film history, it worked.
on 21 Jan 2008 at 5:08 pm 13.John Tebbel said …
Hal Erickson’s Television Cartoon Shows says H-B made 30 episodes of Top Cat, aired on ABC from 9/61 through 3/63. He also mentions that the characters were used in Yogi’s Treasure Hunt in the 80s and in the 90s in Wake, Rattle and Roll. Maybe that explains the ink/Xerox memories.
Kids Say the Darndest Things Dept.: When speaking to my son some years ago about Mary Blair, I got on to the lack of women in the top echelons of animation. He asked, “But what about Hannah Barbera?”
on 21 Jan 2008 at 5:13 pm 14.Michael said …
Thanks for the Top Cat clarification.
A companion I once had thought that the animation industry was run by women: Hannah Barbera, Patty Freleng, and Ruby Spears.
on 05 Apr 2010 at 6:02 am 15.Steven Hartley said …
Actually Michael, William Hanna and Joseph Barbera did direct ‘Puss Gets the Boot’ and they were uncredited for their positions, Fred Quimby was an uncredited producer, and maybe the cartoon led to the ‘booting’ of Rudolf Ising’s career at MGM’s, but to be honest, I think the Fred Quimby cartoons of Tom and Jerry were just better than Rudolf Ising’s “Puss Gets the Boot”, I mean it led them up to seven Academy Awards for Best Cartoon, and it tied against Disney’s Silly Symphonies.
Yet, I think they did a good job of Tom and Jerry, and I was a fan of it as a boy, and I still am, In fact, I love it so much that I’ve downloaded the cartoons onto my Ipod. Yet, they’ve done some pretty awful remakes of Tom and Jerry, like the MOVIE, Chuck Jones’ cartoons, the 1975 TV series, the Tom and Jerry Kids, and the new Tom and Jerry Tales.
Kind regards,
Steven Hartley
on 05 Apr 2010 at 7:25 am 16.Michael said …
Steven, you present a good case for Hanna & Barbera at MGM. However, I don’t like these films, so it doesn’t help me. They’re heartless and violent in a way no other animated characters of the period are.
The Academy Award has rarely been a sign of excellence. I can name two dozen horrible films that won – including Logorama. And I’m an Academy voter.
on 07 Apr 2010 at 5:47 pm 17.Steven Hartley said …
Thanks for your reply Michael, I mean we all have different opinions, you don’t like Tom and Jerry, I love Tom and Jerry. We all have different tastes to things, and yes I do notice that Tom and Jerry are very heartless and violent, but to be honest, I think they are supposed to be,
Yet, there have been Academy Award films that were rubbish, I mean I wasn’t keen on ‘The Milky Way’ because I found it quite boring, I thought Bugs Bunny’s 1st appearance of ‘A Wild Hare’ should have won it, oh well, can’t expect everything perfect, and thanks for sharing your opinions.
on 05 Jun 2010 at 11:44 am 18.Steven Hartley said …
Michael,
About the comment I send before, well I started a website yesterday called “Blabbing on Arts and Culture” and I begun my first “official” post which is about Tom and Jerry and its history.
I feel proud of what I’ve written.
on 01 Oct 2010 at 5:51 pm 19.Stephen Rhodes Treadwell said …
To the person who called Tom & Jerry unoriginal-what are you talking about? They’re very unusual cartoon characters? To the one who called the Chuck Jones T&J’s, the Tom & Jerry Kids show, Tom & Jerry the Movie & Tom & Jerry tales awful-what do you mean? Each of those versions, especially the 1975 one, is real good! I wouldn’t think it at all ridiculous if you called the Tom & Jerry Comedy Show, the Gene Deitch T&J’s or Tom & Jerry the Nutcracker awful.
on 30 Jun 2013 at 5:45 am 20.Stephen Rhodes Treadwell said …
I’m so glad Ben hasn’t followed me here!
on 30 Jun 2013 at 5:53 am 21.Stephen Rhodes Treadwell said …
I’d like to point out the things that make T&J original. Having a version where they’re friends, the 1975 one, does. What other cartoon has a version so unlike the original? The way they team up w/ each other sometimes, the fact that Tom’s not always trying to get Jerry, the fact that he usually tries to harass Jerry rather than trying to eat him & the fact that he defeats Jerry sometimes are all original things about T&J. T&J’s original because it’s not plain & simple like most predator VS prey cartoons.
on 12 Dec 2014 at 3:37 am 22.stainless steel polish said …
I just now like the useful data you source to the content articles. I will search for your blog as well as test all over again right here on a regular basis. My business is a little certain We’re informed a lot of completely new goods appropriate listed here! All the best for an additional!
on 02 Mar 2015 at 7:26 am 23.Stephen Treadwell said …
I definitely prefer Tom from T&J to Sylvester from T&S! I think Tom’s fantastic & I could live w/out Sylvester.
on 04 Nov 2015 at 12:32 pm 24.cartoon tom and jerry said …
Spot on with this write-up, I seriously believe that this web site needs a great deal more attention. I’ll probably be
back again to see more, thanks for the info!