Thursday, July 24, 2008

fleischer's superman

unlike most people my age, i grew up watching old cartoons. i know very little of t.v. from the late 1980's and early 1990's. instead of watching g.i. joe, thundercats, or he-man, i watched looney tunes/merrie melodies, the flintstones, and tom & jerry.
another one of my favourite cartoons growing up was the superman cartoon from the 1940's



look at all the great things in this, the style is amazing, the animation works nicely, it puts nearly all cartoons since then to shame. look at that machine, it's beautiful. and how awesome is lois lane's pilot outfit? kind of funny this version censored out "for a girl". (i'm not saying it's alright i'm just not for censorship, especially retroactive) lois lane always seemed more a strong independent trouble maker than damsel in distress in these anyway.
a random note: see how superman fights against the electrothamasia ray? i still sometimes do that in the shower.


this probably kicked off my love for robots.

seriously i can't get over how beautiful these cartoons are, the amazing art deco style, the sound, scenery, all great! and i love how superman moves, it's so quick and light, that's a superman you can believe in, because honestly it reads as something not from this world.

i'm not really a superman fan these days, superman has become too powerful, too much drama. old superman though, i like him, when he wasn't immortal, when kryptonite wasn't the only thing that could hurt him. although i do love the idea that this man, so dedicated to our world, is completely and totally crushed when brought into contact with fragments of the dead world from which he was born.

superman was a product of a certain time and stood for certain things, this cartoons show that well.



it's easy to see why the batman cartoon of the 1990's took so much influence.

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