The Real Superman - 1942

[scotrace]

Netflix dropped this off yesterday and we've been watching it in bits. The Max Fleischer Superman animated shorts from the early forties. They're amazingly evocative, though my kids find the animation pretty clunky. To me, it looks wonderfully hand-drawn and with much more character than, say, Lion King.

The stories are formulaic, of course. Evil doer is up to mischief, The Daily Planet sends Clark Kent and Lois Lane out for the scoop, Lois loses Clark the weenie on the way, Clark sees what's up, "This looks like a job {voice change} for Superman!" He shows up in the nick of time to save Lois, and gets a swell story in the papers next day.

The Magnetic Telescope, Volcano! The electric Earthquake...

What's not to like?

 

[jake_fink]

I love these too. I have them on dvd, but when my son and I are watching Maxwell DeMille's Movies in Your Home on the computer in the evening we'll watch one of the Superman cartoons between Flip the Frog and Betty Boop - just coz we both love them. They are total eye candy. They were a big influence on the Batman animated series of the 90s and they were ripped off outright for the best part of the Sky Captain movie. The stories are a little.... flat, though.

 

[LizzieMaine]

It's also worth noting that the excellent voice work in these cartoons is provided by Bud Collyer and Joan Alexander -- who were also playing the lead roles in the "Adventures of Superman" radio serial at the time. It was there that Collyer originated the idea of playing Superman's voice an octave lower than Clark's -- the Clark Kent voice was actually Collyer's natural voice, which he was also using to hawk Duz every afternoon as announcer for "The Goldbergs". While his identity as the actor who played Superman was supposed to be a closely held secret, any kid who listened to Ma's soap operas when home from school wouldn't have had too much trouble figuring it out...

Collyer and Alexander would return to the roles in the mid-sixties for a Saturday morning "Superman" cartoon series -- which was far below the Fleischer standard animation-wise, but the voice work was, as always, excellent.

 

[Doctor Strange]

I have loved these FOREVER. They used to run all the time on local NYC station kid shows back in the late 50s/early 60s when I was a kid, because they were public domain. And they were nearly the first thing I tracked down when I started collecting films - I got the first one on Super 8 sound back in 1972.

It's heartening to see that folks are still discovering them and getting blown away today...

 

[Zach R.]

Is there a definitive DVD of these?

 

[Maj.Nick Danger]

Superman as he was meant to be.

Those are way cool! How many were made and are they all compiled on one DVD?

 

[The Wolf]

a big fan as well

I believe a DVD came out recently is the definitive Fleischer Superman. I'll try to find the name and maker.
Ironically on my various classic cartoon DVDs I have six Supermans on a disc that is suppose to be Popeye. It has one Popeye cartoon (from 1956), the over-used Woody Woodpecker cartoon, "The Pantry Panic" and the rest is Superman.

Sincerely,
The Wolf

 

[Doh!]

I recommend "The Diamond Collection;" the prints are all really good. No extras, though.

GREAT stuff.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/63...5-4388626?_encoding=UTF8&s=dvd&v=glance&n=130

 

[scotrace]

I think the one I got is a new release. Popular too: It was a "long wait" for awhile.

 

[Doctor Strange]

For those who aren't up on these, there's a cool page on the Fleischer cartoons here:

http://www.supermanhomepage.com/movies/movies.php?topic=m-fleis

There's a Wikipedia entry too:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superman_(1940s_cartoons)

And you can supposedly view them here - though with my dial-up connection on this machine, I wouldn't dare try:

http://rao.kal-el.org/#fleischer

 

[Maj.Nick Danger]

Thanks Doc.

All the info one could need on the subject, and I found the DVD at Amazon for about 6 bucks.

 

[Jack Armstrong]

The Fleischer Superman cartoons -- and tons of other films from the 30s, 40s and 50s -- can all be downloaded from :

http://www.archive.org/details/feature_films

 

[Hondo]

Max Fleischer

The Fleischer Superman cartoons -- and tons of other films from the 30s, 40s and 50s -- can all be downloaded from :

http://www.archive.org/details/feature_films

Wow thanks, like many of you, I too recall these on TV many many moons ago. I loved these, and if I ran into them by chance, I'd quickly turn and stay and watch, Wow! I loved his Lois Lane with her black hair in bangs, how great they were, Amazon has a great selection if your a collector, I'll add these 2 mine as well, right as Superman should be, It was sad with I did a search on Max Fleischer, he was nearly broke and in poor health, he didn't see the wealth of his life’s work, for had he lived longer, he would have gained millions ($$) by signing a contract, his early animation deserves much credit for work done today, life, old age, can be so cruel, "death be not proud"