There have been hundreds, if not thousands, of different incarnations of Superman, in the nearly eighty years of his existence. He was the first superhero, the Hercules of American culture. And, while he was created on the page, he wouldn't become fully realised until his cinematic debut. And, when I say, "cinematic debut", one of these probably comes to mind, but Superman actually made his leap to the silver screen in a cartoon, helmed by this guy, Max Fleischer. And, if the name seems familiar, that's because he's also the creator of dozens of characters, like Popeye and Betty Boop. He, and his brother Dave, were approached by Paramount to create a show for Superman, who was surging in popularity at the time, and, with a budget of about half …show more content…
Even the lighting is realistic. It looks almost like an oil painting, being dark and shadowy while maintaining that beautifully saturated colour that adds a heightened sense of drama to the cartoons. And it actually anticipates the look of film-noir. Now, let's compare it to something like "The New Adventures of Superman" series from 1966, so, 25 years later.
Holy shit. That is terrible. Max's approach to animation was less about putting pencil to paper and more about adapting the mechanics of film-making to bring these drawings to life. Cartoons don't move like this anymore. There's so much life in the action It's fluid, it's balletic. Every frame is a wholly new drawing.
Now, I want you to just take a close look at this shot from an episode called "The Bulleteers". Did you catch it? Alright, let's reverse time real quick. Take it back right, there. So, you can see how, after he catches his balance, he positions his foot on the ledge for leverage to kick back off. That may seem like a really small detail but it's different to capture that kind of nuance in character movement and to do it, Max Fleischer developed an entirely new method of