In 1956, UPA released the final of four cartoons featuring Dr. Seuss’s adorably strange, noise-making little boy, Gerald McBoing-Boing. This last cartoon in the series deviates from the typical McBoing-Boing short in one important way: the creative, sometimes nonsensical rhyming meter of the previous Gerald entries is gone, replaced by a straightforward narrative. And while I find myself…
It’s a lovely moonlight night, and everyone who’s anyone is making the scene at the Coo-Coo Nut Grove, the hottest nightspot in town. Ben Birdie is leading the band, the rat fink gossip columnist Walter Windpipe is looking for a scoop, and the mood is just right for stargazing. Or, at the very least, for enjoying a…
UPDATE 12/16/13: WE ARE EXTENDING THE DEADLINE FOR THE CONTEST TO JANUARY 8TH, 2014. Entries can be posted on your blog any time between now and 11:59PM EST on the 8th. Winners will be announced on January 12th. Questions about the contest? Contact us at trueclassicsblog (at) gmail dot com. It’s our fourth blog anniversary!…
Thanksgiving is almost here! For this week’s edition of Saturday Morning Cartoons, we animation lovers here at True Classics are giving thanks for all of the glorious classic cartoon bounty there is to enjoy this season by highlighting one of our favorite Turkey Day ‘toons, the 1949 Tom and Jerry short The Little Orphan. A…
It’s (finally) starting to get chilly down here in the South, and that turns our thoughts to … penguins. Okay, not really, but for the purposes of this week’s edition of Saturday Morning Cartoons, let’s just say that’s true as we present you with The Legend of Rockabye Point, featuring the cutest penguin ever. The…
1929 was a good year for Walt Disney: his seminal creation, Mickey Mouse, had just broken out as a huge star in the wake of the immensely popular short Steamboat Willie (1928). That cartoon’s success led to a series of sound-synchronized Mickey cartoons being released to theaters, two of which (Plane Crazy and The Gallopin’ Gaucho) had been…
In 1933, Betty Boop was at the height of her cinematic fame. The Fleischer-animated shorts–racy, daffy, and wonderfully musical–were immensely popular. Audiences couldn’t get enough of sweet Betty and her crazy adventures, and the Fleischers continued to churn out one appealing cartoon after another. Over the course of her 1930s filmography, Betty Boop hosted any…
The 1943 animated short Red Hot Riding Hood begins innocently enough: the insipid narration of an unseen storyteller introduces us to little Red, her sweet grandma, and the big, bad wolf who’s stalking her through the forest. But before the tale can get underway, the characters rebel. The Wolf, breaking the fourth wall, complains to…
True Classics 