veryone knows that Superman can leap tall buildings in a single bound, so it's not too surprising to discover that the Man of Steel also quickly made the leap from comic books to the silver screen. Only three years after his Action Comics debut in 1938, the Last Son of Krypton starred in the first of 17 groundbreaking cartoons created by Max and Dave Fleischer. These amazing works, plus a trio of classic Popeye productions and four other short features, have recently been restored for an action-packed three-DVD box set titled The Animated World of Max & Dave Fleischer: Superman and Popeye.
The initial 1941 adventure, "Superman and the Mad Scientist"—wherein the Man of Steel battles a lunatic threatening to destroy Metropolis with an "Electrothanasia-Ray"—introduces both Superman's origin and the now-famous "faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound" prologue. Subsequent installments, all of which have running times of under 10 minutes, find the world's most famous superhero battling a revived dinosaur ("Superman and the Arctic Giant"), errant meteors ("Superman and the Magnetic Telescope"), resurrected ghouls ("Superman and the Mummy Strikes"), the Japanese military ("Superman and the Eleventh Hour") and Nazi agents ("Superman and the Jungle Drums"). Nearly every story also features intrepid Daily Planet reporter Lois Lane, whose reckless exploits generally serve as the catalyst for each tale's requisite rescue.
All three Popeye cartoons are showcased on the final disc, including "Popeye the Sailor Meets Sinbad the Sailor" and the lengthy "Popeye the Sailor Meets Aladdin and His Wonderful Lamp." "Little Dutch Mill" and "The Song of the Birds" are also presented on this platter, and the collection closes with a colorful 1944 interpretation of "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer."
Charismatic cartoons
that still inspire
Although their names are perhaps not as instantly recognizable as Walt Disney, Max and Dave Fleischer continue to inspire present-day animators, with traces of their inimitable style evident in productions ranging from Batman: The Animated Series to the images of such Japanese anime masters as Osamu Tezuka (Astro Boy) and Hayao Miyazaki (Spirited Away). The Animated World of Max & Dave Fleischer: Superman and Popeye provides a revelatory glimpse into their amazing and impressive oeuvre, offering both entertainment and subtle education in a manner that, notwithstanding a few minor packaging and presentation flaws, is extraordinarily entertaining.
Within each adventure, the depth of field, fluidity of movement and consummate use of color remain astonishing and, even with today's state-of-the-art animation techniques, rarely rivaled. Every frame of "Superman and the Japoteurs" is intriguing, from an opening scene that ingeniously metamorphoses from a mundane office to the lair of a Japanese spy, through an unforgettable sequence where an armada of small airplanes take off from the fuselage of a gigantic flying bomber. Other installments possess a superlative cinematic quality, particularly "Superman and the Secret Agent," with its dark, film-noir feel, and the supernatural "Superman and the Underground World."
While definitely more simplistic and surreal, the Popeye cartoons are similarly engaging, as are the early black-and-white tales, most notably "Ain't She Sweet," which sandwiches flesh-and-blood singer Lillian Roth between bizarre comical sequences. Some supplementary critical or historical insight would be beneficial—the brief descriptions contained on the DVD covers seem to be largely cribbed from the not-always-erudite Internet Movie Database—as would further audio restoration. Still, The Animated World of Max & Dave Fleischer: Superman and Popeye remains a commendable collection, providing contemporary viewers with a respectable introduction to the landmark Superman cartoon and its pioneering creators.
