The strip, now titled Popeye , continues to appear in first-run installments in its Sunday edition, written and drawn by Hy Eisman.
The daily strips are reprints of old Sagendorf stories. These cartoons proved to be among the most popular of the s, and the Fleischers — and later Paramount's own Famous Studios — continued production through Over the years, Popeye has also appeared in comic books, television cartoons, arcade and video games , hundreds of advertisements and peripheral products, and a live-action film directed by Robert Altman starring comedian Robin Williams as Popeye.
Differences in Popeye 's story and characterization show up depending upon which medium he is presented in. While Swee'Pea is definitively the ward of Popeye in the comic strips, he is often depicted as belonging to Olive Oyl in cartoons. The cartoons also occasionally feature family members of Popeye that have never appeared in the strip, notably his look-alike nephews Pipeye, Peepeye, Poopeye, and Pupeye.
Even though there is no absolute sense of continuity in the stories, certain plot and presentation elements remain mostly constant, including purposeful contradictions in Popeye's capabilities. Though at times he seems bereft of manners or uneducated, Popeye is often depicted as capable of coming up with solutions to problems that to the police, or, most importantly, the scientific community seem insurmountable.
Popeye has, alternatively, displayed Sherlock Holmes-like investigative prowess determining for instance that his beloved Olive was abducted by estimating the depth of the villains' footprints in the sand , scientific ingenuity as his construction, within a few hours, of a " spinach -drive" spaceship , or oversimplified yet successful diplomatic argumentation by presenting to diplomatic conferences his own existence and superhuman strength as the only true guarantee of world peace.
Popeye's vastly versatile exploits are deemed even more amusing by a few standard plot elements. One is the love triangle between Popeye, Olive, and Bluto , and the latter's endless machinations to claim Olive at Popeye's expense. Another is his near-saintly perseverance to overcome any obstacle to please Olive — who, quite often, renounces Popeye for Bluto's dime-store advances.
She is the only character Popeye will permit to give him a thumping. Finally, in terms of the endless array of villain plots, Popeye mostly comes to the truth by "accidentally" sneaking up on the villains, the moment they are bragging about their schemes' ingenuity, thus revealing everything to an enraged Popeye, who uses his "fisks" in the name of justice.
Segar and was his third published strip. The strip first appeared in the New York Journal , a newspaper operated by King Features owner William Randolph Hearst, on December 19, before later expanding into more papers. In its early years, the strip featured characters acting out various stories and scenarios in theatrical style hence the strip's name. After the strip moved away from its initial focus, it settled into a comedy-adventure style featuring Olive, Ham Gravy, and Olive's enterprising brother Castor Oyl.
Olive's parents Cole and Nana Oyl also made frequent appearances. Popeye first appeared in the strip on January 17, as a minor character. He was initially hired by Castor Oyl and Ham to crew a ship for a voyage to Dice Island , the location of a casino owned by the crooked gambler Fadewell.
Castor intended to break the bank at the casino using the unbeatable good luck conferred by stroking the hairs on the head of Bernice the Whiffle Hen. Weeks later, on the trip back, Popeye was shot many times by Jack Snork, a stooge of Fadewell's, but survived by rubbing Bernice's head.
After the adventure, Popeye left the strip, but due to reader reaction, he was quickly brought back. The Popeye character became so popular that he was given a larger role, and the strip was expanded into many more newspapers as a result. Though initial strips presented Olive as being less than impressed with Popeye, she eventually left Ham Gravy to become Popeye's girlfriend and Ham left the strip as a regular.
Over the years, however, she has often displayed a fickle attitude towards the sailor. Castor Oyl continued to come up with get-rich-quick schemes and enlisted Popeye in his misadventures. Eventually he settled down as a detective and later on bought a ranch out West.
Castor has seldom appeared in recent years. In , Popeye received a foundling baby in the mail, whom he adopted and named " Swee'Pea. Wellington Wimpy , a hamburger -loving moocher who would "gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today" he was also soft-spoken and cowardly; Vickers Wellington bombers were nicknamed "Wimpys" after the character ; George W. Geezil , a local cobbler who spoke in a heavily affected accent and habitually attempted to murder or wish death upon Wimpy; and Eugene the Jeep , a yellow, vaguely dog-like animal from Africa with magical powers.
In addition, the strip featured the Sea Hag , a terrible pirate , as well as the last witch on Earth her even more terrible sister excepted ; Alice the Goon , a monstrous creature who entered the strip as the Sea Hag's henchwoman and continued as Swee'Pea's babysitter; and Toar , a caveman. Segar's strip was quite different from the cartoons that followed. The stories were more complex, with many characters that never appeared in the cartoons Bill Barnacle , for example.
Spinach usage was rare and Bluto made only one appearance. Segar would sign some of his early Popeye comic strips with a cigar due to his last name being a homophone of "cigar" pronounced SEE-gar. Thimble Theatre soon became one of King Features' most popular strips during the s and, following an eventual name change to Popeye in the s, remains one of the longest running strips in syndication today.
The strip carried on after Segar's death in , at which point he was replaced by a series of artists. Acknowledging Popeye's growing popularity, the Thimble Theatre strip was renamed Thimble Theatre Starring Popeye during the s and s, and was eventually retitled, simply Popeye , the name under which it continues to run.
After Segar's death in , many different artists were hired to draw the strip. Doc Winner and Bela Zaboly successively handled the artwork during Sims's run.
Eventually, Ralph Stein stepped in to write the strip until the series was taken over by Bud Sagendorf in Sagendorf wrote and drew the daily strip until , and continued to write and draw the Sunday strip until his death in Sagendorf, who had been Segar's assistant, made a definite effort to retain much of Segar's classic style, although his art is instantly discernible.
Sagendorf continued to use many obscure characters from the Segar years, especially O. Wotasnozzle and King Blozo. Sagendorf's new characters, such as the Thung, also had a very Segar-like quality. What set Sagendorf apart from Segar more than anything else was his sense of pacing. Where plotlines moved very quickly with Segar, it would sometimes take an entire week of Sagendorf's daily strips for the plot to be advanced even a small amount.
From to , the daily strip was written and drawn by Bobby London , who, after some controversy, was fired from the strip for a story that could be taken to satirize abortion. London's strips put Popeye and his friends in updated situations, but kept the spirit of Segar's original. One classic storyline, titled "The Return of Bluto", showed the sailor battling every version of the bearded bully from the comic strip, comic books, and animated films. Later, in , the show was cut into shorter minutes episodes and re-titled The Popeye and Olive Show , which ran on CBS until It has grown from its days as a film set for the Musical Production 'Popeye' into one of the major tourist attractions on the Maltese Islands.
The U. Postal Service features Popeye in its "American Comic Classics" collection of postage stamps issued to celebrate the th anniversary of the American comic strip. The packaging has continued to evolve over the years and new iterations of the original design were produced in , , , and in The image appeared with scroll-over text, "E.
In Canada, he serves as a milk spokesperson for Le Lait. Artist Jeff Koons partners with Snapchat to release an augmented reality "World Lense" of his famous Popeye sculpture, available for activation in 9 public parks around the world. Designer streetwear brand, Iceberg launches a Popeye apparel collection with a promotional campaign featuring American model, Lucky Blue Smith.
Popeye collaborates with streetwear designer, A Bathing Ape to launch a capsule collection of apparel and accessories for kids and adults. Funko, one of the leading creators and innovators of collectible licensed pop culture products, releases the first Popeye Funko Pop!
Athletic apparel specialist Taymory, releases a special collection of Popeye themed racing gear, perfect for triathletes in training that includes performance swimwear, biking jerseys and training socks. On December 11, Warner Bros. On January 17, Popeye kicks off his 90th birthday celebration with the relaunch of "Popeye's Cartoon Club" comic strip series on ComicsKingdom. First seen in the s, the original "Popeye's Cartoon Club" ran at the end of E.
Segar's "The Thimble Theater" comic strip and featured Popeye fan art. On January 19th, Brazil's Museum of Image and Sound Museu da Imagem e do Som celebrates Popeye's 90th birthday with a special comic exhibit that teaches fans about Popeye's history and how to draw him.
On February 7th, Popeye launches a groundbreaking apparel and accessories collection with augmented reality fashion brand, de Kryptic. On February 8th, Popeye opens his first ever Print on Demand store where his biggest fans can find Popeye apparel, accessories, and more! And popular food media brand, Delish, releases a Popeye-inspired Creamy Spinach and Artichoke pasta recipe video.
Popeye's huge popularity led him to be adapted into animation, which would only be loosely based on Thimble Theatre due to the limited length of the theatrical shorts at the time keeping them from making proper full-length adaptations of the Thimble Theatre sagas, which resulted in the shorts being episodic. The huge success of the first Popeye the Sailor cartoon which originally started as a part of the Betty Boop shorts would ensure a long-running series of independent theatrical shorts for the now famous sailor.
In the various cartoons by Fleischer Studios , he would usually have to rescue his girlfriend Olive Oyl from Bluto , his rival and sometimes friend or go on a daring adventure with Olive and his good friend J. Wellington Wimpy. Some of the cartoons take a different recurring approach, like him rescuing Olive from another threat, dealing with something alone, fighting a small enemy he cannot beat, or watching over his adopted son Swee'Pea.
As these theatrical shorts deviated from Segar's strips quite a bit, many characters from the comic never made an appearance or only appeared once like Castor Oyl and the Goons. However, other characters like J. Wellington Wimpy who sometimes served as Popeye's sidekick , Poopdeck Pappy and, more rarely, Oscar would make semi-regular appearances in the shorts. Eugene the Jeep also made some appearances but would not be used as often as the above. George W.
Geezil also made only two appearances alongside Popeye. Many of these cartoons mostly focused on Popeye's adventures and antics along with Olive and occasionally Wimpy as they tried to resist the antagonistic Bluto.
While not appearing as a sailor very often as Popeye was usually portrayed with a number of odd jobs the stories in the cartoons would involve his brawling escapades or his adventures in certain areas of the world while doing impressive feats and preserving Olive's safety and their relationship.
Navy and his outfit was changed to a white Navy suit, and he would continue to look like this in animation from the s through to the s.
During Fleischer Studios's final years of operations, the shorts they produced were WWII stories focusing on Popeye's heroic attempts to help America fight the enemy, mostly the Japanese and Germans. The cartoons with these battle scenes have often been banned from television for being considered too "politically incorrect.
Also, in the s shorts, Popeye gained four nephews named Pipeye, Peepeye, Poopeye and Pupeye , who originally debuted in an earlier short within a dream sequence as his children, before being made recurring and turned into his nephews.
However, their exact relation to Popeye remains unclear, and the parent of his nephews has never been properly identified. Following the takeover of the Popeye animated franchise by Paramount Studios in , the Popeye cartoons were now handled by Famous Studios , which made drastic changes which abandoned almost all traces of Thimble Theatre and focused largely on plots involving Popeye, Olive, Bluto in something resembling a love triangle, without many other characters appearing and with very few shorts deviating from that setup, which involved Olive falling for Bluto and Popeye beating him after eating spinach in an oft-repeated formula.
Also of note are Famous Studios' remakes of Fleischer cartoons such as Goonland , itself a loose Thimble Theatre adaptation , heavily changed by Famous to remove all traces of Segar creations outside of Popeye, Bluto and Olive, i.
Popeye's Pappy replacing Goonland 's Goons with what might be considered racial caricatures of Africans led by a Bluto-like cannibal , with the only thing in common between the two versions being the rescue of Pappy - who would go on to make only two more appearances after this one of which contradicted the established fact that he left his son shortly after his birth. Supporting characters who were notable friends of Popeye and even had several appearances in Fleischer cartoons, such as Wimpy, Pappy and Swee'Pea, were featured less than a handful of times: Wimpy only appeared in three shorts aside from flashback-oriented stories and others such as Eugene the Jeep never appeared at all.
Popeye's role as an adventuring sailor was also reduced to a point where he was barely ever seen at sea or in the Navy other than in a few shorts mostly from the war period, as the majority of stories preferred to avoid doing more adventurous and fantastical stories and focus on Popeye's everyday life, his vacation hijinks or the "love triangle" setup. Popeye's portrayal in the animated adaptation such as the theatrical cartoons and especially the Famous outings has alternately been criticized for giving him a single means to solve all of life's problems unlike in the older strips , or praised for bringing children to eat healthy.
This reliance was most exaggerated in the short " How Green Is My Spinach ," which presented Popeye as being helpless without spinach and portrayed other vegetables as ineffective , spoofing the cartoons's own formula but at the same time providing a rather questionable message.
In the fifties, Popeye's cartoon catalog was sold by the Paramount studio to Associated Artists Productions for broadcast on television. Animated shows were also made for television in the s, s and s. In , the first Popeye the Sailor animated television series was produced for first-run syndication which proved successful. Like the earlier theatrical cartoon series, it would use many elements that were already well known, mostly the basic storyline of Popeye trying to keep his sweetheart Olive safe from the hands of other male suitors while using spinach to remain fit and healthy.
Unlike the theatrical shorts however especially the Famous Studios shorts , this TV series made a more prominent attempt to bring back characters and elements from Thimble Theatre back to Popeye's side, such as his old friend J.
Wellington Wimpy , who had been considerably absent during the Famous era, and the show even included characters who never had the chance to appear in animation, such as Popeye's old lucky charm Bernice the Whiffle Hen and even Alice the Goon , King Blozo and Rough House yet while bringing in more Thimble Theatre elements, very few episodes were a direct or accurate adaptations of the strips and had no real continuity between them.
While the show did involve Popeye's love life, episodes actually focused more on his adventuring around the world and beyond not unlike the Fleischer and comic strip incarnation, and also brought back other Thimble Theatre antagonists rather than relying solely on Brutus, like the sinister Sea Hag and Toar the caveman, who proved to be a true challenge for Popeye. As in the final Fleischer cartoons and most Famous shorts, Popeye still wore his Navy uniform, an exception being the pilot episode "Barbecue for Two", where he did wear his original outfit.
Unlike the previous show, this series had higher-quality animation and was more akin to Segar's work and Fleischer cartoons than other Popeye animations, with Popeye more regularly seen as an adventurous sailor. Popeye's look was once again changed for this series, this time it was a permanent return to his classic outfit, however he still wore his Navy hat, making it something of a combination of both styles.
The series also gave characters such as Alice the Goon more prominence, having her co-star with Olive in their own segment, Private Olive Oyl. This show focused more on adventure than past animations: there were entirely new segments dedicated to sailing the seas and searching for adventure, as in Popeye's Treasure Hunt.
Popeye and the Sea Hag's relationship was also more accurate to the strips than the previous series, with the Hag wanting to marry Popeye, much to the latter's disgust. Oddly enough, Popeye's signature spinach can would have special effects on other characters, such as Olive and Swee'Pea, who would unusually turn into actual superheroes.
In , a theatrical live-action movie called Popeye was released, featuring an original story written by Jules Pfeiffer, directed by Robert Altman , and serving as a more faithful adaptation to Segar's Thimble Theatre. It brought almost every friend of Popeye's to the silver screen, although it showed the well-known sailor as whom Robin McLaurin Williams starred as having an initial aversion to spinach, and the setting took place in a port town called Sweethaven , created on the island of Malta by Altman's set decorators.
Popeye was produced as a musical, with original songs whose music was composed and whose lyrics were written by Harry Nilsson; however, Sammy Lerner's familiar theme for the character, " I'm Popeye the Sailor Man ," was retained in the final sequence. In , the latest animated series focusing on Popeye was produced, entitled Popeye and Son.
The series was unique in the Popeye franchise for taking place later in Popeye's life, where he had finally married Olive Oyl, settled down and had a son of his own a notable change considering the rarity of having well-known cartoon characters actually move on with their lives.
The series shared similarities with its predecessor, The All-New Popeye Hour , having various references to Thimble Theatre and other media in Popeye's history such as the theatrical film, with the cartoon taking place in Sweethaven.
However, the series didn't prove as popular as its predecessors and was eventually cancelled after 13 episodes. Being the last animated Popeye series on television, it can be considered somewhat fitting that it ended at a later and happier point in Popeye's life.
In , Popeye received a tribute show on Cartoon Network titled The Popeye Show , which only featured classic shorts but also adding trivia info and facts about Popeye as well as occasionally showing unaltered original versions of the shorts, with the series going on to have 45 episodes. An attempt at a full-fledged animated theatrical film was also made by Sony Pictures Animation for release in , with test animation made by Genndy Tartakovsky, yet production on this film has apparently remained on an indefinite hiatus.
In , IDW Publishing began a brand-new Popeye comic book that primarily stays faithful to the character's original comic strip incarnation by E.
Segar and Bud Sagendorf, and features countless throwbacks and references to Popeye's old adventures and even features the return of many if not all of the characters from the classic era.
0コメント