Cartooning – Prattling before the Pratfall

Art’s Maus Art

Not to be missed on PBS American Masters, April 15.

Alakabrodax, Wham Wham Wham

Let’s return to the subject of Beatles cartoons. I most recently talked about them in this post, which has one of my best punniest titles.

Beatles for Cel

All of the Beatles cartoons were produced by Al Brodax. As a kid I watched his syndicated King Features Syndicate cartoons. Brodax cleverly embedded his name into the Snuffy Smith cartoon, ‘Jughaid the Magician’.

Andrew at Parlogram Auctions has this comprehensive history of the Beatles cartoon series on ABC-TV.

Brodax went on the produce the vastly superior and well-received Yellow Submarine animation feature; which, until yesterday, I had thought was the last of the Beatles Toons. But no, Brodax took one more swing at the Beatles. His never completed Strawberry Fields project has a strong Ralph Bakshi vibe.

I learned about this extremely curious artifact from a member of the Cartoon Research group on Facebook. There’s more information on the Cinema Crazed site.

The Bootleg Files: Strawberry Fields

I Am 8th Man

Eight years ago today, due mostly to circumstances beyond my control, I retired. Having survived cancer and recovered from persistent afib, thanks to smart doctors I’m a new man!

Trump was president eight years ago, and he’s president again. Not good. Despite all of the chaos that Boy Wonder Musk has been causing within the IRS, I was reassured this morning when seeing my updated status on Where’s My Refund?

Your tax refund is scheduled to be sent to your bank by April 02, 2025.

Kirby Before Sinnott

The Kirby Museum’s first publishing project is here and I’m impressed. My copy of Sky Masters of the Space Force: The Complete Sunday Strips in Color came with a print and t-shirt.

Copies of the book should become available in comics shops. Publication was crowd-funded on ZOOP, with much of the interest coming from Wally Wood’s ink finishes over Jack Kirby’s pencils. Wood’s run on the comic strip was actually somewhat sporadic, until he eventually dropped out altogether.

Woody never stuck with any one thing for very long, especially after Bill Gaines limited EC to publishing MAD and nothing else. But the work Wally did on Sky Masters is outstanding and wouldn’t be equaled until Joe Sinnott’s run inking Kirby on the Fantastic Four.