#gerald mcboing boing

[oldshowbiz]

[obscurecharactershowdown]

Group D Round 1

[image ID: the first image is of Gerald McBoing Boing, a boy in a red cowboy outfit with a white hat and boots. he's reading off a paper into a 40s/50s style radio microphone. the second image is of Gruftine, a girl with pale skin, red-purple hair in a ponytail, dark circles around her eyes, and little fangs. the sides of her head are bald. around her neck is a purple choker with a black spider, and her outfit consists of a purple cloak/robe and a darker purple top and bottom that shows her stomach. she's holding a pink bag with flowers in it. end ID]

Gerald

He's a boy who can only speak in sound effects!

Gruftine

Adorable gothic vampire girl from an equally adorable vampire show! 

[tehherminator]

That show Boomerang used to air when the sun would set.

[dash-n-step]

anyway randomly remembered gerald mcboing boing

the autism of it all

"When he reaches the age most children begin to talk he instead speaks in his own unique way. He can get his point across, and he can understand others. He just cant do what’s “normal”. His parents, instead of trying to understand his language, seek a doctor to give him some pills. When that fails, they ship him off to school. Here, you deal with him! The school falls short and everyone throws in the towel. Never once talking to Gerald. Never trying to see things his way. No therapy. No one even gave him a pencil. Maybe he can write in English, even though he can’t speak it. Gerald runs away rather than hear his parents complain about what a burden he is for one more night. He is pulled back, rescued, at the last moment. Only then is he given a job, and his parents love, when the adults realize they can exploit his talents. That which was a problem a short time ago is now beloved once it becomes profitable."

yeah this gets it

[punster-2319]

I’ve been stacking up on my classic animation collection lately with Warner Bros, MGM, and Disney, so it made sense to add UPA as well. This studio’s history is interesting, mostly ran by former Disney artists that wanted to get away from the realistic character animation popularized by Disney in favor of more experimental animation.

[stone-cold-groove]

The life and times of Gerald McBoing-Boing.

[lenorayez]

The crossover nobody wanted but me lol

[ducktracy]

constantly thinking about this bit from a segment that Rod Scribner animated and directed for The Gerald McBoing Boing show. and it is as deranged as you could ever hope something directed and animated by Scribner could be!

[haveyouseenthisseries-poll]

[oldshowbiz]

pro-gerald mcboing boing propaganda

[thinkbolt]

Gerald McBoing-Boing (UPA, 1950) dir. Robert Cannon

adapted from the story by Dr. Seuss, narrated by Marvin Miller (voice of Robby the Robot)

[lesserknownwaifus]

Gerald mcBoing-Boing's mom from Gerald mcBoing-Boing (2005)

[irregularbillcipher]

i DO have bill and kryptos and all my flatlanders say real grown-up swears but i also think that in canon bill can only use cartoon sound effect swears. it's a trade off. the axolotl said "hey i'll give you god powers but you need to stop saying fuck" and bill went "yeah sure" with the plans to deviously say fuck anyway and then the first time he did it sounded like gerald mcboing boing and he's been so mad about it ever since

[linesonscreens]

Let's Read Peanuts (Yes, all of it) - August 1951

There are lots of great strips I just don't have room to comment on. I strongly encourage everybody to read the full month at the official GoComics page. Today's month starts HERE.

Aug 3, 1951

Lots of emphasis on the fact that Charlie Brown is a little kid lately.

Aug 4, 1951

Daw. :3

Aug 7, 1951

Turning a wagon into a mobile garden sounds like a really cool project, actually.

Aug 9, 1951

This is a great example of a joke that would have probably been kind of obnoxious in later decades thanks to how hard modern Snoopy mugs for the camera all the time. A subject I'll probably dedicate an entire post to at some point.

Aug 13, 1951

Were the Peanuts comic books a thing this early on? If not then this is prophetic as hell.

Aug 16, 1951

First “Blockhead”!

Aug 21, 1951

This is actually a pretty good prank. Just setup another sprinkler near the hose valve and you've essentially trapped your victim in a mobile water cage they can't take off/escape without getting soaked.

Aug 22, 1951

I once heard someone speculate that Schroeder's early design was heavily influenced by the animation of UPA (the people who made Gerald Mcboing Boing [a cartoon that was a surprisingly big deal in 1950]) and I absolutely believe it.

Aug 27, 1951

Aug 31, 1951

Me: “Oh yeah, pigs will eat, like, anything. That's why the mob uses them to dispose of corpses. Anyway, how's preschool been going?”

Also, we finally have the outfit that Schroeder will wear for the next 50 years! Huzzah!

Thoughts:

It's really interesting to me that despite being about the same half-dozen characters making the same jokes over and over this strip not only doesn't get boring, but manages to feel like it's “story” (for lack of a better word) is progressing at a decent pace. Yeah, there's not a “plot” in a traditional sense but the characters constantly grow and change in organic ways (a new recurring hobby here, a new interpersonal conflict over there, etc) while the status quo is regularly shaken up with the addition of new characters and previously unseen aspects of the world.

In this sense it's actually kind of a shame that Peanuts got as popular as it did because I feel like a lot (though not all by any stretch) of the willingness to try new things and experiment we see in these early years went away as merchandising, TV specials and other branding considerations required the strip to have a much more stable and recognizable core image. It makes me wonder sometimes if the later decades of the strip would have looked radically different if it had never taken off the way it did.

Oh well, at least the strip's success got us “A Boy Named Charlie Brown” and at least 3 fairly decent TV specials so I can't stay that mad about it.

[princesssarisa]

A Christmas Carol Holiday Season: "Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol" (1962 animated musical)

Now we reach a pop culture landmark: the first animated Christmas special ever produced for American television. Before A Charlie Brown Christmas, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, or any other similar classics, there was this 1962 cartoon musical from the UPA animation studio, starring their most famous cartoon character, Quincy Magoo. A character rarely seen on TV today, because the comic mishaps caused by his weak eyesight aren't politically correct by modern standards. But this special, with songs by legendary Broadway composer Jule Styne (Gypsy, Funny Girl, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, and more) and lyricist Bob Merrill (Funny Girl), has never lost its popularity.

The framing device of this Christmas Carol is that Mr. Magoo is starring as Scrooge in a Broadway musical of Dickens' tale. While the opening scene of Magoo's arrival at the theatre and the final scene of the curtain calls feature the standard Magoo slapstick, the Christmas Carol itself is played surprisingly straight, with only a few small gags hinting that Scrooge needs glasses. For the most part, it's a faithful, if abridged version of the story. There are only two really notable changes: (a) the character of Fred is cut, and (b) the order of the first two ghosts' visits is reversed, so that the Ghost of Christmas Present (voice of Les Tremayne) comes first, and then the Ghost of Christmas Past (portrayed as an androgynous golden-colored child, voiced by Joan Gardener). I can only assume the latter change was made because the Christmas Past sequence is more emotional for Scrooge than Christmas Present, so they were re-ordered to create a "rising line of tension," so to speak.

The result is a Carol that's both funny and emotionally effective, which both children and adults can enjoy. Especially worth appreciating is its poignant emphasis on Scrooge's lonely childhood, since so many other versions downplay or cut that plot point. UPA's impressionistic style of animation, simple yet colorful and vivid, suits the tone of the production well, and the voice cast is first-rate too. Jim Backus, Magoo's iconic voice actor since 1949 (also known as Thurston Howell III on Gilligan's Island and James Dean's father in Rebel Without a Cause), is a vivid, engaging Scrooge throughout every stage of his character development. Meanwhile, standouts in the supporting cast include Jack Cassidy as a warm, rich-voiced Bob Cratchit, Royal Dano as an imposing Marley's Ghost, Jane Kean as a touching Belle, and Joan Gardener doubling as an ethereal yet wry Ghost of Christmas Past and an adorable Tiny Tim (who looks like another popular UPA character, Gerald McBoing-Boing). Last but not least, Styne and Merrill's songs – "It's Great to Be Back on Broadway," "Ringle, Ringle," "The Lord's Bright Blessing" (a.k.a. the "razzleberry dressing" song), "Alone in the World," "Winter Was Warm" and "We're Despicable" – are all memorable and strike an excellent balance between childlike simplicity and Broadway quality.

The first-ever Christmas cartoon special is still one of greatest.

@ariel-seagull-wings. @thealmightyemprex, @reds-revenge, @faintingheroine, @thatscarletflycatcher

[randomaccessmike]

The Tell Tale Heart - 1953 narrated by James Mason

Animation studio UPA—United Productions of America—is best known these days as the studio that gave us Mr. Magoo and Gerald McBoing Boing (which inspired a certain website). But the studio, originally created by three former Disney employees, wanted to broaden horizons back in the 1950s, and created this quite disturbing adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart,” narrated by the venerable James Mason.

Due to its adult subject matter, it was the first animated film to receive an “X” rating (or “suitable for those aged 16 and over”) in the UK. Though not intended for children, many undoubtedly saw the film as kids and were profoundly affected by it. The film, designed by Paul Julian, borrows both from Dali-esque surrealism and German expressionism.