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William Hanna Dead at 90 81

Posted by CmdrTaco from the he'll-be-missed dept.
shaniber writes "Animation pioneer William Hanna, co-creator of such classic cartoons as The Jetsons and The Flintstones, has passed away this week. ABCNEWS is also carrying the story." Besides giving me Tom and Jerry and The Jetsons, I think the thing that I respect most about Hanna is the fact that a show like Space Ghost Coast to Coast was allowed to take their characters and do something truly unique with them. He even lent his voice to the show in one episode. Not a lot of people would be willing to allow one of their creations to be twisted like that, but the original Space Ghost was one of my childhood staples, and C2C stands in a class all its own proving that creativity isn't dead on TV.
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William Hanna Dead at 90 More

William Hanna Dead at 90

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  • SPONGEBOB ruleZ! (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    he's better than any HB cartoon.
    I mean mcgilla gorilla? that cartoon sucked.

  • correction (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    "stands in a class all its own proving that creativity isn't dead on TV" Well....it is now.
  • I think he was trying to make an analogy.

    --
  • The early Tom & Jerry cartoons are still great (though they don't play them anymore because spoiled parents are afraid their rotten kids will shoot each other and stuff.) The crap like Scooby Doo, the Jetsons, and the Flinstones (come on, a cartoon with a LAUGH TRACK?!) is unforgivably bad, sure, but it's balanced out by the really good stuff HB did. I think if you were to take most of the stuff they did in the '70s, lock it in a vault, and shoot it into space, never to be seen again, the remainder of their work would be truly exceptional.

    - A.P.

    --
    * CmdrTaco is an idiot.

  • Hanna and Barbera were pioneers who took animation beyond "moving comics" and made it great. Their classic serieses such as Tom & Jerry still outshine the animation of today. William Hanna will be missed.

    On a similar note, Space Ghost is possibly the funniest and most original show on TV today. Thank you, Mr. Hanna, for letting it be created.

  • The "Space Ghost" mentioned here is usually not the original series, but Cartoon Network's homegrown Space Ghost Coast to Coast [cartoonnetwork.com], which is a show that cannot be easily described but can be very, very funny. Check it out, Sundays at midnight EST.

  • Hey, there where a few other studios around at that time (Ruby-Spears & Filmation come to mind) - they (more than H-B) contributed to the decline of quality in cartoons (by making them half-hour commercials for toy products).
  • The rest were an unfortunate result of the times. WB and HB cartoons through the 60s, 70s, and much of the 80s were junk.

    It wasn't until the latest batch of toons from WB (Tiny Toon Adv., Animaniacs, Batman, etc) and from the now Time-Warner (PPG, Dexter's Lab, etc) that we're starting to see actually funny and well-written/drawn toons.
  • I mean seriously, am I the only one that thinks almost all of the HB cartoons suck in quality AND story?

    Hmm... When I was 5 to 10 years old watching Scooby Doo, Squiddly Diddly, El-Kabong, Doggie Daddy, etc.. I never really noticed.

    Now, as an adult, _if_ I get a chance to see those classics again, I don't miss the story lines at all... Cause I am just too busy laughing.

    I guess with the influx of Asian animation, people look at cartoons very diffrent now. And, I'll give you that the new stuff can be very technical, very complete stories, etc... But, nothing today makes me laugh quite like the old HB stuff did... and they did it over 30 years ago.

  • Jeez, why did my submission of this story (with the SAME headline) get rejected TWO days ago? I suppose that's Just Another Slashdot FAQ. :-)

    * 2000-12-18 12:41:29 P2P Piracy? Piffle! (articles,news) (accepted)

    * 2001-02-05 18:40:20 Using XML-RPC with Perl (articles,news) (rejected)

    * 2001-03-23 12:58:25 William Hanna dead at 90 (articles,news) (rejected)

    But, I'm not bitter...

  • Re:I think people fail to realize... (Score:3)

    by Jonathan ( 5011 ) on Sunday March 25, 2001 @01:28PM (#341035) Homepage
    but if you look at the cartoons revolving around the time HB made most of his cartoons, the other cartoons REALLY sucked. I mean really. They're terrible.

    So, in your opinion, the classic Chuck Jones Warner Brothers cartoons (Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, etc.) were terrible? *Those* were HB's competition in the early days.
  • Cellophane animator dead. No film at 11!
  • I have fond memories of the original show. Yes, it may have been a silly superhero in space show, but it was a lot of fun when I was a kid, and the design work on the show was top-rate and still holds up quite well, much like the original Johnny Quest.

    Besides, when the chips are down, nothing saves your bacon like a monkey sidekick...

    Because I liked the original, I have a correspondingly virulent hatred of the Coast to Coast bastardization. Especially when they reshow the original episodes with a laugh track. It's not that they're making fun of Space Ghost. That wouldn't bother me so much. It's that they're just mining Space Ghost for source material to make a really cheap Max Headroom ripoff (the talk-show Max Headroom, not the actual show).

    I've seen PowerPoint presentations that had more animation than SG:CtC! If they were creating actual animation for the show, that would be something, but they're just capturing snippets and reusing them over and over and over again. It just galls me on an artistic level.

    It doesn't help that I don't like campy humor.

    Jon
  • William Hanna was an visionary in his field, who deserves to be remembered among the likes of Walt Disney. My happiest childhood memories were at the Hanna Barbera Land theme park in Houston, something that William Hanna had a direct role in creating. (Unfortunately, the theme park was torn down a few years ago to make room for a run of the mill water park.) I supposedly even met William Hanna once, but I was three at the time. :) Thanks to Cartoon Network his legacy will be passed on to yet another generation. May he live on forever!
  • I'm quite disappointed at the denunciation of William Hanna, of all things!

    People often forget that between 1957 to the early 1970's, Hanna-Barbera produced a surprisingly good amount of animation. Besides The Flintstones, who could forget the Jonny Quest or the groundbreaking series Wait Till Your Father Gets Home?

    The Flintstones was groundbreaking in many ways, despite its obvious homage to The Honeymooners. Many of the episodes before Pebbles was born dealt with surprisingly adult subjects for its day. Wait Till Your Father Gets Home was another series that tackled surprisingly adult subjects, sometimes almost as edgy as All in the Family (which came out almost the same time).

    I will miss Bill Hanna. He and Joe Barbera created a lot of classic cartoons, that's to be sure.
  • Fortunately, there were some real gems that Hanna-Barbera managed to produce every now and then.

    Remember The Flintstones before the birth of Pebbles? Despite the obvious homage to The Honeymooners there was some really good episodes, and often dealt with surprisingly adult subjects for its day.

    Or the original Jonny Quest? Really nice artwork, and really good writing, too.

    Or the groundbreaking Wait Till Your Father Gets Home, which came out almost the same time as All in the Family? This series often was almost as edgy as the famous CBS sitcom in regards to subject matter.

    I do agree that H-B did produce a lot of mediocre stuff, but you have to admit that H-B could also produce very good shows, too.
  • Please excuse this brief tirade concerning a very important subject.

    While SGC2C is slightly amusing in the offhanded way, it is important to remember that many people here and in the larger portion of the population seem to believe that Cartoon Planet (the show that featured SG, Zorak, and Brak exclusively) is in fact the same show, even though it is not. SGC2C is a "talk show", and while it has featured such characters as Brak, Tanzit and SG's grandfather (with the voice of Randy "Macho Man" Savage, OH YEAH!), the principles are SG, Zorak and Moltar. I have personally only seen 3 episodes with Brak in it, so I am uncertain as to why people confuse him as being a part of this show.

    Of his small appearances on C2C, Brak has never sung one of his funny songs that have reached cult classic status. When you reminisce about getting high and watching SG, you are thinking about Cartoon Planet. When you start singing "Don't Touch Me" for no apparent reason in the middle of traffic, you are paying homage to the classic from Cartoon Planet.

    AFAIK, C2C is still in production, considering that two weeks ago, the second episode (most are only 10-11 minutes long, while this past week had a full 22 minute episode that was truly bizarre with Conan O'Brien) had a guest appearance by Brak where someone told him he was on the wrong show, and he stated that "That show's not on anymore!" The attempt to recreate the magic of Cartoon Planet with Brak Presents the Brak Show starring Brak! failed because the irreverence just wasn't there. I think the pitch went something like "It's like you take Cartoon Planet and C2C and you throw it in a blender and the result is this." It was in fact just that, a giant mess that didn't work.

    So, please for the love of god, look closely at the Musical Bar-B-Q CD and notice that these songs are indeed from the wonderfully erratic Cartoon Planet, the likes of which have never been recreated on either C2C or BPTBSSB.

  • Wow, cutting edge reporting at it's best.

    Did you hear Commander Odama was dead too?

    -josh
  • > Wow, grammar at its best.

    I don't get it, what's you're point?

    -josh
  • Nothing today makes you laugh quite like the old HB stuff did..?

    ...

    Ever heard of The Family Guy?

  • Apparently it wasn't interesting enough when the story was new...

    2001-03-23 16:27:28 Cartoon Legend William Hanna dies (articles,tv) (rejected)

  • Wow, grammar at its best.
  • ...you have to bear in mind; if it wasn't for Mr. Hanna (and Barbara, too), we probably wouldn't have cartoons on television.
    I forget where I read this...an interview with the late Don Messick, I believe (Don was Scooby-Doo, BooBoo, Baba Louie, etc.). Hanna and Barbara suggested to MGM (back in the '50s) the idea of running cartoons on television. MGM basically turned around and told them they were crazy; said it would never sell and it would never work, because cartoons were too expensive and too big of a production deal to run on TV.
    Hanna and Barbara replied, "Fine, we'll do it ourselves."
    They left MGM and started their own company; just them, a few guys (mainly writers) from Warner Bros., and Messick and Daws Butler (both were in the army together; HB contacted Daws about doing voices for their cartoons and Daws asked Messick if he was also interested...the rest is history).
    Thus HB put television's first cartoons on air. They developed ways of making the cartoons less expensive to produce (recall the same frames often repeated several times in same episodes of Yogi Bear, QuickDraw, etc.), while still managing to make them appear better than many of the TV cartoons being produced--using some of the same methods--by other studios at the time.
    Yes, they went to hell in the '70s and '80s, but we obsessive fans try not to think much about that. ^_^ Folks, try remembering Mr. Hanna for all the good he's done for us, and not the bad...and bringing [sometimes quality] cartoons to television was one of those things. Both Hanna and Barbara were truely pioneers in the field of animation, including but not limited to American.

    Thank you. ::steps down off soapbox::

    -miyax
  • Is this "flamebait"? I kind of have to admit he's got a point here. While HB certainly put out some great stuff, they also spewed out a fair amount of garbage. Anyone remember the MC Hammer cartoon? Or Jabberjaw?

  • The Tech Connection (Score:4)

    by td ( 46763 ) on Sunday March 25, 2001 @01:22PM (#341049) Homepage
    Back in the late 1970s I worked at the NYIT Computer Graphics laboratory on Long Island. At the time the Graphics Lab was among the world's best CG research facilities (its founding director, who I still work for, is now president of Pixar.)

    The main focus of our research was a system for doing cartoon animation. In 1978 or '79 Bill Hanna, then approaching 70 years old, came out to see what we were up to, and seeing exciting possibilities for his cost-driven business, put together a team led by Mark Levoy, a Cornell graduate student (who I believe we recommended to him, and who is now a CS professor at Stanford) to build what would be the first commercially successful computer animation system, which Hanna-Barbera used to produce The Flintstones, Scooby Doo, etc. throughout the '80s and '90s.
  • Actually, I dispute that. Look at the old Tom and Jerry cartoon. The ones from the 40's and 50's. In my opinion, most of the T&J's of that era where the finest cartoons ever made. I don't know that most of the names, but the one where Tom goes fishing in this insanely beautiful pond, using Jerry as bait, has got to be one of the best cartoons ever made.



    Dive Gear [divingdeals.com]
  • someone explain how this is a troll, I'm confused.....


    I'm not sure that I would have marked it as troll, maybe flamebait. The reason though is pretty clear. In case you didn't notice, the post was made by Wacko Warner who is one of the Warner Brothers. It's pretty obvious that he would have a difficult time offering an objective opinion about a competing studio's work.
    ---CONFLICT!!---
  • Sorry dude, but I loved Hong Kong Phooey.
    --
    Lord Nimon

  • According to the obit [go.com] posted March 22nd on ABCNews.com [abcnews.com] Mr. Hanna was gone, deceased, dead, an ex animator, holding his breath forever, taking the long blink, taking the dirt nap, etc. three days ago.

    Your headline makes it sound like he died today. You mean he wasn't really dead, but now he is, cuz you say so? So you mean you killed him again?!

    You BASTARDS, you KILLED BILL HANNA!

  • NPR had an interesting story on Hanna on Morning Edition [npr.org]. Look for the story titled Classic Cartoonist Dies (4th story from the bottom of the page). It's in real audio format.
  • Hanna died when an anvil dropped on his head.
  • Lets face it: a lot of Hanna-Barbera TV shows were crap. In fact, the sheer number of bad shows they produced far outweighs the good ones. Also, the fact that they weren't alone in producing crap (as the following list shows) doesn't mitigate the fact that they DID spew a lot of crap. And no, it's not just limited animation: Jay Ward was a genius, and the worst episode of Rocky & Bullwinkle was better than the best episode of anything Hanna-Barbera ever produced.

    And now, a short but woefully incomplete list of real crap:

    Alvin & the Chipmunks
    All the cartoons on the Bannana Splits (Huck Finn, etc.--though all were better, I think, than Danger Island)
    The Beatles (good music, lame show)
    Clutch Cargo
    Cubey (An animated Rubik's Cube. Hands down winner for dumbest animated show idea ever.)
    Davey & Golaith (Heavy-handed moralizing R Us. I was amused when Mad TV finally made the same Son of Sam connection (named David, talking Dog, messages from God) I had years ago.)
    Every animated version of a live action TV show EXCEPT the animated Star Trek
    Grape Ape
    The Harlem Globetrotters
    He Man and the Masters of the Universe (right there with Clutch Cargo at rock bottom)
    Hercules
    Hong Kong Phooey
    Huckelberry Hound
    The Marvel Superhero show with The Hulk (Hey, The Jetson's theme was "Ode to Joy" compared to the Hulk theme), Submariner, etc.
    Mighty Mouse (the old ones, not the new ones)
    Mister T
    Mr. Magoo
    MUSH
    My Favorite Martian
    Pac Man (and all the other frigging video game shows)
    Pebbles & Bam Bam
    The Perils of Penelope Pitstop
    Pinky and the Brain AFTER they added Elmyra (and whoever came up with THAT bright idea deserves hot pincers plucking out their eyes for all eternity)
    Planet of the Apes
    Scooby Do after the second or third season (at least once they started their "guest star" phase. And whoever came up with Scrappy Do deserves bamboo up his fingernails for, oh, say 1000 years (after all, he didn't ruin a classic))
    The Smurfs ("And I said 'Shrink, I wanna kill'...")
    Snuffy Smith (This bit hard. Was there ever a time the strip it's based on didn't suck?)
    Space Ghost (original, not Space Ghost Coast-toCoast, which rules (to use a technical term ;-))) & Frankenstein Jr.
    Yogi Bear

    (And these are just shows I've seen, or at least remember seeing commercials for. There's a pretty frightening list at:
    http://www.coolstuffvideos.com/cartoons3.html.
    Or do a Power Search at the IMDB. I've never seen The Three Robonic Stooges, but I can only imagine how mind-numbingly bad it must be...)

    I'm leaving out things that Weren't Very Good (Josie and the Pussycats (in or out of Space), Popeye and even (urp) the D&D animated show) but which didn't seem as unremittingly awful as the above. In any case, even though I'm not a Jetson's fan, it was clearly superior to all the above...

    Any other candidates?
  • Come on, even though the Flintstones was a Honeymooners rip-off it was still funny as hell. When was the last time an animated show was run primetime on a weekday and came in #1?
  • I thought about The Simpsons before I posted. If it was run during a weekday I don't think it ever came in #1 for its timeslot. Does anyone know for certian?
  • Hanna [was a pioneer] who took animation beyond "moving comics" and made it great.

    (Edited, since Barbera is still alive.) Hanna-Barbera did many things. They made great cartoons. Anyone who calls them cliché is missing the fact that they only seem cliché because everyone copied them -- these are the originals. But, for all of that and even on this sad occassion, I will dispute that Hanna-Barbera took animation beyond "moving comics." If you have ever watched Hanna-Barbera cartoons, the animation is of exceptionally low quality. Max Fleischer, Disney, and Warner Brothers took animation beyond "moving comics."

    He was still a great pioneer in the industry and with Barbera made some of the greatest contributions to cartoons. I don't believe that Hanna-Barbera contributed much to animation, though, so the credit for that belongs with the other geniuses.

    Naturally, I could be wrong. He might of contributed a lot to the field of animation, but it sure doesn't show in the animation of the Hanna-Barbera cartoons.



  • Mr. Praline : It's not pinin,' it's passed on! This Hanna is no more! It has ceased to be! It's expired and gone to meet its maker! This is a late Hanna! It's a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in peace! If you hadn't nailed him to the perch he would be pushing up the daisies! Its metabolical processes are of interest only to historians! It's hopped the twig! It's shuffled off this mortal coil! It's run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible! This.... is an EX-Hanna!

    (pause)

    Owner : Well, I'd better replace it, then.


  • Many people attribute most of T&J's success to Hanna-Barbara. Sure, they were geniuses, creating much of the most-loved animated classic characters, but Tom and Jerry was a different stroke for them. Chuck Jones, the guy behind Merry Mellodies at Warner Brothers, was the man who made Tom and Jerry really grand. Once television was the wave, Jones came in. Older Tom & Jerry (still great) isn't him... the art we're all used to is Chuck Jones, not William Hanna. The vision was Hanna's (and what a vision!)

  • No, you're not the only one. I recall reading that H-B were notorious for churning out truly lousy animation, cutting corners wherever possible. (OK, not as bad as the infamous Clutch Cargo, but certainly in comparison with WB or Disney.) And what were The Flintstones but a "Honeymooners" ripoff set in a twisted cross between the 50s and prehistory?

    I'll forgive them about anything, though, for the original Jonny Quest (emphasis on original, not the recent attempt at updating), which had the coolest theme music ever written this side of Mr. Henry Mancini himself.

  • Duh. Astro's real name is, of course, Tralfaz. (Yuck!)
  • Bill Hanna didn't create Space Ghost, it was Alex Toth -- granted, FOR Hanna-Barbera, but it wasn't Hanna himself. And Space Ghost Coast to Coast was also paid for by Hanna-Barbera. I'm not denying the sheer, utter quality of SGC2C, but well, you have to give credit where credit's due, eh?
    ---
  • Hmm. Was the "Hair Bear Bunch" one of theirs? While I agree most of this is crap, I'd still watch it... To me, cartoons are *supposed* to be mind-numbingly awful.

  • Re:What a guy (Score:3)

    by small_dick ( 127697 ) on Sunday March 25, 2001 @04:16PM (#341067)
    You might want to re-read that, sport. It says "Educational Division", meaning that there was a animation group that made short films for classroom use.

    Widely distributed? Probably not.

  • But seriously, this man's work had an incalculable effect on my personality. Though we have a new generation of masters (think Craig McCracken), we must pay homage to the orignal greats.


    If you're not wasted, the day is.
  • Chuck Jones, the guy behind Merry Mellodies at Warner Brothers,
    Just a little nitpick: while Chuck Jones ist one of the BIG directors re Merry Melodies et. al. let's not forget the other guys a Termite Terrace like Bob Clampett, Friz Freleng, Robert McKimson, Frank Tashlin and of course Tex Avery.
    ---
    For a real millenial disaster, computer glitches cannot hold a candle to global warming.
  • Yeah, well when I was 5-10 I sure as hell noticed. I NEVER liked anything by HB (at least as far as I recall)

    Guess I was just lucky...was able to catch robotech on sunday mornings and voltron on weekday afternoons.

    Of course, the all time worst cartoon may have to be the super mario brothers super show...sheesh.

    OT - why on earth was I marked flamebait? I thought I expressed my distaste of all things HB rather politely...

  • Dexter's lab isn't hanna barbara (at least I dont think so)... so, no exceptions! Their cartoons are rather dry with a boring plot...
  • Mr. Hanna was gone, deceased, dead, an ex animator, holding his breath forever, taking the long blink, taking the dirt nap, etc. three days ago.

    Huh huh, I guess you could say he's "in-animate".

    I'm going to hell for that.
    --
  • I've noticed alot of people giving their input on the topic saying how HB's cartoons sucked and the such... but if you look at the cartoons revolving around the time HB made most of his cartoons, the other cartoons REALLY sucked. I mean really. They're terrible. He introduced a new type of cartoon with more identfiable cartoons (i.e. the idiocy of Fred Flintstone, the bad luck of Tom) and gave way to more cartoon evolution. The only reason we can enjoy some really great cartoons now (i.e. Dexter's Lab) is due to his work in the field. So before you tag this up with "first post bitch!" and the such, have a little respect. Or I'll spray paint FP on your tombstone.
  • C2C stands in a class all its own proving that creativity isn't dead on TV.

    Too bad it isn't alive enough to actually be running new episodes on Cartoon Network.

  • ...sucked but I liked it (as 12-years olds do). I used to run competitions with my cousins using the 25-15-10 points system -- usually involving running, a couple of board games, and soccer penalty kicks. I liked to be the Really Rottens.
  • I know some fan will probably -1 flamebait me on this, but am I the only one out there who thinks Spaceghost sucks? Seriously, I have had the misfortune of sitting through a handful of episodes with rabid fan friends, and I just don't see the humor in it. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE cartoons and always have, but when Spaceghost comes on I can't seem to find the remote fast enough...

  • Yes, flintstone was the first primetime cartoon, blah blah blah. and to top it off, alot of the jokes and plots were based on the old Jackie Gleason Show, the Honey Mooners. That is where a lot of the original creativity was, in the shows and characters from the 1950's; tossed around like old hand me downs.

    but some of the humor was situational, based on the absurdity of a modern technology based on dinosaur power.

    [shrug] I should be so successful.

  • No, no, no, no, no.

    Chuck Jones no doubt was a great talent. However, he came on to T&J long after it had achieved classic status. In fact, Chuck Jones' take on T&J wasn't all that well received. They are classics in their own right, but in no way can Chuck Jones be credited with making T&J.

  • The only thing that series like the Jetsons and the Flintstones hammer into your brain is that it is OK to act like a cowering sack-of-shit, because you'll always have your loving family to cover for you, and if you don't, well, GET ONE!
  • I am a huge Juan Garcia Equivel fan and I never see any references to the music he wrote for all of these cartoons and such great shows as Gilligans Island, Bewitched, and I Dream of Jeanie. He always seems to fogotten in these exposes. He has had such a profound impact on American Television and Movie history and yet few people can name him.
  • lol, man.. your posts are hillarious yo. peace..

  • H-B were notorious for churning out truly lousy animation, cutting corners wherever possible. (OK, not as bad as the infamous Clutch Cargo, but certainly in comparison with WB or Disney.)

    Apples to oranges.

    The Warner Brothers and Disney cartoons you are comparing HB against (presumably you mean Bugs Bunny, Mickey Mouse, etc) were of course theatrical shorts, which came from a different world of higher production values than TV shows like the Flinstones and Yogi Bear.

    The only Hanna-Barbera cartoons you can fairly compare to classic Bugs Bunny would be Tom and Jerry. It is well known that MGM (and Disney as well) often spent as much money on the animation for one cartoon as WB spent in a whole year. The production values of Tom and Jerry are lavish compared to the average Bugs or Daffy.

    Of course, most people think that WB had funnier writing. Which was usually true. Also, most people agree that WB's artists were more creative. But you can't call HB cheap!

    Extreme cheapness and herky-jerky animation was the rule for all made-for-tv cartoons for most of television's history. It's not limited to Hanna-Barbera. In fact, most of the others were much worse!

    Look at Bullwinkle or Underdog. In comparison, the Flinstones looks pretty good, and the Jetsons looks state-of-the-art. Of course, I personally think that Bullwinkle was funnier than anything HB ever did, but that's another matter.
    ---

  • When I was a little younger, I loved Space Ghost Coast to Coast. However, until just the other day I'd never seen it written up anywhere. In The Oxford American [oxfordamericanmag.com] they had a really funny, interesting article. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to be available online. Here is a tidbit about it though. [nbci.com]

    If you want a laugh, go onto Napster and search for "Space Ghost". My favorite is known as "Brak is stoned".

    --

  • Dexter's lab just has Hanna Barberra's name on it at the end. Other than that I'm pretty certain that they were never involved in it. I guess it must be that Cartoon Network uses their production company or whatever you want to call it.

    Er... Well, y'know. You can't make an omelette without um... destroying a forest. Or something.

  • The stuff in the 50's and 60's was bad too. All of their stuff other than Tom and Jerry was pretty bad. They also made lots and lots of other cartoons that aren't remembered today, these were even worse than the ones that are remembered.

    Er... Well, y'know. You can't make an omelette without um... destroying a forest. Or something.

  • Days ago? That's horrible. I get all my news from /..
  • So Sad.... Watch Boomerang, the other Cartoon network Station. It has Hanna-Barbera Cartoon 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. I love it.
  • I'm sorry, you must have a different sense of humor than I. I have never even come close to laughing at the Flinstones. Vomiting, yes.
  • I saw about four cartoons cast from the same mold as JabberJaw. Talking animal with three or four "cool kids" who were clearly traced over the top of the Scooby-Doo set. And I mean this is just recently that I caught these on Cartoon Network -- late at night usually. They must have been pouring that shit into a churn

  • Comment removed (Score:5)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Sunday March 25, 2001 @01:45PM (#341090)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • "All cartoons sucked in the 80's. They were, after all, the 80's. The Moral Majority was in full control, and only the most mindless stuff was suitible for Saturday mornings. Heck, I blame the decade for killing off Saturday morning cartoons." Hmmm, this makes me really sad that I grew up in the 80's. But wait, didn't the Dungeons & Dragons cartoon come out in the 80's? That was pretty risque for the MM.......
  • Take a look at the chronology of Hanna-Barbera cartoons, http://www.hlla.com/reference/hanna-chron. , and tell me that they didn't do great cartoons for the 40s and 50s. "Touché, Pussycat" has got to be one of the funniest Tom and Jerry cartoons ever and that was in 53 or 54.

    I agree that some of their later stuff especially in the late 70s sucked but I'll also admit that I watched "Blue Falcon" , "Herculoids", "Space Ghost" and even "Speedy Buggy" regularly. Scrappy Doo was the antichrist in ink but no one can be perfect.

  • What a guy (Score:3)

    by IVotedIn2000 ( 252669 ) on Sunday March 25, 2001 @01:43PM (#341093)
    Bill Hanna was an amazing man. This comes from http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bbshop/message/4774 from a listserv for America's oldest male singing society.

    ***

    Date: Fri, 23 Mar 2001 11:40:49 -0600 (CST)
    From: Gary Stamm
    Subject: [bbshop] Bill Hanna (1910-2001) A Barbershopper's Perspective

    Most of you did not have the opportunity to personally know Bill Hanna, the
    SPEBSQSA Honorary Life Member who passed away on Thursday, March 22. But
    it's safe to say that he touched all of your lives through his "children":
    Fred Flintstone, Yogi Bear, George Jetson, Huckleberry Hound, Scooby-Doo,
    Tom and Jerry, and many, many more.

    I had the priviledge of working for Mr. Hanna from 1977-1982, an experience
    I would not trade for anything. I was director of the educational division
    of Hanna-Barbera Productions. We used the classic studio characters to make
    educational filmstrips and films for schools. I had the priviledge of
    working with top notch artists and voice actors on these projects. You all
    know the thrill of perfectly locking a chord and producing a couple of
    overtones -- a real goose-bump producer. Well, directing a recording
    session with the "human" voices of Fred Flintstone and Yogi Bear produced
    even larger bumps for a guy in his 30s who had grown up with these icons.

    But my six years at the studio had an additional benefit. During that time
    I became well acquainted with Bill Hanna. It had been his idea to use the
    characters in the classroom, and although this venture produced a very small
    stream of revenue in comparison with the Saturday morning productions, his
    personal interest in the project kept him in close contact with me. Mr.
    Hanna was a tough business man. It was his role to keep projects on
    schedule and on budget. It was not uncommon to pass his office and hear him
    barking out orders to someone, or even chewing someone out. But, I learned
    that these were always justified, and I also learned that he was generous
    and warm to those who did their job well and truly cared about what they
    were doing.

    Mr. Hanna had a number of interests. He loved boating and had a beautiful
    cruiser that he took out on the ocean as often as he could. He loved to
    take several days and cruise to Baja California where he would fish and
    trade with the local residents. He was also a very staunch supporter of the
    Boy Scouts. He himself was an Eagle Scout and credited Scouting with much
    of his early development. Like anyone who was faithful to him, Bill Hanna
    never forgot Scouting and repaid the organization in many ways.

    Mr. Hanna was also a singer. He loved to sing the songs from his childhood,
    so when he was introduced to SPEBSQSA and barbershopping in the 1960s, he
    became enamored with it. Although he was a member of the Reseda, California
    Chapter for a few years, his very hectic work schedule did not permit him to
    be an active member.

    During my years at the studio, however, I was able to help bring a little
    barbershop back to his ears and voice. Once, his staff staged an impromptu
    birthday party and invited my quartet to sing Happy Birthday. Mr. Hanna was
    not content with one song, nor with simply listening. He insisted on
    pushing out our lead and singing his favorite song, "Sweet Sixteen." We
    ended up singing far longer than planned. We were surprised when he invited
    us to dinner. We were all escorted to one of Hollywood's finer restaurants
    where we were regaled with stories of the early days of the studio and how
    "The Flintstones" had evolved.

    Perhaps the greatest barbershop experiences with Mr. Hanna, however,
    occurred on his boat. Mr. Hanna belonged to the South Long Beach Yacht
    Club. Every Christmas season the club would have a parade of boats in the
    harbor. The boat owners would cover their vessels with lights and
    decorations and cruise the harbor for an assembled "audience" and judges.
    One year Mr. Hanna had the idea of adding some live entertainment. Many of
    the boats would hook up a tape player to a loudspeaker and play Christmas
    music. Mr. Hanna went them one better. He had my quartet on board, as well
    as a professional actor by the name of Frank Welker. Frank was the voice of
    Freddy in the "Scooby-Doo" cartoons, but is also a wonderful impressionist.
    Frank and the quartet took turns in front of the microphone. We would sing
    a carol and he would do an impression of George C. Scott as Patton, Cary
    Grant or dozens of other. At the end of the parade, Mr. Hanna's boat was
    awarded the prize as the most entertaining boat.

    The other real treat was the Big Billfish Tournament. I mentioned that Mr.
    Hanna was a great supporter of Boy Scouts. In 1981 the Los Angeles Boy
    Scout Council approached Mr. Hanna with a fund raising idea. Mr. Hanna's
    friends at the yacht club would donate boats for a three day marlin fishing
    contest off the coast of Catalina Island. The Boy Scouts would find
    companies or individuals to sponsor a fisherman for $1,000. Since the
    boats, meals and other ammetities were donated by the boat owners the
    sponsorships would be pure donations for Scouting. Each boat was to carry
    four fisherman. This magic number sparked an idea with Mr. Hanna. He came
    to me and asked if I could get a quartet to agree to make the trip if he
    would sponsor it. I had no trouble recruiting three of my barbershop
    buddies to take a three-day, all expenses paid vacation around beautiful
    Catalina Island. We were able to make the trip two years in a row, before I
    moved to Kenosha. Both years, five boats (20 fishermen) caught no fish --
    but who cared? We had fun, food, drink and beautiful weather. At night,
    all the boats would moor together and everyone would gather on one of the
    boats for a party. We were the hit of these nights, performing, leading
    sing-alongs, and, of course, having Mr. Hanna step in the quartet for a few
    numbers, including "Sweet Sixteen".

    I left the studio in 1982 and moved to Kenosha to begin another dream job --
    working for SPEBSQSA. A few years later, I suggested considering Mr. Hanna
    for Honorary Life Membership in the Society. Mr. Hanna had been very
    supportive of the Society in the 60s and 70s. He hosted Far Western
    District board meetings on his boat and contributed money to buy a series of
    administrative training films for the Society. He also had a long
    background in music. He dabbled with background music for his first job in
    the animation industry at the Harman-Ising Studio. (How foreshadowing that
    he was at Harman-Ising even before he was a harmonizer.) Mr. Hanna also
    wrote the lyrics for many of the Hanna-Barbera cartoon shows, such as the
    "Flintstones", "Yogi Bear" and others. In the 1960s the studio produced a
    number of phonograph records. One of these was the story of how Fred
    Flintstone put together a quartet to go to the national contest. Also, a
    barbershop quartet appeared in the animated film, "Charlotte's Web".
    Although the original story did not contain a foursome, Mr. Hanna thought
    that the county fair scene deserved one. The committee liked the idea of
    honoring Mr. Hanna and the Society Board approved. Mr. Hanna was delighted
    at this accolade, and he and his wonderful wife Vi were forever grateful for
    the honor bestowed on him by SPEBSQSA.

    Just this past February two barbershoppers, Jim Graham who had served on the
    Honorary Member Committee and Larry Gilhousen of the Harmony Foundation
    staff, arranged to have a Singing Valentine delivered to Mr. and Mrs. Hanna.
    Mutual Fun quartet made the call. Even though Mr. Hanna was suffering from
    late stages of Alzheimer, he was smiling and attentive to the music. When
    the quartet asked if he would like to sing one with them, Mr. Hanna's son
    quickly explained that Mr. Hanna really was incapable. At that point Mr.
    Hanna rose, gently pushed his son aside and began a clear rendition of
    "Sweet Sixteen" as the quartet joined right in.

    The Hannas made several generous contributions to Harmony Foundation over
    the past 10 years. Last year the Foundation Trustees voted to name the
    SingAmerica Endowment Fund in Mr. Hanna's honor. Hopefully, the
    SingAmerica, SingCanada-Bill Hanna Endowment Fund will grow and help keep
    singing alive in our culture far into the future. He would have loved that.

    For those of you who wish to honor a very fine Barbershopper, a truly great
    humanitarian, and a man who made us laugh at animals, cavemen and future
    space-dwellers, please join me in making a contribution to Harmony
    Foundation (6315 Harmony Lane, Kenosha, WI 53143 or through our website
    www.harmonyfoundation.org). The first $250 will go to place Bill Hanna's
    name on the Keep a Melody Ringing Memorial which hangs in Harmony Hall. The
    rest will be placed in SingAmerica, SingCanada-Bill Hanna Endowment Fund so
    that future generations can enjoy their voices singing, "Sweet Sixteen" and
    perhaps hear an echo from the heavens.

    Sing... for life,

    Gary Stamm, Executive Director
    Harmony Foundation
    6315 Harmony Lane, Kenosha, WI 53143
  • One of the beauties of the Net is information on demand. In other words, you want up-to-the-minute news reporting (as opposed to engaged discussion) - go back to TV and Radio. Life online has the facility of moving at a different pace - yours. (And that includes death, too.) When you lot start paying /., you get the moral right to criticize its timeliness - or lack of it. Until then, I suggest you belt up. And for me, Scooby Doo alone is enough to warrant a seat at the high table of the Gods for the late Mr. Hanna.
  • Disney is dead mate, and it still called Disney!

    Anyway, WB cartoons are the true classics of all cartoons.. Its like comparing the simpsons (WB) to something like Dilbert (HB)... there's no comparison in my opinion :)

  • Thank you Michael, i was trying to make an analogy, but i will always idiot proof my comments in future :)



  • Space Ghost C2C was funny before they had it on Comedy Central!

    (Just incase you didn't know,(You probly do know this)Space Ghost C2C was on Cartoon Network first and it was just as funny then.)

    Dexter's Lab is the bomb! I wish I had a lab like that.
  • Dude, Grape Ape was good. :P And I can't believe you're slamming "Hong Kong Phooey!" ...Hong Kong Phooey, #1 super guy! I hated the Wacky Races myself...and the Laffalympics, anything that had Josie & the Pussycats in it, including all their "guest shots" on other cartoons... "The Three Robonic Stooges" was utter crap, and I happened to catch it on Boomerang the other night...it used to be part of a show I vaguely remember as a child with rollerskating birds, talking trees (a'la HR Smokin'stuff) etc. Anyone remember the CB Bears? Was that Hanna/Barbera? ...who can forget "Wheelie and the Chopper Bunch" :) and that vulture that always chased the worm...a blatant ripoff of Coyote and Roadrunner...but still funny. ;)
  • And what I remember is the absolute lamest television program I have ever seen. SG used a ProtectoSheild, the bad guys used KilloBots... I wasn't entirely awake at the time. Was that supposed to be ironic? Help me out here.
  • I like Bill Hanna just like everyone else, but I have to say his cartoons were anything but 'educational'...except maybe to other cartoonists.
  • Since when is The Simpsons a Warner Bros 'toon? It's Fox.
  • It woudln't be so bad if Disney wasn't trying to be the Microsoft of cartoons. Whenever something cool comes out, Disney buys it out and utterly ruins it. Doug USED to be a really good show...
  • "Hanna Barbarra blew in the 80's. Putting that shit on TV instead of Japanimation deprived US audiences of great shows like Robotech"

    At least the H-B stuff was original, not the Frankenstein that Robotech turned out to be (add Macross, Southern Cross, and Mospoedia, take out all but the most imortant plot points, and stir vigorously).

    All cartoons sucked in the 80's. They were, after all, the 80's. The Moral Majority was in full control, and only the most mindless stuff was suitible for Saturday mornings. Heck, I blame the decade for killing off Saturday morning cartoons.

    On the other hand, there wasn't all that much to work with. Look at DC Comics during the 70's and 80's. Of course, then there was that cool show with Spider-Man and the Incredible Hulk and X-Men cameos...

    "Making a show like the Flinstones was very appropriate. "

    The Flintstones wasn't originally intended for kids. It was an animated "The Honeymooners" (same time era, more or less). But, becuase you're too busy comparing it to modern standards (Astro Boy is modern by comparison), you don't want to give it credit for, say, the first animated television show in prime time... If we didn't have the Flintstones, we sure as heck wouldn't have had the Simpsons, or South Park, or any other big animated series you can think of today.

    "Low-brow humor is about all Americans seem to be able to appreciate. "

    A real intellectual-type, hm? I guess your nose is too stuck up into the air ot notice that the majority of the jokes in South Park are intellectual. Let's see what gets laughs in South Park:

    1.) The whole "Duck and Cover" thing from the 50's

    2.) The Elian Gonzales situation

    3.) The "Moral Majority"

    4.) The whole New Age movement

    5.) Politics politics politics

    6.) Censorship

    7.) The relationship between parents and children

    8.) The "follow the herd" tendancies of people

    9.) Questioning peoples' values

    10.) Western society in general

    Yeah, a whole bunch of low-brow stuff there...

    "which were at least a decade ahead of the US"

    And what makes you assume that the Japanese are "ahead" of us? Why aren't we "ahead" of the Japanese? You really can't pick two cultures that are as different as those two. Comparing Japanese and American animation is like comparing soccer and (American) footbal. Sure, both are played on rectangular fields, two teams trying to get the ball from one end of the field to the other, and various amounts of kicking, but that's about it.

    At the very least, you should have some sort of common ground before comparing. After all, I could pick Sailor Moon to represent the Japanese efforts and Daria for this side of the Pacific, and prove how much better American animation is.

    "Just look at the popularity of stuff like SouthPark and Jackass. "

    I'm not so sure they belong in the same category. Jackass wants to find out just how low people would go for money. South Park makes fun of the people who watch and/or want to be on Jackass.

  • Dexter's Lab and PowerPuff Girls both originated at Hanna-Barbera.

    Cartoon Network was formed by Turner Broadcasting, which owned H-B at the time, primarily as a showcase for Hanna-Barbera cartoons.

  • I used to work for H-B. Whenever we had company parties, Mr. Hanna always insisted on being the one to serve the cake, and he took great pride in how quickly he could scoop up pieces of cake, put them on plates and hand them to people. He did this with a very fast, jerky motion as if he were a cartoon character himself. It was always a very funny sight. The somewhat gross part was that he used his hand to slide the cake onto the spatula, and always mutilated the cake and got frosting all over himself.

    Regarding Space Ghost Coast-to-Coast, it should be noted that when that show was made, Mr. Hanna and Mr. Barbera were no longer involved in decision-making. That was a production of Turner Broadcasting, which owned H-B at the time, and it was produced in Atlanta without any involvement of the H-B studio.

    As to whether H-B cartoons sucked, keep in mind that by 1960, animation in the United States had come to a complete halt due to high costs. Up to that time, most cartoons were shorts made to be shown in movie theaters before the feature, and both MGM and WB decided that they had enough cartoons in their archives that they didn't need to make any more. Mr. Hanna and Mr. Barbera were the visionaries who realized that people would watch a half-hour cartoon on television, and that the only thing that mattered was that it be funny. They used stylized, limited-motion animation rather than the slick style of MGM or WB because not only was it much cheaper, it was funnier too. That vision has guided the TV animation industry ever since.

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