And you know, what the heck, let’s keep going with the Terry Toons cartoons. Here’s one that brings together Farmer Al Falfa and the other silent or near-silent star, Kiko the Kangaroo, and what’s probably as close to an origin story as Kiko can get. It’s a fairly strongly plotted cartoon for the era, and … Continue reading “Farmer Al Falfa and Kiko the Kangaroo: The Prize Package”
For today I’d like to continue the Terry Toons theme that’s been going on around these parts with the 1922 short “Magic Boots”. This is another good example of the kind of loose and improvisational style that was so common in cartoons before sound. The action starts with some mice dancing, and turns to a … Continue reading “Farmer Al Falfa: Magic Boots”
A mouse scares off some cats by beating up his elephant-shaped scooter. A fish demands a drink of water from the annoyed Farmer Al Falfa. An ostrich or maybe a penguin (I guess a duck is plausible enough?) pops out of trap doors and walks through rooms. The Farmer berates his maid, a mouse, to … Continue reading “Farmer Al Falfa: Mouse’s Bride”
George Herriman’s Krazy Kat, as I mentioned last week, was a strange and somewhat exotic comic strip that’s been highly regarded but never really popular. In 1916 and 1917 William Randolph Hearst’s International Film Service made somewhere around 26 very short cartoons, for inclusion in news reels, that probably satisfied the requirement for “cartoon starring … Continue reading “Krazy Kat in Love’s Labor Lost”
So on to my monthly examination of whether anyone actually read my little humor blog here anytime recently. The good news is people seem to have: WordPress’s statistics in fact say I had my greatest number yet of unique visitors this past month, 369 of them, up from July’s then-record of 332. The total number … Continue reading “Statistics Saturday on Labor Day: Humor Blogging In August 2014”
