I had a chuckle the other day when I read Steve's response to receiving the Brutus award. Actually Steve there were two bad guys in the Popeye cartoons; Bluto and later Brutus. From POV Online. Why was Popeye's bearded, burly foe named Bluto in some cartoons and Brutus in others? Popeye was created in a newspaper strip for King Features Syndicate called Thimble Theatre, written and drawn by Elzie Segar. The sailor eventually took over the strip and it was renamed in his honor. When the folks at the Max Fleischer studio licensed the right to make cartoons of the sailor, they decided to use Bluto, a villain in a then-recent (1932) newspaper strip sequence, as Popeye's nemesis. Segar had only intended Bluto to be a one-shot antagonist but the bearded brute wound up appearing in most of the cartoons produced by Fleischer and later by Paramount Studios. Because he was such a part of the cartoons, he became an intrinsic part of the Popeye comic books and the newspaper strip, as done by those who took over after Segar's death. When Paramount stopped making the cartoons, the animation rights reverted to King Features. In the early sixties, King Features decided to produce their own, low-budget Popeye cartoons for television. The way the old contract had been structured, they had the animation rights to anything that had appeared initially in the newspaper strip but not to any characters created by the Fleischer or Paramount operations. Because Bluto had not appeared much in the Segar strips, someone at King Features made the mistake of thinking Bluto had been created for the cartoons and therefore could not be used in their new films. As a replacement, they designed a new, similar villain and called him Brutus. Jackson Beck, who had been the main voice of Bluto for Fleischer/Paramount, was engaged to provide the same voice for Brutus. So that's why Brutus was in the TV cartoons in lieu of Bluto. However, while the series was still in production, the error was discovered...and they actually did one cartoon, late in the run, where Bluto showed up and teamed up with his "brother," Brutus. In the newspaper strip and comic books, Bud Sagendorf -- Segar's assistant and main successor -- kept drawing the same villain he'd previously called Bluto but started calling him Brutus. Since then, they've largely reverted to the Bluto name...but every so often, he's called Brutus. As for the character's look: There was one model for Brutus but Bluto went through several redesigns. Nowadays on merchandise, any of these versions is likely to turn up and there are times when it appears the artist is trying to split the difference and do an amalgam. So it's no wonder you're confused. ____________________________ Here's another explanation from Characterlandwa.com.au BLUTO or BRUTUS What is the difference between BLUTO and BRUTUS? - Which character was first - BLUTO or BRUTUS, and why were there two characters introduced? Okay, - here is the answer. Halfway through 1932, Elzie Segar wrote a narrative titled, "The Eighth Sea". A fearless fiend named, 'BLUTO the Terrible' was introduced into this story. He was treated as a 'throwaway' character - the same way that Segar had originally planned to handle POPEYE when he debuted in January of 1929. In the case of BLUTO - Segar never returned him - after POPEYE was allowed to engage him in a bloody battle and defeat him with his legendary 'twisker punch'. The following year - POPEYE made his motion picture debut at the hands of Max and Dave Fleischer. To add some spice to the cartoon, OLIVE OYL was cast in the role of the jealous girlfriend, but the Fleischer's wanted to really spice things up - so they resurrected BLUTO to be POPEYE's on screen 'emeny'. - he was immediately accepted as POPEYE's number one nemesis. In 1956, the old theatrical cartoons were released to television. The 'POPEYE' phenomenon met an entirely new group of fans - the 'Baby Boomers'. POPEYE's popularity soared. The kiddies of the 'nifty fifties' were consuming the cartoons faster than POPEYE could open his can of spinach. King Features Syndicate recognized the potential of their animated adventurer - so 220 new cartoons were ordered - BUT there was a problem. KFS wasn't sure who owned BLUTO. To avoid legal hassles, BRUTUS made his screen debut in 1960's For the next 18 years, BRUTUS was POPEYE's formidable foe. In 1978, Hanna-Barbera introduced, "The All New Adventures of POPEYE" - (aka "The POPEYE Hour"), and BLUTO was returned to the stories. Unfortunately, BRUTUS was not. It's too bad, because the cartoon series might have been fun with the two bad guys teaming-up against good guy POPEYE. There you have it - BLUTO - BRUTUS - BLUTO..... (Information courtesy of Official Popeye Fan Club) _______________________________ In the 1980 Robert Altman film Popeye starring Robin Willliams and Shelly Duvall Popeye, actor Paul L. Smith played Bluto.
