Why do modern Looney Tunes look so worse than the original theatrical cartoon shorts?

I’m thinking about that and I suppose it’s true that good artists can get good results using modern technology (thinking of some of Pixar’s animated features) even if they don’t truly have the feel of the old hand drawn stuff. I think in the case of modern Looney Toons, we could charitably attribute the crappiness to aesthetic choices, but more likely it is because they are now cheap assembly line products with no aesthetic considerations at all.

 

The 60s to 80s were very tough times for the animation industry in the United States. But the late 80s, and specially the 90s, really saw a renaissance and huge boom of cartoons, budgets growing and creators daring to challenge the huge limitations of plot and animation that had plagued TV animation for decades. The birth of cable cartoon networks and decline of saturday morning cartoons helped that boom. And animators since then collect the fruits of that change. The medium of TV can still be complicated to handle, but it is far wider than before. We are now at a point where truly everything is possible. Even if the likes of Michael Barrier remain still very cynical towards modern american animation in general and TV (remember him saying that Ren & Stimpy is one of the very few TV cartoons ever made that deserves serious critical examination, says that he thinks that TV as a whole, live-action and animated, can pretty much only do really well sports or situation comedy, and that animators nowadays don't have the chance to make a film as durable as Snow White, which I think he sees as still the best animated film ever made). Animation has never been more sophisticated story-telling wise, TV animation allows a form of serialized storytelling and arcs that previously couldn't be done in the system of theatrical shorts, it's the main aspect of what makes TV unique and special, what one needs to be able to appreciate in order to understand and respect TV as an artform as good as others (coming back to just animation, some of the older guard of scholars or animators might complain about an over-emphasis on dialogue and plot rather than depth of animation itself in illuminating a character's inner life compared to the Golden Age). But times change. Culture changes And, as I said in one thread I made here before and in which you participated, I prefer to keep a open mind about this amazing art form that is animation. So much radically different stuff with different purposes and aesthetices from all eras an aesthetic sensibilities. Japanese anime often gets criticized for how it breaks many principles of what good and depth of animation is as understood in the US. Or soviet animation.

Cheers! Your contributions are always interesting and meaningful

 

What I'm REALLY enjoying are the new restorations on HBO. Too bad they screwed up some of the title cards. Like HOW DOES THAT HAPPEN?

As for the new cartoons, the ones I've seen are funnier than anything from the Seven Arts era.

 

I suspect, re-distribution deals over the years have caused a lot of title cards to be misplaced, and nobody thought to check them for correct originals?

As to what Matheus is saying about Barrier's estimation of Snow White...it may be a great film, but at that time, there was only that one and Gulliver to compare with, in terms of the American effort to put a whole feature onto screens. He's saying, there was never a greater animated feature than that one, but, comparing that experience with the experience today of having tens of thousands to choose from, is completely different context. That's like saying nobody can put out an album as great as Meet The Beatles, forgetting that now, in the marketplace, there are thousands of others to compare it to, where at the time, there was not.

It's my well-used, "first bowl of ice cream" metaphor, where your second bowl will never be as good, because...you already know what you're getting, having tasted the first one. You can only "discover" a thing once, unless you have one of those curious mental issues that prevent you from recalling your discovery.

 

Well, he has seen many animated films, but he is often very harsh towards many of their aspects, like writing, character animation (he says that Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston's 1982 book "The Illusion Of Life", that became reference in animation, had a terrible influence in it and that animators should dump it into the trash box, he says the book created a problem for Disney movies and so much animation in general, to make characters of virtuoso, free and dynamic animation, but without much emotional depth and substance to that character animation, calling it overly literal animation, specially when compared to the early Disney classics, he is very critical towards the level of praise made for Disney's Nine Old Men). Personally, I think he's too jaded, he's not an animator, and he doesn't have the final word on what it should be, a perceptioj often skillfully disguised by supposedly very analytical and eloquent commentary. As I talked about in one thread I made, and as anyone can easily see the problems by themselves in great detail if looking at his site's many posts and comments. Good answers as always by you.

That's all great to hear. To be clear, I don't want to sound like I'm dismissing the new Looney Tunes cartoons altogether. I'm interested in them, but I really felt the visual decline compared to the classic cartoons.

On the broader topic of restorations:

I want Fleischer's Superman cartoons restored and in HBO Max too. I've heard that DC Universe had them scanned from the negatives and in Full HD, but not anymore. The restorations are ready, it should be easy for HBO Max to just post them in their streaming platform. Why don't they?

 

Maybe Warners had already done the Supermans to their satisfaction when they did their DVD, a few years back. Have you seen it?

A final thought on Michael Barrier. He's just one voice in the conversation. You're another. Viva la difference.

 

The Great Piggy Bank Robbery is gorgeous! And so creative too!

But the shift in the background style can really be seen in the cartoons released from 1954 onwards. But, like I said before, it wasn't just due to slowly diminishing budgets, but artistic influence from UPA too. Arrival of Maurice Noble too. And Jones had already showed a love for more abstract and simple backgrounds in The Dover Boys from 1942.

Recommend watching Tom Thumb In Trouble, from 1940 and directed by Chuck Jones. Looks like what you would expect from Disney rather than Warner Bros. Almost no jokes, stunning backgrounds, unbelievable what they did without Disney's budget. Made when Jones was still finding his voice, and still being a Disney imitator

 

No. But these cartoons deserve a HD remaster. They are too gorgeous to not have one. Warner has already done an HD remaster scanned from the film, why not post it in HBO Max already?

I found this upscaled (from the DVD) version of The Mad Scientist. Look at how gorgeous it is, and why I want to watch so much an actual HD scan.

Yeah, for all aesthetics of this amazing artform!

 

Jeepers creepers, that IS one hell of an upgrade! I've been following the improvement of comic book production technology for decades (still do), and the shading and gradiation of the colors where they apply it, is up to that level of "wow".

(as far as I'm concerned, anybody who ever had something bad to say about Ted Turner's colorizations of the 1980's, needs to see this, and see what that continued refinement of technique and craft, has led)

 

Felt something was off even as a kid watching The Sword and The Stone when first released in the theater finding out later it was due to the pencils directly Xerox'ed onto cell acetate. But the Disney animation and character designs quickly distracted from that minor aesthetic with the uniquely only to Disney stylized look in the way the character designers drew facial features movement and costume design Ralph Bakshi copied in his later feature films.

I just remember the trailers for Disney's mid '60's feature films seemed to sparkle and jump off the screen with intoxicating effervescent feel like Beach Boy's music. It seemed like a drug for me as a kid.

Disney's Jungle Book had the same distinct character design and engaging energy I didn't see in Loony Tune animation.

 

What are you referring to when you say "this"?

 

Considering I was referring to the post above, I must have been referring to the DVD upgrade of the Superman short. The quality of this detail, is a direct result of the processes that started when people started colorizing black-and-white films, which was roundly criticized as heresy. What it actually was, was a craft in progress, that had not progressed to this level at that point.

 

It's a process of film restoration that can only happen in the digital medium. As were Turners first attempts to bring more life into old film. Whether you like the clunky results of earlier attempts to bring that life into a new print, it is all a part of the process that leads us to modern film restoration technique. But stoning the monster for just trying to walk...is never going to teach him to get better at it.

Sorry, I'm not up to having this conversation nor, or in this thread. I have three wifi processes on my desk now, along with a new doohickey and a dongle, plus two legal pads of scribbling to get to. Find an older defense of Turner's colorization as a part of the process which I have laid-out in length a few times before, and go read those.

Let's try and keep this focused on what the thread was started for, m'kay?

 

I'm a little confused, I was just asking how an upscale of a DVD relates to Ted Turner's colorizations of the 1980's, (which you brought up). And although you somewhat explained the connection, I didn't mean to hit any sore spots about the culture and debate over film colorization. So as you requested, ill veer back, m'kay?

 

There is a Chuck Jones gallery in Santa Fe and I've gone in there several times. IMHO, "Bully For Bugs" is the greatest cartoon every made. The last time I was in the gallery, there were a couple of cells from "Bully For Bugs" there but I just couldn't afford them. I'd love to have one and hang it on the wall.

 

I will stick to originals as when I watched as a child..

 

Chuck Jones was the master of facial expressions and expressive character design, animation and body poses. So much that he often excelled at silent characters, like in One Froggy Evening (1955) or Marc Anthony in Feed The Kitty (1952). El Toro, the antagonist of Bugs Bunny in Bully For Bugs (1953), is truly one of Chuck Jones' greatest creations. In that same year, Chuck Jones also released Duck Amuck and Duck Dodgers In The 24 And A Half Century (the design, colors and visuals of the latter are so gorgeous and amazing).

 

I couldn't resist posting a video of Duck Dodgers to show my point. Maurice Noble made the amazing futuristic designs. Ended up creating some truly new and classic designs in all of sci-fi.

 

For some reason Chuck just wasn’t a good fit for Tom & Jerry. Certainly his facial expressesions for them were good with a raised eyebrow for Tom (or Jerry) he could elicit a laugh but the physical comedy was lacking and I love Chuck.

 

Chuck Jones' poised and subtle style of comedy simply wasn't a great fit for the insane Tom & Jerry's anarchic violence.

But everyone seems to agree that Jones' work at Tom & Jerry was still clearly better than Gene Deitch's.

 

Yeah Gene’s we’re certainly the weakest of all the T&J cartoons (not including the more ‘modern’ ones). It is funny though because, based on Roadrunner and Coyote cartoons you might think so but if you compare the two….they really aren’t alike at all.

 

That wasn't where Deitch was best suited, but he found his way at UPA soon enough.

And obviously Hanna and Barbara reinvented themselves when they left MGM. Created an empire doing it, as I recall.

 

I totally agree. We had a German Shepherd whose noises and facial expressions were very close to the bull. We mentioned every time we saw Bully For Bugs.
That dog has been gone for over 20 years and we still talk about it.

 

On the Chuck Jones Tom & Jerry toons; even he said he didn't capture what made them special like Hanna & Barbera did when they created them. But, like he said, it's quite possible that they couldn't have performed the same magic if they had taken over the Roadrunner series. And, looking at the dreadful RR toons WB cranked out after Jones was on his own, (directed largely by Rudy Larriva), Chuck was probably right. I'm sure that like the Jones T&J toons, a Hanna/Barbera RR seires would have looked great. But, they might have been as flat as the Jones ones. The Chuck Jones T&J toons are so beautifully illustrated that it's a shame they're not as funny as they need to be.

And, since this thread started out about background art, MGM's animation dept deserves a shout out for the lush & gorgeous backgrounds they used in the T&J & Tex Avery toons under Fred Quimby's production. They're far richer & more painterly than any WB or even Disney backgrounds.

 

It's interesting to note how the Tom & Jerry cartoons had their fair share of detractors (and still do, though far less), mainly people complaining and disdaining about their humor often based solely on one-note slapstick pain and quite gruesome (for the time at least) painful gags that were seen as of bad taste and low level, specially ones involving knives, puncturing the characters and so on. I think that Chuck Jones was one of those people, and that working on Tom & Jerry gave him a new appreciation for what Hanna-Barbera accomplished in Tom & Jerry. And I think other animators back then also ended up changing their opinions about Tom & Jerry when they actually got the chance to work in the shorts, gaining a new perspective on them.

WB cartoons often had really awesome backgrounds in the 40s and early 50s. A vast oeuvre I just barely scratched the surface.

I want to explore more MGM cartoons too, but while it seems that almost all Tom & Jerry ones seem to be easy to find in great quality, Tex Avery's on the other hand...

Would like to see you giving examples of most gorgeous backgrounds in MGM cartoons.

Also, I'll randomly say that Walter Lantz and the Woody Woodpecker cartoons, at least outside of Brazil (Woody Woodpecker is so iconic, his cartoons are still shown on TV to this day, and the brazilian dub is a masterpiece), are tragically underrated. It seems they are ignored or disdained by many scholars due to how low-budget they were, and comparatively far less artistically ambitious than WB or MGM, at first glance at least. Though Walter Lantz at least doesn't have the huge bad rep that Terrytoons has.

Still, it's interesting how we, brazilians, have appropriated and assimilated Woody Woodpecker in our culture and popular consciousness as if it was our own creation. Memes, jokes, it's all unbelievably iconic. United States, meanwhile, doesn't love Woody as we do.