The Mechanical Monsters (1941)

Powerful

Just perfect...

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

I so enjoyed these cartoons when they came on. I was a child and was so pleased to know that this series predates the George Reeves offerings (which I also liked). In this one, a mad scientist (apparently part of subculture) has created something resembling Transformers. They are machines that can morph into other machines with a goal of destruction or sophisticated pillaging. Once Lois Lane gets wind of this, she manages to make her way on board one of them. This brings Superman out and he must face off against a horrible Ray created specifically to do him in. Lois, as usual, seems to cause considerable complications. One of the better of the series.

I love the Fleischer Superman cartoons. The animation is smooth and fluid with vivid colors. The distinct art-deco style, vintage science fiction imagery, and use of noirish shadows gave them a look unlike any other cartoons. The music and voice work is superb. They're fun, accessible, enduring animation classics.This second cartoon in the Superman series is about an inventor who has built giant robots to commit robberies. The robots can fly like planes and opens banks like tin cans. Did I mention they are also SUPER FRICKING COOL!!! Pardon me geeking out but these robots are just awesome to watch. Anyway, back to the plot: Lois gets into trouble (naturally) and finds herself captured by the inventor. This, my friends, looks like a job for Superman if there ever was one. Supes must tangle with electrical wires, giant robots, and molten metal to save the day. Look at this cartoon! I mean, really, as you watch just take it all in and savor it. The rich details, the creativity, the vibrancy...it's just beautiful.

The Fleischer Brothers Studio made 17 Superman cartoons in the early 1940s. All 17 are very, very similar and suffer from very low quality animation and plots compared to contemporary cartoons. While THE MECHANICAL MONSTERS is far from the worst of the lot (that honor goes to THE MUMMY STRIKES), it's also not particularly noteworthy and is typical of the low quality of the series. While I am no fan of the Fleischers' other series such as Popeye and Betty Boop because of their incredibly similar plots, they are far superior to the Superman cartoons when it comes to animation quality. You can't fault Popeye or Boop for their quality of their animation. While in color, the Superman films lack the detailed backgrounds, characters and line drawings of the other cartoons and they just look cheap.As for the plots, cheapness is also the case. Part of the problem is that you can't tell much of a story in only about eight minutes--no room is left for character development or depth to the villains. Another part is that the Fleischers didn't do much to create interesting plots or situations. In other words, the villain just appears and Superman beats the snot out of him...end of story.Here, we once again we have a generic villain. He unleashes some robots that are smaller versions of the type of robots you might have seen if you'd watched SKY CAPTAIN AND THE WORLD OF TOMORROW. But the robots are easily defeated and the whole thing is over before you can become too bored.Now if you read through the rest of the reviews, you'll see an awful lot of 9s and 10s for this and other Superman films. Frankly, I think these incredibly high ratings come from comic book fans and not people who can objectively rate the films. Fans tend to vote their favorite things 10s mindlessly and ignore a film's shortcomings. After all, any non-zombified fan has to admit that the cartoons have rather poor animation when compared to the Looney Toons and MGM cartoons of the era. Plus there just isn't enough depth to merit such outrageous scores. It's okay to enjoy the films, but can anyone seriously consider them among the very, very best cartoons ever made?! By the way, I saw this film on the DVD entitled "Cartoon Crazys: And The Envelope Please". This is a rather poor compilation of supposedly award winning and nominated films. Poor because several of the films are very lame and are NOT award nominated, the prints are rather bad and parts of some of the cartoons are missing!

This 1941 animated introduction to Superman had a different "take" on it in that they explain that when the baby from Krypton crash-landed on earth, the infant was taken to an orphanage and raised. What happened to the Kent family? Well, that's not in this version. However, the rest of the story is familiar Superman adventure stuff with, of course, Lois having to be rescued. It's good, too - not dated in the least.The introduction of Superman/Clark Kent as an adult "Superman" is almost word-for-word the same one they used a decade later in the famous television series (i.e. "Faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive," etc.)After that two-minute introduction, we get into the crime story which is an interesting one and way ahead of its time. Remember how popular the "transformers" were in the '80s? Well, here we are in 1941 with the same thing, a robot which turns into an airplane and back to a robot, all the while stealing money. The "mechanical monster," as labeled by the press, is one a number of them created by its criminal inventor. After robbing a bank, robot number five's next task is a big one: take the $50,000,000 worth of jewels on display at the "House Of Jewels." In an obvious goof, "5" turns into "13" after he robs the jewels.This production must have really looked cool to kids and adults 67 years ago because it still looks good today in 2008. It features some great artwork. Then again, a classy animated production is no surprise when you know and have seen the work of either of the Fleischer brothers, Max or Dave, who first became noticed with some extremely clever animated work way back in the silent film era ("Koko The Clown" and "Felix The Cat," as two prime examples). Max and Dave Fleischer went on to make numerous famous Betty Boop and Popeye cartoons, and then Dave got into directing the early Superman animated shorts.This one has been restored and looks great, too. I saw it as part of the Popeye The Sailor Volume 2 (1938-1940) DVD.The voices of Clark Kent and Lois Lane were odd because they sounded so much different from all the Kents and Lanes I've heard through the decades. This Kent voice was noteworthy because it had the recognizable voice of Bud Collyer, who became quite famous in the 1950s by hosting two extremely popular TV shows: "Beat The Clock" and "To Tell The Truth."