Blink and You Miss It: Archie, Edith, Gloria, Mike... and Mike?

Things are typically "ALL IN THE FAMILY" at the Bunker household, in 1971 Queens, New York.

Left to right, there's Archie, Gloria, Mike, and Edith...

But what's THAT in the upper left, hanging down to catch Archie's every word? 

We'll zoom in a littler closer...

And, a bit closer, still...

Methinks, there's more than one "mike" in this room!  And, one of 'em's more "mechanical" than "meathead"!

"Aw, geez!", as Archie would say! 

From the final scene of the ALL IN THE FAMILY Season One episode "Mike's Hippie Friends Come To Visit", SOMETHING ELSE has "come to visit", after the hippies have left! 

...But, Blink and You Miss It!

 

Blink and You Miss It: The Walking Dead - Season 3: “Bloody” Good Cinematography!

At the end of 2012, I made the decision to take the plunge into AMC’s cable horror series THE WALKING DEAD as a blind (yet, informed by its many good reviews) buy on DVD.  You can read my account of that HERE. 

As I write this, I am presently in the middle of Season Three of THE WALKING DEAD, which has just been released to DVD and Blu-Ray on August 27, 2013.  And, I am utterly amazed at how much good storytelling and characterization the show CONTINUES to wring out of the basic “flesh-eating zombies come to life and attack the living” idea.

Each season has upped the ante from its predecessor (pre-DECEASE-or?) with compelling conflicts among the LIVING, as well as “life and (…um) death” encounters with the titular “walking dead”. 

 
Another way the ante has apparently been upped is in the volume of spattered blood.  So much of it that, in at least two cases, I noticed it even hits the camera lens! 

First, in Episode SEVEN (“When the Dead Come Knocking”), prison inmate “Oscar” offs a “walker” (Our band of characters’ name for the zombies). 

It’s all over the screen here – but mostly on the left side.  You may Click to Enlarge.

Then, in Episode TEN (“Home”), Carol shields herself with the body of another prisoner (Axel), as the camera catches a Big Red Splat – again at the upper-mid left.   Click to… Aw, you know! 

That's not on the GROUND, folks!  You can see it spatter against the screen!  -- Talk about "Breaking the Fourth Wall"!  





…But, Blink and You (bloody) Miss It! 

A special “PLEASE”, to any WALKING DEAD fans reading this… No spoilers on Season Three, as I am experiencing it for the first time on DVD! 

 

 

I hope to be done with the backlog and ready to begin watching regular broadcasts of THE WALKING DEAD when Season Four begins this coming October 13, 2013.   …We can discuss it THEN, okay? 

Blink and You Miss It: Headlines of 1939.

In ancient times, a trick resorted to by cinema to illustrate the passage of time, or the advancing of a series of events, was to show close-ups of newspaper front pages – atop which the progression of items or plot points would appear as the paper’s main headline.

These “newspapers” were never actual newspapers, but clever mock-ups created to illustrate time's passage in a sort of visual shorthand.

Viewers would glance at the screen, the main “headline” would make its point, and both film and audience would move on.

Even THE SIMPSONS uses this old chestnut - quite often!

But, more recently, thanks to DVD clarity and freeze-frame, I’ve looked below the headlines to see what else was going on. Sometimes the “other stories” are planted for laughs, as in THIS VERY EARLY BUGS BUNNY CARTOON. And, sometimes, they look as if they were clipped wholesale from the newspapers of the day, and inset to fill the remaining space… space that original theatre audiences (or later TV audiences) never had the time to look at.

Here are a bunch of them transcribed from the 1939 Humphrey Bogart Warner Bros. gangster film “King of the Underworld”.

Our actual “Looong DVD Review” ™ of this film is coming soon. (It's HERE now!) These headlines are not gags, but an odd collection of what was likely "then-current events", that are just fun to consider…


“Two Men Seized: Body was Put in Burlap Bag”

“Nation Warned Against Trend to Machinery”

“Dope Convict’s Parole Rocks Party Circles”

“36 Mexican Rebels Killed by Soldiers”

“2 Die in Gun Fight at Door of Palace”

“Cabinet Crisis Causes Return”

“Praises Work; Makes Charges on I.R.T. Claim” (…This is a NYC Subway reference.)

“Lightning Bolt Kills Two; Hurts Several Others”

“Daring Aviators Begin First Hop on Round-The-World Jaunt”

“Urges City Pay Bills of Subway in Bonds” (…More NYC Subway news?)

“War on Kidnapping by Federal Forces”

“Kidnappers Shoot Victim who Fights”

“Progressives Halt Confirmation Move” (…Obstructionist Progressives??? Who’d have ever imagined!)

“Officers in 8 States Seek Mystery Plane”

Whew! That’s a LOTTA newspapers! But, there was a LOTTA PLOT in that great little film! With a Running Time of a mere 01:06:42, I’d guess they had to advance the plot rather quickly… giving us a look into the “Headlines of 1939”.

Blink and You Miss It!

Let's hope Bogie misses, too!

“Island in the Sky” Blink and You Miss It: Mickey’s Mistake?

Aw, c’mon! You knew we weren’t through with Floyd Gottfredson’s Mickey Mouse comics classic “Island in the Sky”!

We’re NEVER completely through with “Island in the Sky”! That’s just how darned great it is… Especially when it’s now ours to enjoy in Fantagraphics’ wonderful new book: “Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse 'House of the Seven Haunts' by Floyd Gottfredson”.

The subset of posts I call “Blink and You Miss It” has always applied to a moving on-screen image that may come and go so quickly that a superb joke or other observation is not realized by the viewer.

But, in this case (believe it or not), it applies to a static comic panel!

A panel I must have been “Blinking and Missing” on for 47 or so years – since I first read the story then-called “Mickey Mouse and his Sky Adventure” in the 1965 Gold Key reprint comic pictured below.

At the story’s climax, Mickey has just subdued his adversary Peg Leg / Black / Big Bad / Just Plain Pete, and saves Dr. Einmug’s floating island at literally the last second by following the doctor’s explicit instructions:


“Pull Lever ‘S’ FORWARD, Lever ‘K’ BACKWARD, and open Value ‘Q’!”


Read it again, folks… just for effect:


“Pull Lever ‘S’ FORWARD, Lever ‘K’ BACKWARD, and open Value ‘Q’!”

"S Forward", "K Backward"... That's what the man SAID!  ...He SAID that!

And, in what is surely the Mouse’s most exciting and dramatic moment to that point (and maybe since) – amid massive electronic crackling and as many atmospheric pyrotechnics as Floyd Gottfredson could fit into his newspaper-standard panels – Mickey does just that!

…Or, DOES HE?  (Click to Enlarge!)

Sorry for the less than perfect resolution of this Internet scan of that moment… but isn’t Mickey “…pulling Lever ‘S’ BACKWARD and Lever ‘K’ FORWARD, as he opens Value ‘Q’?!”

…Well, ISN’T HE?

So, how does the thing stay up?                                                                                                          

It’s not even the perspective of the image! He’s really doing the REVERSE of what he was instructed to do!


After all those years of reading this classic tale – in EVERY ONE OF THESE FORMATS – I never noticed it until the Fantagraphics version!

It’s a good thing that Dr. Einmug was a little bit more of the “absent minded professor” than he ever let on!

And, as I’ve become fond of saying: “Blink and You Miss It”!

Joost walk BACKWARD, Mickey, and you'll be okay!

Blink and You Miss It: The Tex Avery Riots!

We interrupt our series of New York Comic Con posts for an important DVD-related announcement!

A definite crown jewel of the LOONEY TUNES PLATINUM COLLECTION (Blu-ray) VOLUME TWO, released October 16, 2012, was the completely restored version of the early “Proto-Bugs Bunny” cartoon “Hare-Um Scare-Um” (1939) directed  by Ben (“Bugs”) Hardaway and Cal Dalton. 

To my knowledge, this version has NEVER been seen before the release of this DVD set – and is very much worth the price… never mind that you get more than 50 great looking cartoons and loads of Extra Features (new and recycled from earlier LOONEY TUNES GOLDEN COLLECTIONS) to boot! 

The version we’ve seen on TV for decades is also available for comparison – on the DVD of the George Raft / William Holden / Humphrey Bogart film “Invisible Stripes” (also 1939), as part of the excellent “Warner Night at the Movies” Extra Feature that I’ve raved about in previous Warner Bros. film DVD reviews… like THIS ONE. 

Curious bugger that I am, I pulled out the “Invisible Stripes” version for a comparison with the PLATINUM COLLECTION version – and found there to be a difference in running time of 7: 40 vs. 8:09! 

…And, yes, there’s an ending you’ve never seen before!  That’s all I’ll say! 

Also, via the magnificent clarity of Blu-ray, we are able to see DETAILS in the newspaper in which would-be rabbit hunter “John Sourpuss” (Where did I get that name from, as it not actually mentioned in the cartoon itself? …Maybe in some book?) reads of the soaring meat prices that prompt the fateful hunt, that contributes greatly to the gestation of what may arguably be the single greatest animated character of all time.     

“MEAT PRICES SOAR – Consumers also sore!” 

We’ve always seen that, but blink and you miss most (or all) of this: 

Below the “Meat” headline:  “Butchers demand a living wage.  Chicago… Jun.. 5… The Butchers’ Union voted today upon a thirty-three percent raise on all beef and pork, which will go into effect – Continued on Page 11.”  (…I didn’t know they could do that?  Where are all those Free-Market Advocating, Union-Busting politicians when you need them?)

Above that headline is the “Daily News” masthead, with little boxes containing “Weather – Yes and No”… and “Merry Melodies are your best entertainment”.  [ Yes, “Merry” is spelled WRONG for “Merrie Melodies”!]

WHO'S "incidental", Doc?

Ben (“Bugs” – for whom the Bunny is eventually named)  Hardaway is also pictured as “Happy Hardaway [undecipherable] …ing handicapper”

Perhaps also contributing to the record meat prices is this item: “Freight Tie Up Looms as Car Space at Premium.  Hog Hollow, Mo.  Owing to the large number…” 

There’s an odd item headlined: “Lu-Cavett Named in Shake-Up”  (Anyone know what that meant?)   

But, we’re really here to highlight THIS WONDERFUL ITEM: 

“Hundreds Hurt in Rioting!  Hollywood, Cal…

“Rioting broke out today at the Looney Tune Cartoon Studio when Tex Avery was caught dealing from the bottom of the deck. 

“All able police men were called to quell the savage fighting.  Many were reported to be in a bad way. 

“When Avery was apprehended the [becomes undecipherable]”

Ironic that Tex Avery would be the one to refine “Bugs’s Bunny” into the “Bugs Bunny” we know and love today with “A Wild Hare”, a year later in 1940. 

Also, could this be the first on-screen naming of “Tex Avery”?  In his earlier cartoons, he was more typically known as “Fred Avery”. 

…And “Blink and You Miss It”! 

BONUS OBSERVATION on “Hare-Um Scare-Um”:  On LOONEY TUNES PLATINUM COLLECTION (Blu-ray) VOLUME TWO, “Hare-Um Scare-Um” is immediately preceded by “Porky’s Hare Hunt” (also by Hardaway), where Porky Pig hunts the wacky white-proto-rabbit. 

A highlight of “Hare-Um Scare-Um” is the song that Proto-Bugs sings about being crazy.   During which he delivers the lines:

“Nuthin’ ever wrong,

“Life was just a song,

“ ‘Till that Looney Tune came along.”

He denotes a billboard with the image of Porky Pig, that says: “Looney Tunes starring Porky Pig.  That’s All Folks” – and tears down and shreds the bill with Porky’s image. 

…Until seeing these directly back-to-back, it never occurred to me that the crazy rabbit was referring to (and maybe even lamenting) his debut appearance in “Porky’s Hare Hunt”. 

That’s easy to miss, even without blinking! 

Hur-Hur-Hur-HUR-Hur!

Blink and You Miss it: Five-Fingered Bugs!

 

Check out the great Bugs Bunny cartoon “The Rabbit of Seville” (1950), written by Michael Maltese and directed by Chuck Jones. 

Here, Bugs is about to give Elmer Fudd “The Works” to the strains of the famous opera.  Note he has the standard number of fingers on each hand, characteristic of anthropomorphic animated characters… four. 

Click to Enlarge, Doc!

Later in the cartoon, however, he now has FIVE fingers!  Done, I’d suspect, to allow the animation of each finger to keep time with the music. 

…But, blink and you miss it! 

Blink and You Miss It: The New Family Guy Dancers.

…After OUR LAST POST, this can’t help but be a quickie – but enjoy it anyway! 

In 2010, FAMILY GUY, at long last, moved into the realm of HD widescreen broadcast. 

When THE SIMPSONS made a similar move some time ago, its opening credits sequence was both revised and expanded.  Read about that HERE! 

No such revision, it seemed, for FAMILY GUY… until you look just a wee bit closer! 

Check out the lines of male and female chorus dancers in both the standard and widescreen versions. 

The standard, or original, version is made up of generic characters…

…While the widescreen version is made up of CHARACTERS from the SERIES! 

Click on each -- and maybe you'll see it larger... or maybe not!  Feeling lucky? 

Note the appearances of:

MALE (From bottom to top): Glenn Quagmire, Joe Swanson, Mayor Adam West, Mort Goldman, Tom Tucker, and Carter Pewterschimdt. 

FEMALE (From bottom to top): Trisha Takanawa, Bonnie Swanson, Jillian (Brian’s former love interest), Angela (Peter’s boss), Joyce Kinney (the new newscaster), and Babs Pewterschimdt. 

But, “Blink and You Miss It!”  

Blink and You Miss It: “Here’s to you, Mister Robinson”!

Here at TIAH Blog, we love Edward G. Robinson!

We loved him HERE, HERE, HERE, and in many other things.

But, here’s a great “Blink and You Miss It” moment from the JUSTICE LEAGUE episode “Comfort and Joy”, which was part of my recent Christmas Holiday DVD viewing, which I described HERE.

Yeah, I’ve seen the image of “Frankenstein” every time (though I wonder if it was Boris Karloff, Lon Chaney, Jr., Glenn Strange, or some interloper)…

…But check out what’s FOLLOWING “Franky”!!!

I sure gave my pause and rewind buttons a workout to confirm what I *thought* I saw!

All I can say is “Mnyaah!”

Blink and You Miss It! Great Music Gags!

The DVD set “The Cleveland Show: The Complete Season Two” (Released September 27, 2011) leads off with a great episode in which Cleveland Brown becomes the manager of a character voiced by music star Kanye West.

As West’s character’s hit climbs the charts, we get these great glimpses of those very charts. Thanks to DVD Freeze Frame, we can see what we missed on TV.


Note to Mark Arnold, check out the guys from “Total Television” associated with Hanna-Barbera's “Hong Kong Phooey”!

Not to mention multiple references to The Simpsons!

And, in this second one, note references to The Jetsons, the Chuck Jones/Michael Maltese Warner Bros. cartoon “One Froggy Evening”,  The Flintstones, South Park, Futurama, and more Simpsons! 

Blink and you miss it! I’m glad I didn’t!