Attack of the Barberaians

Most everyone else has commented on the demise of Joseph Barbera. The "Pitchman" for Hanna-Barbera productions. Everyone I know grew up with his work, from Oh My Darlin' Huckleberry Hound, That Smarter than the Average Yogi Bear, Snagglepuss, Exiting Stage Right, my personal favourite, El Kabong with his sidekick Bubbaloey, the Yabbadabbadoing Flintstones, of course, and the Futurama of 1962, the Jetsons. Check out this galaxy far away for a parallel universe of Mr. Spacely's own lackey, George.



My least favourite H&B creations are Scrappy-Doo (who ruined Scooby) and that ubiquitous duo, Tom and Jerry. Maybe some of the Academy Award winners of the 40's were okay, but primarily it was just the same plot over and over again. (Hey, wait a minute, that sums up all H&B toons.) Joe Barbera was the Ultimate huckster for his creations. Fred was a shill for cigarettes before Pebbles came along. Then they sold Jam and pretty much every character of the 60's was featured on a cereal box. But I digress, I'm talking about Tom & Jerry.

A little known fact for those outside of Japan is: "Banks here use cartoon characters to entice people to put their money in their vaults." Snoopy, Hello Kitty, and others want you to invest your hard-earned shekels in their Financial Institution. So who's the spokespersons for my bank? Well, none other than Tom & Jerry (as if you needed to guess.)






The last thing I want to mention about H&B is about the Action/Adventure series of the 60's. I loved Space Ghost, BirdMan, the Herculoids and the toon that introduced me to Jazz, Jonny Quest. (Charlie Brown's Vince Guaraldi helped a lot, but Hoyt Curtin started the ball rolling. Hoyt did the Jetsons and Flintstones themes too.) Here's the theme song...