The Evil Cartoon – The Beginning.
Continuing our series about Disney Villains, we take a look back to the beginning of the Evil Cartoon and how it all got started.
The Alice Comedies series began in 1923 which starred Alice and her cat named Julius, who was really the beginning of Felix the cat.
The villain in this series was none other than Pete, who eventually came to be known as Peg Leg Pete as he was carried across into the Oswald cartoon series and this was really the first start in the evil cartoon.
Although Alice is seen as a very cute little girl, some of the content may be considered frightening to kids as it contained a lot of danger, perils and even kidnapping and audiences then were not as accepting as today.
One of the problems of this series was that the main characters had no real personality or developed character and the audience found it difficult to relate to them. The cartoons were just a mass of chasing and dodging the bad guy with no real personalities.
However that being said the following cartoons were produced:
1923 Alice’s Wonderland
Alice’s Day at Sea
1924 Alice Gets in Dutch
Alice Hunting In Africa
Alice’s Spooky Adventure
Alice the Toredor
Alice’s Wild West Show
Alice’s Fishy Story
Alice And The Dog Catcher
Alice The Peacemaker
Alice Gets In Dutch
Alice And The Three Bears
Alice The Piper
1925 Alice Gets Stung
Alice’s Egg Plant
Alice in the Jungle
Alice Solves the Puzzle
Alice Wins the Derby
Alice Gets Stage Struck
Alice Rattled by Rats
Alice on the Farm
Alice’s Tin Pony
Alice Chops the Suey
Alice the Jail Bird
1926 Alice’s Mysterious Mystery
Alice in the Wooly West
Alice’s Orphan
Alice’s Balloon Race
1927 Alice the Whaler
As you can see the series finished after 4 years in 1927.
Surprisingly the studio actually went bankrupt after making the first cartoon and had to raise more money to carry on. Winkler Pictures actually came to their rescue.
Margaret J. Winkler (or M. J. Winkler) was one of the key figures in silent animation history, having a crucial role to play in the histories of Max and Dave Fleischer, Pat Sullivan, Otto Messmer, and Walt Disney. She was also the first woman to produce and distribute animated films.
By the time 1927 came, Julius was made to be the hero and he was changed from a cat to a rabbit with long ears and became Oswald.
Pete the villain also changed. He was still the cigar smoker, but now he was bigger, meaner and more stupid. Sometimes he would have a wooden leg and other times it would disappear!
Pete the villain forced Oswald to become ever more crafty and this helped develop his character. And this is just the beginning of the Evil Cartoon.
Alice Comedies
