With the release of the third and final volume of the classic Max Fleischer/Famous Studios Superman cartoons you may have done some basic math and realized that while there are 17 episodes in total to the series, the 3D volumes only contain 14 episodes. For a quick breakdown, the Max Fleischer run was nine episodes. The first four are contained on Volume One and the remaining five are on Volume Two. So we’ve got 100% coverage on that run.
The subsequent episodes fall under the Famous Studios moniker and contain eight episodes, five of which are included in my Volume Three release.
The omitted episodes are Japoteurs, Eleventh Hour and Jungle Drums.
To cut straight to the chase, those three episodes are quite blatantly racist and I don’t enjoy them as entertainment. Jungle Drums features stereotypical racist renditions of black people while Japoteurs and Eleventh Hour are full of racist stereotype depictions of Japanese people in what are essentially World War II propaganda films. They are a direct reflection of a time when the United States of America was imprisoning its own citizens without charge or due process based solely on how they looked. To top it off one of the episodes features Superman ruthlessly killing countless people.
For me, 3D is in and of itself fun and entertaining. When applied to films and cartoons it adds an entertaining component - in fact there are several films I don’t care for enough to watch in 2D but are quite entertaining to me in 3D.
With that in mind - when do we choose not to convert to 3D? Our friend and fellow 3D enthusiast Jonathan Sabin of Variety Films posted an extensive interview with Andrew Murchie fairly recently and Andrew specifically ponders the question of what films shouldn’t be converted to 3D. He quickly cited Schindler’s List as an example. I wholeheartedly agree with that; while Schindler’s List is a hugely important, fantastically acted and well made film I certainly do not sit down and watch it to be entertained. It enlightens, engrosses and provokes but fun it is not. Adding an entertaining layer - vis a vis 3D - to Schindler’s List would not only not make the film fun or entertaining, it would likely distract from the filmmaker intent.
Circling back to these specific Superman episodes, that’s where I settled. There is historical context and the episodes are not unimportant and should be preserved, but I cannot watch them for fun and be entertained by them; therefore I’m not inclined to add 3D to them.
Ending on a very positive note, we do now have 14(!) episodes of these beautifully animated cartoons in 3D and they are a blast! Volume Three features what I feel is some of the best 3D conversion work I’ve ever done - period!
Phil