Cartoon a Day: Terror on the Midway

Terror on the Midway
1942
Directed by Dave Fleischer
Available on: The Complete Superman Cartoons

I wish I could say that "Terror on the Midway" is as good as "The Bulleteers," but sadly that's not the case. Now this isn't a bad cartoon, it's just doesn't have the pacing do keep the viewer as involved.



In this short, Clark Kent and Lois Lane are on assignment at a circus. Lois is bored to tears with the big top when a small monkey inadvertently lets a monster gorilla loose. The panic results in lions and panthers being let loose, stampeding elephants and even a fire. Luckily, Superman swoops in to save the day.

One of the most interesting aspects of this short is that many scenes involve showing the action in shadow. In case you didn't know, I'm a puppeteer and shadow puppetry happens to be one of my favorite forms of puppetry. So portraying several sequences in shadow is really intriguing to me. Even if the rest of short isn't as exciting as some of the other Superman toons, there are still some interesting techniques at work.