Cartoon a Day: Betty Boop, M.D.

Betty Boop, M.D.
1932
Directed by Dave Fleischer
Available on: YouTube

Here's another Betty Boop cartoon available for viewing in full thanks to YouTube and the public domain. Enjoy.




This is a truly bizarre cartoon featuring Betty, Koko, and Bimbo as part of a medicine show. By the time this cartoon get rolling, their wonder product, Jippo, has got people's skeletons jumping out of their skin, babies turning into monsters and all sorts of other weird stuff. The cartoon is almost psychedelic.

It's pretty weird, but it is a great example of the originality that went on at the Fleischer studio. Whereas many cartoons from this era are repetitious in their animation, this is anything but. We don't see the same gag, not to mention the same animation, over and over. This cartoon quickly moves from bit to bit.

I've certainly seen some Betty Boop shorts over the years, but I guess I've never looked at them as closely as I am now. There is really a lot of innovation in them. I finding the Fleischer studio to be one of the under appreciated gems of early animation.