It’s the Spooky season again, and a day of running all over here to get all sorts of things done… so it’s a short day here, but a good excuse to haul out some spooky cartoons.

First, in Thunderbean disc news:

We’re working on getting a bonus ‘special disc’ out to everyone that ordered the Halloween set so there’s some things to show for this Halloween while we’re still working on replicating the ‘official’ set. So, if you ordered watch your mailbox soon…

Second, in Thunderbean broadcast news:

I can finally officially announce that Thunderbean has a deal with MeTV and MeTV Toons.. so look for some of the things we’ve released there sometime soon— along with a few surprises! We’re really excited to be working with them and can’t wait to see what shows first!

Now— onto a cartoon favorite: Flip the Frog in Spooks (1931)

Spooks is a favorite of many in the series – and certainly one of mine. The combination of Grim Natwick’s animation and direction and Iwerks’ continuous technical improvements make this film especially fun and well produced. The ability to truck in and out in a scene is a huge new improvement in 1931, expanding the technical abilities in animated film making through Hollywood and New York. Something else to note is how beautifully executed all the camera work is throughout the film, as well as multiple exposures and transitions – something that the Iwerks studio seems to take a lot of pride in.

This cartoons is full of fun scenes, from Flip being forced to dine on a skeleton turkey or chicken to taking the longest staircase ever up to bed. The skeleton designs are well-animated and detailed in their designs.

When we were working on the Blu-ray set of Flip, I was so happy to scan the original camera negative. The final version is made from that negative as well as MGM’s 1931 fine grain. The soundtrack’s original cue music survived because it was on the other side of the 35mm track negative, along with another Flip cartoon. This practice, probably done by Consolidated film service, accidentally preserved the cue music since the other track was end up.

Have a good week everyone!