Check it out! Long-lost test footage from Bob Clampett for a proposed series of John Carter of Mars shorts!
I had no idea such a thing ever could have existed. How awesome would that have been?
Screw the Mickey Mouse hacks at Pixar, I would pay hard-earned cash to see this. I love John Carter and I love Bob Clampett. It’s a crying shame the studio cheated us out of seeing their collaboration. The oil-painted scenes look like they would’ve been amazing.
Plenty more Barsoom art here.
I actually own all of those Gold Key and Marvel comics. Didn’t know Dark Horse did a series but I’m going to look for it now. Thanks.
While I disagree with calling the folks at Pixar hacks, I have to agree that Ted Clampett’s version no doubt would have been superior. The man was quite obviously an artistic genius, which is rare in any medium. It is too bad that he didn’t have the tools available to him that exist today, then he could have done it without a studio.
I tried to find one film on this list of Pixar features that I could use as an exception to find some common ground with you and I couldn’t do it. I can only conclude that - as far as my tastes and opinions go - they suck ass as a studio and don’t belong anywhere near John Cater.
In the interest of full disclosure, I loved Boundin’, but that was all of, what, 4 minutes?
Am I the only one who first read the thread title as Jed Clampett?
I’m still trying to figure out who Ted Clampett is.
I’ll admit that Pixar’s stuff isn’t high art, but it’s a damn site better than anything Michael Bay, Roland Emmerlich, and Uwe Boll put out. And J.C. of Mars is far from high art, either. Pixar’s got the skills to do a decent film, IMHO, but it’ll certainly not be the gobsmacking beauty that Mr. Clampett would have done.
If this ain’t a whoosh, then, IIRC, he’s the guy responsible for the art of the original Superman cartoons. Certainly the style and flow of his artwork matches that.
Only if Ted Clampett is spelled “Bob Clampett” and pronounced “Max Fleischer.”
Bob Clampett was a key figure in the history of Warner Bros. animation (how key is a matter of some debate) and also brought us Beany Boy and Cecil (a Bob Clam-pett car-too-oon!). Max Fleischer was responsible for a highly regarded series of Superman cartoons. Jed Clampett was a poor mountaineer who barely kept his family fed. Ted Clampett, I have no idea.
I’d like to travel back in time and garotte whoever spragged the production of those cartoons.
Too bad they never were produced. I grooved on ERBdom, and Carter in particular thru most of the early 70’s. And I became enamoured of Bob Clampett’s work via his masterful opus “Beanie and Cecil”.
I read and loved all the John Carter books when I was a young teen in the late 70’s. I never discovered “Beanie and Cecil” until a few years ago and they were great.
At first, I thought this was an April Fools’ joke based on the date of the post. But then I decided to look around the Internet and this attempted project is, in fact, well-documented enough that it’s safe to say it isn’t. It seems strange that the man who directed Porky in Wackyland and The Great Piggy Bank Robbery would be involved in a realistic animation before those cartoons were even made!
Alas, such a course of action could only lead to your own destruction. Allowing Bob Clampett to complete his John Carter of Mars animated serials would result in an overwhelming demand for similar animated films, provoking a distinct pulp fantasy aesthetic which sweeps away the stereotype of animation as a purely comic, childish medium. Disney’s lock on feature animation would be broken as the studios scramble to compete for this new market, and animated features become the default medium for sci-fi and horror. Massively profitable animated film franchises are built around the works of Burroughs, Wells and Verne, as well as numerous pulp magazine properties and the popular Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers newspaper strips. However, the costly and time-consuming animation process slows Hollywood production during the critical years of WWII; while the vividly realized pulp science vistas provide enthusiastic inspiration to an altogether unexpected audience: Adolf Hitler. Soon Nazi rocketmen are descending on Moscow and New York even as Hitler’s marine assault tripods boldly stride across the English Channel. Decades of global tyranny follow under the iron heel of National Socialism, as its science overlords extend their reach ever further in their quest to conquer the uttermost limits of space and time. Yet at the last moment, one man-- the last survivor of the American Resistance-- dares to commandeer a lunar rocket to New Berlin and wrest the secret of the Time Projector from its techno-dystopian masters… plunging back, BACK! through the ages, to defeat the interplanetary techno-dystopia by altering the very fabric of History itself! And that man’s name was… Ted Clampett.
See, I knew there was a simple and logical answer. Thank you Terrifel.
I read A Princess of Mars in about 1954? Something like that. The first science fiction I ever read, and it woke an enduring passion for scifi in me. Yes, I know it was not very “good” science fiction, but it was surely entertaining and an eye-opener to a 10 year old girl. Our pathetically inadequate school “library” consisted of a long shelf of ERB’s Tarzan and Mars and Venus books along with collections of “Chatterbox”, an English boys’ magazine. I read 'em all and when I’d done, I began them all over.
I used to think they’d make great movies. Not so sure, now.
Changed my mind - that little animated clip was lovely. I wish the movies had been made.
Better than Uwe Boll?
Are you competing for the Backhanded Compliment of the Year award?
Agreed about Bay and Boll. I don’t know who Roland Emmerlich is but I’ve left better stuff on toilet paper than the other two’s movies.
Agreed again, but when it comes to lowbrow entertainment I get to choose my poison :D.
And in all fairness, The Incredibles wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t what the explosive hype would lead you to believe it was. Finding Nemo was bad.
Roland Emmerlich. This is not so much a case of fighting ignorance as it is spreading the pain.