Popeye. In CGI. Honestly, why? Why, why, why? It’s terrible! Sure, they got a decent voice actor for Popeye who does the Popeyeisms pretty well, but for cryin’ out loud, CGI? Won’t somebody think of Max Fleischer?
You’re referring to Popeye’s Voyage: The Quest for Pappy, a CGI Christmas special. I saw it when it first aired on Fox a few years ago- I didn’t think it was that bad, and was true to the Popeye spirit.
I just saw a “Mickey Mouse Christmas” movie that was so unwatchable I gave up before the first punchline. 3-D with bouncy motion and correct, overobvious shadows, but no relationship to Mickey or Donald. They didn’t even try to match the voices, mannerisms or expressions.
I think my problem is with the “CGIzation” of classic cartoon characters. Cartoons are cartoons, but when you attempt to turn them into 3D characters it just reeks of cashing in on popular trends – except by now, they’re popular trends that were popular when Reboot! was still on the air. Now they’re just cheap and cheesy slapdash works made easier by relatively simplistic 3D modeling and inverse kinematics. It is perhaps in part because they approach closer to that disturbing Uncanny Valley that separates them too far from their traditional cel animation. It’s just too quasi-realistic to be authentic, but not realistic enough to pass for live action.
If it was traditional animation I’m sure I could have watched it without too many problems (although the voice actor they got for Olive Oyl was annoying)
I dunno, Minefield. Inspector Gadget does OK.
But the worst cartoon ever, must include Scrappy Doo. It cannot be otherwise.
Don’t pick and choose. ALL the Hannah Barbera cartoons were dreadful.
Thank you. I hate it when people act like Scrappy ruined Scooby Doo. It was already a horrible show even for its time. I find that some of the cartoons of my youth are still watchable but Scooby Doo is NOT one of them.
Well, the time is coming to where we are seeing the end of the ‘classic’ cartoon character. I’m nostalgic too, but an all CGI cartoon future is near.
Cathy, no doubt
I can’t see it. Traditional cartoons (whether hand-drawn on acetate or done via more modern – but still very cartoony – computerized cel animation) still have a very strong following and a definite place in the market. 3D CGI cartoons are a very different beast which take a very different approach to animation in that they are (ostensibly) more “realistic” (even if they’re still pretty cartoony in presentation) and are much more fluid in character movement – too fluid, actually, which is part of the problem. They look computerized – painfully so, sometimes. At least traditional cartoons are far enough removed from reality that we unconsciously dismiss inconsistencies in inaccuracies in the way characters move. 3D CGI cartoons, on the other hand, actually end up enhancing our notice of those things.
This is better-suited for Cafe Society. Offs ya’ go.
I vote for The Return of the King. It’s like a special kind of bad.
Where’s the hate for The Family Circus?
The Tom & Jerry cartoons during the Gene Deitch era. The weird sounds, speeds, animation.
“Dicky Moe!”
I, for one, am eagerly awaiting the Quest-for-Pappy-style CGI remake of Dickie Moe.
I may be the only person who has a perverse sort of love for Return of the King, borne out of the fact that I believe I watched it when I was about six, before I managed to finish the book itself.
All these candidates you name – even Scrappy-Doo, for the love of God – pale in comparison to the Highlander cartoon. Not only was it badly acted, drawn, and written, it took place in the world of the second (and bloody well nonexistent) movie.
(On a side note, I had a coworker once who insisted for far too long that Highlander 2 was a very fine movie, possibly even better than the first one. For months afterward, we would describe movies, games, TV shows, and anything else we can think of as 'Well, it’s no Highlander 2, but it’s pretty good!)
Don’t let Race Bannon hear you say that, you’ll wind up screaming “AAAAIIIEEE…!” in a vaguely asiatic manner while a giant boulder crushes your jeep as you drive over a rickety wooden bridge.
So don’t.
Well, if you’re willing to take a trip on the Wayback Machine, there’s Clutch Cargo, which was so creepily bad it was difficult to watch, even for kids. I would imagine, especially for kids.
I’ll go with this one.
Don’t forget the other “Syntha-Vox” cartoon, Space Angel. Also with those creepy lips.
There are plenty of “bad” cartoons that had really cheap animation, but redeemed themselves with their creativity or wit. XCrusader Rabbit was like this – an early effort by the team that made Rocky and Bullwinkle (and later continued by others), some of the “animation” would put Anime to shame – still pictures without even a portion of it moving, or very, very limited animation. But neat puns and situatyions. even Clutch Cargo and Space Angel were pretty fair adventure 'toons, once you got past the greepy mouths.
My choice for worst cartoon is one that had tremendous potential and blew it – the Japanese American movie Metamorphoses (aka Winds of Change, but not to be confused of others with that name). It was to be a modern “rock Fantasia”, with music by The Rolling Stones aqnd others, with animation by some of the animators who worked on the original Fantasia, and by ciomic-book artists like Mike Ploog, and top-notch Japanese cartoonists.
What emerged was awful, with second-rate, poorly-recorded music and frequently pointless and aimless animation. The plot was so incoherent that, although it was supposed to be without voice-overs, they brought in Peter Ustinov to narrate it. and the narration was awful.