I'm a real fan of Disney's Big Bad Wolf comicbook stories. After Barks'stories, the ones starring him are my favorite in the Disney comicbooks made in the States.
Here's one great story, drawn by Gil Turner.

I was asked to post this story by a fan of my blog.

As can be shown here, "The Snerd Bird" was named Beaky right in 1942, in his first comicbook appearence (from FC 16, the first one devoted to Porky Pig and first time our porcine character starred in long adventures). In his second animated starring role, however, Beaky will still be called Killer.
Guess that they decided to use him again in cartoons because it was so much used in comics.
The story is hilarious just for the poses of Beaky and the fact that they used a giant version of Sniffles.

Three years ago I've obtained all the Popeye b/w entries in DVD-like quality. I never thought that one day I would have owned even better copies. Nevertheless, the day 30 of September will see the release of Popeye volume 3 (stay tooned for tons of screenshots from volume 2 to be posted here soon)and this means that all the sailor's black and white output will finally be on DVD, restored, with original opening etc.: in few words, the way his cartoons were originally released.
For you lovers of classic WW2 racial stereotypes here a few shots from the cartoons that will see DVD release in September (and in even better video quality!!). This should give you an idea about why these are so rare and how much a milestone this third volume will be for us animation collectors.

Thanks to Larry and Thad I've been introduced to the marvellous stories made for Harvey comics by such artists as animator Marty Taras.

Here's one good example, a story drawn by Taras starring Rags Rabbit. Look at the life in these drawings!!!!

Time for Elmer and Bugs' antics....in the funnies!

The remaining pages! Enjoy!

Here you have the final strips.

Will we ever have "Song of the South" on an official Disney DVD release?
While we are waiting......

It is now no mistery that one of my favorite cartoon character is Famous' Wolfie, expecially for the marvellous Berth Lahr's "Cowardly Lion"-like characterization provided by Sid Raymond.
Here we have "our hero" in a comic story drawn by none other than Walt Kelly. David "God's gift to animation and comics fans" Gerstein provided these beautiful scans and here I am, sharing them with you.
Note how Wolfie resembles Goofy, expecially Barks' version of it.

I promise there will be no more comics-related posts for a while (tee-hee) but, considering I've highlighted yesterday the work of Famous animator Taras, today I want to share a real funny Herman and Katnip story drawn by another talented Famous artist, Dave Tendlar. Look at the poses of the "supporting mice"!

(Thanks to Larry T for the identification)

Enjoy an hilarious Baby Huey story!

Second part of the Mickey Mouse continuity. Hope you are liking it. Is it difficult to wait till tomorrow? Try to imagine that in the 50s they had only one strip per day and they had to wait something like 2-3 months to know the end of each continuity.

Enjoy this Jim Davis classic Fox and Crow comic story from Real Screen Comics 45!

Are you at least aware of the existence of this extraordinary character?
Fethry is really famous in Italy. He starred in a number of delightful stories, the best ones drawn by Giorgio Cavazzano, in which he was paired with Donald, his cousin, creating a team a là Laurel and Hardy (in one story they were even ghostbusters!).
The best stories with the character are the early ones, drawn my talented Al Hubbard and written by Dick Kinney
When you have a great writer and a marvellous artist, you can't fail (just think at the Walsh-Gottfreson team).
This is probably my favorite story by Kinney/Hubbard, one of the funniest ever made with Fethry. Enjoy.

The following shots are from a scene missing in many prints of this Famous short.

According to Alberto Becattini and his marvellous articles about the man, Thompson is the correct name. I've found it spelled "Thomson" many times.
This shows how little this artist is considered and how unsung is his work.
Thompson not only directed some of the finest Disney shorts, but he was also a prolific comicbook artist.
To my knowledge he never wrote his stories, so he was one of them artists, like Paul Murry, that can only be remembered for their drawings, unlike masters like Barks or Scarpa. However he should be considered more than he is as now, because his drawings and his talent were great.
Enjoy this short story featuring Grandma Duck, Gus Goose...and the Cinderella Mice Gus&Jaq!
The pages are full of energy and life, and look at Grandma's wacky expressions! It remind me Woody in the Dick Lundy's cartoons.
Let me know if you like Thompson's work in the comments and maybe I'll post more of his stuff!

Yep, this time Oswald was pretty unlucky, folks.
Back in the Thirties (from the style of Oswald, that reminds me of his look in such shorts as "Happy Scouts", I guess we are around 1938) Walter Lantz tried to sell an Oswald daily strip series to syndicates, with no success.
It looks as one week (6 strips) was actually made but remained unpublished.
Someone tried even to sell those dailies on Ebay (as now, one strip is still auctioned at a "reasonable price" and I don't know if the other ones were sold or not).
David Gerstein was enough nice to send me images of all of them and here we are sharing them with you.

I bet only a few of you have seen this sequence complete.

I'd like to know if anyone knows more about this story, the second one featured in FC 169.
I've heard by somebody that John Stanley worked on it, while my friend Becattini says that all the stories in the issue are the work of Dick Hall.

This sequence from "'Sno Fun", an Heckle and Jeckle cartoon, includes everything that makes Tyer so great!
Similar sequences are also in "A Cat Tale" and "The Reformed Wolf".

This is the last frame in all copies I've seen since yesterday of "A Lamb in a Jam", a good Blackie and Wolfie Noveltoon and the characters' second short.
I discovered that there's more: an additional ending gag.
It is pretty nice to find this "meta-gag", considering that a gag of this kind is also present in the character's debut, "No Mutton fer Nuttin'". Enjoy!

In Italy we venerate Disney comics stories, expecially the daily strips of Mickey Mouse (on the other hand, very little attention is devoted to animation).
Virtually every continuity starring Mickey between 1930-1955 has been reprinted at least seven times, so I was quite surprised to discover that many of these classics were never reprinted since their original release in the newspapers.

Here you have one of Mickey's funniest adventures ever, "Mickey Mouse and Dry Gulch Goofy" by Bill Walsh and Floyd Gottfredson (78 daily strips published on US newspapers between 26/3/1951 and 23/6/1951), that has NEVER BEEN REPRINTED SINCE THE ORIGINAL RELEASE IN THE STATES.
Pay attention to sexy girls, Gottfredson's trademark of the 50s.

(Thanks to Thad K for making all this possible)

Oswald's daily strip series was not made, but the rabbit starred in hudnreds of comicbook stories. Among them one of my favorite is the following one in which Ozzie is paired with his adopted son Floyd and Lloyd.

I've always loved Famous Studios' Little Lulu cartoons.
That's why I was extremely happy to obtain from GACers Leviathan and The G Man great transfers of some of her greatest appearences.
Here I am, sharing with you a few shots from "Lulu gets the Birdie". I love the blue...er "now cross dat out 'n' make it" black crow character.

Thanks to the one and only David Gerstein I'm able to show this marvelous stuff on this blog.
Among the many things you'll enjoy a production drawing from the Silly Simphony "Bugs in Love" (for which, by the way, David provided a commentary in the "More Silly Simphonies" Treasures set) and storyboards for "When the Cat's Away" (an early Mickey entry where he and Minnie have the size of real life mice!)

What happened to that "p"???

Gonna be incredibly busy for the next ten days, and it's easier to post already made scans of comics than make tons of screenshots, select the best ones and then post them.
So here's again another comicbok story, hope the loyal fans of this blog will not be disappointed if classic cartoons are being neglected at this time.
I will soon return to highlight rarely seen animated shorts in the following weeks.
And I hope Hammerson will be able to do cartoons-related posts in these days.....

Meanwhile enjoy this terrific Riley Thomson (David Gerstein seems to have more believable proofs about his surname than Becattini).
This is one of the funniest Donald Duck stories EVER, so why it has NEVER been reprinted in the States? It's incredibly hilarious, and Donald's poses are extremely wacky and really remind me of Woody in "The Mad Hatter" and other early Lundy shorts with the character.

I've watched many Terrytoons of the 50s during the last days. These are the years in which Tyer was given long footage to animate in almost every short Terry produced.
The commentator in "When Mousehood was in Flower" stands out among Tyer's best works.
Enjoy.