I Yam What I Yam And That's All What I Yam- Popeye The Sailor Appreciation
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I figured since there are appreciation threads for DC and MARVEL characters, I figured it's time to give American comic(strips)'s first action (super) hero his own appreciation thread especially since the character celebrated his 90th Anniversary several months ago. So open your cans (or packs) of Spinach and let's celebrate the one eyed he-man, Popeye The Sailor Man.
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[B]A refresher for newcomers:[/B]
Created by E.C. Segar, the one eyed Sailor made his first appearance in Thimble Theatre comic strip, which began on on December 19, 1919 first appearing in the New York Journal and syndicated by King Features Syndicate. The main characters of the strip were originally Olive Oyl and her then fiancee Harold Hamgravy, who was often attracted to other women who were considerably wealthy and depicted as a slacker who preferred getting rich quick rather than earning money honestly. The strip later introduced other characters including the rest of the Oyl family which consisted of Olive's older brother Castor Oyl, who was always coming up with get rich quick schemes and would eventually become the strip's protagonist for a couple of years and their parents Cole and Nana Oyl. While starting as a gag strip like most comic strips at the time, the strip would later start using story lines (it is considered by many to be the first strip to use this formula) that usually involved Castor coming up with get rich quick schemes, which involved going on adventures, dragging Hamgravy along with him with Olive herself tagging along despite the objections of both her brother and her boyfriend, it was during one of these adventures where the one eyed sailor made his debut on the January 17, 1929 strip where he was initially created as a minor character for a story line.
Initially hired by Castor Oyl and Ham to crew a ship for a voyage to Dice Island, the location of a casino owned by the crooked gambler Fadewell. Castor intended to break the bank at the casino using the unbeatable good luck conferred by stroking the hairs/feathers on the head of Bernice the Whiffle Hen. Weeks later, on the trip back, Popeye was shot many times by Jack Snork, a stooge of Fadewell's, but survived by rubbing Bernice's head. After the adventure, Popeye left the strip but, due to reader reaction, he was quickly brought back. Popeye proved so popular with readers that he was made a permanent member of the main cast. As time passed, Popeye would later get top billing in Thimble Theatre and the strip was taken up by many more newspapers as a result. Initial strips presented Olive as being less than impressed with Popeye, but she eventually left Hamgravy to become Popeye's girlfriend and Hamgravy left the strip as a regular, Castor Oyl continued to come up with get-rich-quick schemes and enlisted Popeye in his misadventures. Eventually, he settled down as a detective and later on bought a ranch out West. Castor has seldom appeared in recent years.
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Over the years, new characters would be introduced like Popeye's arch nemesis for Olive's affection, Bluto, Swee'Pea Popeye's adoptive child he found in the mail. Other regular characters in the strip included J. Wellington Wimpy, a hamburger-loving moocher, Eugene the Jeep, a yellow, vaguely dog-like animal from Africa with magical powers, Poopdeck Pappy, Popeye's father who's a spitting image of his son minus the moral compass, the strip's main antagonist the Sea Hag, a powerful witch who tries to destroy Popeye and Alice The Goon, a monstrous creature who debuted in the strip as the Sea Hag's henchwoman but would eventually become an ally and friend of Popeye and co. and would become Swee'Pea's babysitter. Popeye proved to be extremely popular worldwide as well, for example after Mussolini came to power in Italy and banned all American comic strips, but Popeye was so popular the Italians made him bring it back. Popeye was of course a star of several adaptations, most prominently the animated shorts produced by Paramount, first animated by Fleischer Studios and later Famous Studios, his popularity grew during the Great Depression and would eventually eclipse Mickey Mouse in popularity for a while.
Eventually the strip's name would change to Popeye in the 1970s and remains one of the longest running strips in syndication today.
[video=youtube;wBLii1eQeas]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBLii1eQeas[/video]
