Saturday, April 7, 2012

Misc. Cartoon weirdness - sci-fi/horror

Many of the Beatles' Saturday morning cartoons don't seem to have much overall sci-fi/horror themes in them. But most have at least one or two odd moments. Here is where we can post any of the miscellaneous things we see.

For instance in the Ticket to Ride cartoon, there is a moment where Ringo chases a girl through space and they end up on another planet where Ringo encounters his alien doppleganger. They both had the hobby of putting young women in cages.


However, that didn't seem to be the overall theme of the cartoon.

Paul's hobby was painting, and he was painting white on white canvas. A prelude to The White Album?

And in Elenor Rigby we see the old lady keeping a mask in a jar by the door, during the song when Paul sings that line.
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However, the theme in the cartoon is about scaring little children into believing that witches are really just lonely people.



In It Won't Be Long, a scientist creates a potion that can shrink anything. He pours the potion into the lake. Later John falls in the lake and gets shrunk - then resized. Then later the other three fall in and get shrunk.
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Maybe that's why Paul goes from 5'11" to 5'9" and back again over and over ;)

(also interesting: in Help!, Paul gets shrunk by potion in a syringe).
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And in Paperback Writer, there is a quick scene where George takes the other 3 into his lab to meet the robot he created. Which they end up accidentally destroying. 
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Paul imagines himself as a smart scientist, developing a cure for Yellow Fever.

What does the sign behind him say? Yep, it definitely says 'Beetle Killer'. But they don't show you the entire poster in one shot. Except when Paul walks across the room, then you can see it for about 4 frames.

The other three are prisoners numbered 98, 99 and 100. Paul's serum kills them.
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Another shot of John as a war hero.

Another underlying theme I seem to notice a lot, is that their fans are the bane of their existence and that they barely tolerate them.


And in the Nowhere Man cartoon, George gets a kick out of the hermit's sign.


There's two cartoons for HDN. The one I saw, they enter a creepy castle under a grave inhabited by monsters. The monsters chase them but eventually ask the Beatles to play music for them. While they're playing, they suddenly become green and go lifeless, while their instruments continue playing. And that was the end.

We also see these gravestones which read R.I.P. and MAC. This episode aired in 1965.


In the Please Mr. Postman cartoon, they need to send a telegraph to Brian, and the company they find is called...
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Other than that, and an underlying theme of being money-hungry and selfish, there wasn't much else to this one. In Good Day, Sunshine their music controls the weather. 

In I'm only sleeping it puts dragons to sleep. John also befriends Merlin the magician and King Arthur.
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In Run For Your Life, Ringo gets bonked on the head by a statue while at a museum in Versailles, and imagines that John is Marie Antoinette. They kiss several times.
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In Eight Days a Week, which aired Sept 10th, 1966, a girl grabs at Paul while he's driving, causing the steering wheel to come off and they drive off a pier.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrjLvEKrnnM


In Please Please Me, George & Ringo impersonate matadors while John & Paul impersonate a bull. John says they’ll pull the bull over our eyes.
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In Mr. Moonlight, they meet Professor Ludwig Van Brilliant, and convince a tribe on Moonie Island that their music controls lunar eclipses. The Tribe leader then gives them a submarine.
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In Long Tall Sally, John & Ringo put on cursed suits of armor and fight to the death. Until they accidentally set off the “Drums of Peace”.
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In I Feel Fine, they go to Hollywood and Paul of all people spends the entire episode showing them how everything there is fake and phoney.


In I Call Your Name, they all sleep in the same bed, with a giant crystal over their heads? George plays left-handed
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Greek Mythology in I Should’ve Known Better. Their music also destroys the Collesium in Rome.
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Again? Hmm...
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Eight Frankenstein scenes that I've seen.


And of course there's the one from the Yellow Submarine film where John is a Frankenstein and he has to drink a special potion to become human.
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