A Cycling Bear is Not Rare

Hanna-Barbera cartoons have a reputation of featuring characters being immobile except for eye blinks or the same few mouth movements. But there were times, even in the early days, where complete drawings were made; the animation wasn’t just part of an arm moving while the rest of the body was on a held cel used frame after frame after frame.

The studio found ways to save money on artwork. It resorted to cycles. There are plenty of them in Polar Bear Scare, a Ruff and Reddy segment that first aired on NBC January 17, 1959.

This is a polar bear run cycle. There are six drawings, each shot on two frames.



Uh, oh. The polar bear (played by Daws Butler) slips on the ice. There’s a four-drawing cycle (on twos) as he fruitlessly tries to slow down.



Reddy slips, too. His cycle is in three drawings. Director Bill Hanna finds a way to save the animator some work by simply flipping the drawings and having the same cycle inked and painted in a mirror image.



The other cartoons that originally aired with this one were Never Land on Never Never Land and A Liking for a Striking Viking. The titles are typical Charlie Shows rhymes. The series was into season two and sponsored by Mars, Inc. and Borden Co.

It’s unfortunate there are no screen credits on these cartoons, but the animation in this one is by Lew Marshall. I couldn’t tell you about layouts or backgrounds. (The last two episodes of the adventure are unmistakedly animated by Carlo Vinci).

The music behind the chase scenes above is TC-221 HEAVY AGITATO by Bill Loose and John Seely. It's followed by TC-203 WISTFUL COMEDY (Loose-Seely), then Jack Shaindlin's LAF-2-12 ON THE RUN in the next chase sequence, with the final cue that Yogi Bear favourite TC-303 ZANY COMEDY. The cartoon starts with ZR-91C WEIRD-EERIE by Geordie Hormel.

I don’t know more than what you may have heard and read from Warners’ George Feltenstein on-line about restoring this series. It’s on his wish list. Don’t expect it any time soon, though.