Betty Boop celebrates her 92nd birthday

Betty Boop, one of the most popular cartoon characters, debuted on the small screen on this day, August 9, 1930, in "Dizzy Dishes". It was created by Max Fleischer, the creator of cartoon characters such as Popeye, Super, and others...

Betty Boop was, first of all, popular in the thirties of the last century, and as it is said, she was created after the image of the singer Helen Kane. In May 1932, Kane filed suit against Max Fleischer and the Paramount Publish Corporation for what it said was a "deliberate caricature" that created "unfair competition" and exploited her personality and image.

The case moved to New York in 1934, and on April 19, Fleischer testified that Betty Boop was a pure figment of the imagination. Ultimately, the court dismissed the lawsuit. By the way, Betty Boop was originally designed to be a poodle, but she was given human form anyway.

Betty Boop's popularity grew over the decades, and she even became a sex symbol during the period of the so-called "Great Depression", which reigned from 1928 to 1939. Other female cartoon characters of the same period, such as Minnie Mouse, regularly featured underwear or flowers, in the style of childlike characters, but were not a fully defined female form.

Betty Boop wore short dresses, high heels, garters, and her breasts were emphasized in the cleavage. In cartoons, male characters often couldn't take their eyes off her.

The last Betty Boop cartoons were published in 1939, and a few tried to usher Betty into the swing era (a style of jazz popular in the 1930s and 1930s). In her final appearance, in the 1939 cartoon "Rhythm on the Reservation," Betty drives an open convertible, labeled "Betty Boop's Swing Band," through a Native American reservation, where she introduces people to swing music and forms the "Swinging Sioux Band." The Betty Boop cartoon series officially ended with "Yip Yip Yippy" from 1939.

Betty Boop appeared decades later in two television specials, 1985's The Romance of Betty Boop, produced by Lee Mendelsohn and Bill Melendez, the same creative team behind 1989's The Betty Boop Movie Mystery. Also, Betty, like many cartoon heroes, ended up in a comic that was printed from 1934 to 1988.

On February 11, 2016, Deadline reported that a new 26-episode television series focusing on Betty Boop was in production. As stated at the time, the series was supposed to be aimed at a teenage audience.

Post by: Rinna James