WE found TOP CAT to be greatly to our liking in our household. The incidental music was mostly the standard made-for-television stock stuff with usually some of the original theme music blended in. Their extra long and repetitive hallways, fences and tree lined cityscapes with multi identical trees, planks and other landmarks abound and flourished. The backgrounds were of the typical sorts that the Hanna-Barbera Productions' teams had made famous.
Operation topcat tv#
ANIMATION is of the limited type as all of the Made for TV stuff was and basically is. Officer Dibble always had Top Cat and the Gang under suspicion and they usually pulled through the crisis with flying colors the hard-boiled Dibble usually revealed a soft side as well as a deep down affection and admiration for the gang of alley cats. IN one Episode after another the action would revolve around the "boys" getting involved in some sort of mischief or deal which was not exactly kosher with the law. The resulting series, TOP CAT (Hanna-Barbera/Screen Gems/ABC TV, 1961-62), was born. The voice for Officer Dibble was done by the previously mentioned, Allen Jenkins. BILKO), Fancy-Fancy (John Stevenson) and Brain & Spook (Leo DeLyon). They were voiced by a fine gang of NY types with the title guy, Top Cat (Arnold Stang), Choo-Choo (Marvin Kaplan), Benny the Ball (Maurice Gosfield from SGT. The main characters were mostly of the Feline Persuasion except for the Beat Cop, Officer Dibble.
Operation topcat series#
THE folks at Hanna-Barbera Productions next hit on a second primetime project with the idea of a group of New York specific comedy series which would be highly reminiscent of the old Movies set in the Big Apple with a lot of characters which would definitely remind one of folks like Bogart, Cagney, John Garfireld, Frank McHugh, Marc Lawrence,Warren Hymer, "Slapsie" Maxie Rosenbloom, Ed Brophy, "Rags" Ragland,Jimmy Gleason and Allen Jenkins.
The ground was traveled and a new phenomenon was broken into the networks, the Primetime Family Animated Cartoon Series. The Stone Age HONEYMOONERS derivative was highly successful hitting all the right demographics as well as piling up some good ratings in the nights "Lead-Off Position. It was shown on Friday evenings, early but it was in primetime. HANNA-BARBERA made the jump back to the networks with ABC TV and THE FLINTSTONES (Hanna-Barbera/Screen Gems TV, 1960). It gave us not only "Queeks Draw" & Baba Louie, but added back up features of SUPER SNOOP & BLABBER MOUSE (Detective Parody) and single parent family of AUGIE DOGGIE & DOGGIE DADDY. About a year or so later western spoofing QUICK DRAW McGRAW Show (Hanna-Barbera/Screen Gems, 1959) bowed (also syndicated). RUFF & REDDY (Hanna Barbera/Screen Gems, 1957) on NBC's Saturday morning schedule was followed by the syndicated HUCKLEBERRY HOUND Show (Hanna-Barbara/Screen Gems, 1958) which introduced not only old HUCK, but also YOGI BEAR and PIXIE, DIXIE & MR. When the Animation Team of William Hanna and Joseph Barbera first enjoyed success on TV, it was with some anthropomorphic "funny animals" series. Best Episode: The Unscratchables Worst Episode: The Case of the Absent Anteater Top Cat and his friends have outrageous adventures, ducking and diving their way through the city streets, while trying to stay out of the way of the long suffering Officer Dibble. Funny when your a child, even funnier when you're an adult, Top Cat is a hugely entertaining show that I would recommend to anyone looking for a good animated series. For only thirty episodes and a very small cast Top Cat still remains a well remembered series, whether it be the lead characters patronising attitude towards his best friends, Officer Dibble, the gang trying to mind a baby, or the Untouchables parody, there isn't a single episode that dosen't have at least one classic moment. It's certainly not perfect, there a several weak episodes where the storyline just feels like they couldn't think of anything else to do, and for children it could get a bit tiring, it's certainly not as wacky as Scooby Doo or as zany as Tom and Jerry, a lot of the show takes place in the same locations and it's very dialogue based, but once the lines are well written it isn't a huge issue. It's an absolute classic, the humour still holds up today and there's enough in it for both kids and adults to enjoy, it's a typical Hanna Barbera series, with the same sort of comedic tone that features in the Flintstones, and I would say it's one of their finest, the characters are still remembered and very loved to this day, which shows the timelessness of it. Top Cat is a brilliant television series with very well written episodes and a fantastic voice cast.