A to Z of Animation Studios: H Is for Hanna-Barbera
The studio that brought cartoons to TV, one reused background at a time.
H is for Hanna-Barbera
Founded: 1957, by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera. The two had spent nearly 20 years at MGM making Tom and Jerry, which won seven Oscars. When MGM shut down its cartoon department, they started their own studio and aimed it at a new medium: television.
The approach: TV needed a lot of cartoons, fast and cheap. Hanna-Barbera figured out how to deliver.
Greatest hits
Huckleberry Hound and Yogi Bear (1958). Yogi stole picnic baskets and stole the show.
The Flintstones (1960). REAL: the first animated sitcom in prime time, modeled on the live-action comedy The Honeymooners. It aired at night for adults and families, not on Saturday morning.
Top Cat (1961). A smooth-talking alley cat always running a scheme.
The Jetsons (1962). The Flintstones of the future. It's well past the show's predictions, and we're still waiting on flying cars.
Jonny Quest (1964). Adventure with real action animation, a big leap for TV at the time.
Wacky Races (1968). Eleven cars, one cheater and his snickering dog.
Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! (1969). Four teens, one Great Dane, endless masks.
The Smurfs (1981). Hanna-Barbera's cartoon version of the Belgian comic became a Saturday-morning giant.
The Hanna-Barbera formula
Limited animation. Hanna-Barbera popularized a style where only a character's mouth or arm moved while the rest stayed still. It saved a huge amount of drawing time.
Looping backgrounds. Ever notice Scooby running past the same table, lamp and window over and over? That's a looping background.
A few great voices. Performers like Daws Butler and Don Messick voiced dozens of characters. REAL: Messick was Scooby-Doo; Butler was Yogi Bear.
The sound library. The studio's boings, zips and crashes became so famous that you can recognize a Hanna-Barbera cartoon with your eyes closed.
The struggle
The same shortcuts that made Hanna-Barbera successful made a lot of TV animation look cheap for decades, as other studios copied them. Fans of the old theatrical cartoons were not impressed.
Honorable mention: Harman-Ising
REAL: Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising created Bosko, the very first star of Warner Bros.' Looney Tunes in 1930, and helped launch Merrie Melodies. Before Bugs, before Daffy, there was Bosko.
The lesson
Hanna-Barbera proves that limits breed invention. They couldn't afford full animation, so they invented a whole system for TV. When you can't do everything, decide what matters most. For them, it was characters and voices.
Up next
I is for Illumination.
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