For many of my generation, Hanna-Barbera animation is more associated with television than film (see TVSquad's post). After all, the studio produced some of the most famous TV cartoons from the '60s on, including The Jetsons, The Flintstones, Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!, The Yogi Bear Show, The Powerpuff Girls, and many, many more. Plus, the Cartoon Network would hardly be anything if not for the team-up of William Hanna and Joseph Barbera.But Hanna-Barbera had a lot to do with cinema, and not just for movie versions of their series, like The Flintstones and Scooby-Doo. In the beginning, before cartoons were a Saturday morning TV staple, they were a Saturday afternoon cinema staple, and animated shorts were shown on the big screen. Hanna and Barbera got their start making shorts for MGM, which led to multiple Oscars for their Tom and Jerry titles (none of which were actually won by the pair by name) plus an uncredited bit for Anchors Aweigh, before the studio closed its animation studio in 1957. It was then that the duo formed their own company and dove into television, but other features did come now and then, such as The Man Called Flintstone, Jetsons: The Movie and Charlotte's Web.
William Hanna died in 2001 and now Joseph Barbera has joined him in Hollywood Heaven. He died Monday of natural causes at the age of 95.
Check out Hanna and Barbera's Oscar-nominated debut, Puss Gets the Boot:
