Studio: Fleischer Studios
Distributor: Paramount Pictures
Produced by: Max Fleischer
Short Synopsis
Clark Kent and Lois Lane are at a circus midway, Lois complaining that she wanted a more exciting story. That night a monkey wanders off and opens the cage of Gigantic, a gorilla the size of a house, who breaks loose; the circus hands try to rope him and are thrown off, the elephants stampede, cages burst open, and lions, tigers and the whole menagerie are loose among the crowd under the big top. Lois, back at the Planet, hears the news and rushes to the scene, where she is cornered by Gigantic as the tent catches fire. Superman arrives, fights the lions, herds the stampeding animals, and takes on the gorilla hand to hand on the burning midway before dropping him back into his cage and carrying Lois out of the flames.
Why It Matters
- It is the series' one monster movie, a King Kong in miniature, and the fire under the big top, with the animals silhouetted against the flames, gives the Fleischer artists a set piece with more motion in it than any of the gangster plots. Gigantic is animated with real weight.
- Terror on the Midway was the last Superman cartoon the Fleischer studio made before Paramount removed Max and Dave Fleischer and renamed it Famous Studios; the next film, Japoteurs, went out under no studio name at all. It is the end of the Fleischer line, and it is in the public domain.
Notes and Trivia
- Jack Mercer, the voice of Popeye, is among the cast.
- The gorilla's name echoes the giant apes of the pulps and of Kong, then nine years old.
- See also: Electric Earthquake (1942), Japoteurs (1942), Popeye the Sailor (1933).
