The Adventures of Paddy the Pelican

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♥ This article is dedicated to Sam Singer (August 27, 1912 - January 25, 2001).


The Adventures of Paddy the Pelican
Behold, the end result of making a cartoon with the budget of a torn carpet and an expired milk cartoon.
Genre: Animation
Running Time: 5 minutes
Country: United States
Release Date: September 11 - October 13, 1950
Network(s): ABC
Created by: Sam Singer
Starring: Sam Singer
Unknown actress (uncredited)
Seasons: 1
Episodes: 6
Previous show: Adventures of Pow Wow
Next show: Bucky and Pepito


The Adventures of Paddy the Pelican is a 1950s American animated television series created by the late Sam Singer, who also did all of the voices in the show, that aired on ABC of Chicago. It is considered one of the worst cartoons of all time by many, and this page pretty much explains why.

Plot

As you can expect from the title, it is about a pelican named Paddy going on numerous adventures.

Why It Does Not Go on Any Adventures

  1. The animation is terrible, reused and abundant, because it is actually a bunch of pencil tests that somehow got submitted as finished cartoons.
    • If the animation wasn't bad enough, In the low-quality copy to "Piggy Bank Robbery", the screen randomly becomes blurry and dark at times, even though it isn't supposed to be dark.
    • Not to mention, some scenes are not even animated at all, which is just lazy.
  2. Bad lip-syncing due to reused animation which looks like it was done by a 4-year-old.
  3. It tries to be like other classic cartoons like Mickey Mouse and Looney Tunes but fails terribly.
  4. The character designs, while not bad, look like generic Disney-styled rip-offs.
  5. Poor yet very cringeworthy attempts at humor that obviously fail.
  6. The plots are generic and have been done way better in other shows.
  7. Sam Singer's voice acting is awful and doesn't try to make any of the characters sound distinct from each other, plus the fact he did all of this without a script.
  8. Ear-grating theme song that sounds like the show is LAUGHING at you for being stupid enough to watch it.
  9. Poorly synced soundtrack that changes from a Hammond organ to squawking, and also drowns out the dialogue most of the time.
  10. Very poor sound editing, especially in the opening sequence where the narration in the background is hard to hear due to its low volume and playing over the "laughing like" theme song (see WIDNGOAA#8).
  11. No sound effects at all.
  12. In the episode “The Land of More”, Paddy does not appear at all, despite the title of the show. He also only appears at the end of “Pirate Pete”.

Redeeming Qualities

  1. The bad lip-syncing and lack of sound effects can both be unintentionally hilarious to some viewers and people depending on your POV with the voices are either seen as hilariously awful or atrocious.
  2. This was the second animated series made specifically for television, so it gets a pass because nobody knew how to translate animated shorts to fit television standards of the day. For all we know, Sam Singer was on incredibly strict deadlines and was forced to submit unfinished work that television stations deemed "good enough" because they had nothing else to air in that timeslot.
  3. Some of the character designs are decent, despite them looking like they were stolen from Disney.
    • Speaking of the animation, although it's mostly bad, it can also be decent or alright on very rare occasions like at the end of "Pirate Pete" where the only scene with Paddy in it is decent.
  4. A few of the voices of the characters sound pretty nice, Even if they are voiced by the same person (with one exception)
  5. While the music scores are mostly bad, There exists a couple of times in episodes such as "The Land of More" and "Pirate Pete" where the music can be alright or great to listen to
  6. The concept of a pelican going on adventures and helping others is a good concept that would had been executed well if the series reached it's full potential

Reception

The Adventures of Paddy the Pelican received overwhelmingly negative reviews the show has a 1.5/10 currently on IMDB making it one of the lowest rated TV shows on the site just behind Thomas & Friends: All Engines Go.

Trivia

  • The entire show is in the public domain, meaning it is free of copyright, because Sam Singer and company never bothered to renew the copyright, as would have been required for 1950s works. This means it can be used for any purpose, including redistributing and remixing and can be downloaded for free online.
  • Despite claims that it was aired in 1950, A "Billboard" newspaper from 1954 about TV Shows currently in production shows that the series started production on the first day of June of that year, with it copyrighted in 1954 as such. It is likely that the series did got to air as some newspapers after that one show the name of the show. Plus, it was mentioned that 65 episodes were to be produced, however, only 6 ended up being produced.

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